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The question of what served as the root of the Counterculture movement can be looked at as a game of Jenga. We have all played that game where you pull out a foundational piece to see if the whole structure still stands. The Counterculture was prolonged by the Vietnam War but not dependent upon it. The Cuban Revolution in 1959 woke us up a little to the idea that people could be liberated. It was happening in Africa, too. And then there was Vietnam. Liberation was a "thing". The movement would have taken shape even without the war and the draft but would not have been as intense in the protest efforts. (There was an anti nuclear bomb movement already in place that might have grown.) If Leary and Alpert had never pushed LSD the psychedelic aspect of the movement would have been muted but there was already fertile ground for increased creativity and mental/psychic awareness. Ginsberg and Kerouac and Zen and alternative music were on the table already. Then came the folk music craze and the civil rights movement and inspired liberation activism. That propelled the sexual freedoms and the downfall of many strict rules of behavior, especially for women. The "pill" was an important and timely factor. JFK's inspirational (perhaps contrived) message was important. The idea of the Peace Corps and public service was a hyper-American thing that was part of the movement. The coming of age in a make-believe world of 'Leave it to Beaver' prompted the creation of a different make-believe response.
Without the antiwar movement the Counterculture would not stand out as much in our national history and might not not have sparked other movements and some social reforms that we have today but it would have existed under its own steam. Those who did not grow up in the Baby Boom do not (cannot) imagine the landscape of wall-to-wall kids in the urban environments. My Boy Scout troop had 150 kids and we went to summer camp with 100 kids from just our troop -- along with other kids from other troops, like a plague of locusts. We knew them all by name (or soon would) and were in school together. We had 40 kids in a classroom and one teacher. We had Music or Art classes in different rooms just so the teacher could take a leak and a 40-minute breather. We had kids with deformed limbs from polio and it was accepted as just the way things were. We all dutifully lined up for our vaccine shot and for our TB tests. There was the occasional A-bomb drill but not every week. Churches were full and Christmas pageants had 12-15 shepherds and as many angels milling around aimlessly. Conformity and regimentation were the golden rules and the reaction to that was a brief spate of nonconformity in the mid-60s followed by a new expectation of counter-conformity. Conformity was what we knew best in white America. The rebellion against conformity became the new conformity. The draft and forced military service were an easy target and the war made no sense to anyone who actually gave it any thought. The notion of liberation (on many levels) was part of that reaction.
And then there is the counter counter-culture reaction that we still have today that has become part of the genetic makeup of conservatism and that fuels a good deal of the political and social debate.
If you were a teenager or a person in their early 20's during the 60's it was an easy choice to make. We had grown up in an authoritarian society with strict dress codes and codes of behavior and obedience to our elders, teachers, priests, bosses. The hippie revolution offered great music, colorful clothes and styles that didn't cost much (bell bottom striped jeans and a $20 surplus navy pea coat or army field jacket and some boots and you were groovy), weird light shows, free love and shared psychedelic drugs. It was invigorating and exciting and entertaining for a kid brought up in the 50's. Biggest plus was probably pot. Once you experienced being high on pot, your whole world view got just a bit larger. Biggest negative was the dream ended by 1969. Peace, love, understanding and sharing of the 1960's gave way to the reality of crime and greed and poverty. The death knell was Altamount. Most people realized there was more to life than the 60's dream, got jobs, got married, raised families, retired. Some great memories though and many of us retained the mind set we learned in the 60's.
The only time I voted Republican in my life was for Nixon in 1972 because he promised to end the war in Vietnam. I think Nixon's greatest moment was allowing the draft act to expire. Once the draft ended, the anti war movement collapsed like a punctured balloon. It was a win-win for the whole country. We elected Jimmy Carter, with great hope and the best intentions and saw him get trampled and hog tied and vilified. Reagan broke the unions and pursued Nixon's drug wars while the CIA trafficked in cocaine to finance their black bag overseas adventures. Clinton balanced the budget but was persecuted for having an extra marital affair in the White House. The Bush father and son presidents started wars in the mid east that are still going on. Moderator cut: Too close to current events. We saw and continue to see through the inequities, hypocrisy and greed of the establishment, but we learned we were actually powerless to change it, so we found our own niches in life that allowed us to experience the American dream and be true to our conscience as well.
Last edited by mensaguy; 09-28-2020 at 02:24 PM..
Reason: Current and immediate past presidents are off topic.
Biggest negative was the dream ended by 1969. Peace, love, understanding and sharing of the 1960's gave way to the reality of crime and greed and poverty. The death knell was Altamount.
I lived through the era and I would not mark 1969 as the end, it continued into the early '70's and left footprints through the rest of the decade. Look at films and television shows made from around '74 through '79, with particular attention paid to the older actors. What you will see is longish hair and sideburns and mustaches being sported by the likes of William Holden, William Conrad or Dean Martin, all actors who were not youngsters in the '60's. Even my father, born in 1919, let his hair grow out some during the '70's. M*A*S*H didn't go on the air until 1972, yet you may note for the entire run of the series, the actors sported inappropriately long hair, something you would have never seen in the actual Korean War. It was obviously more important to the actors or producers, to have the characters seem to be in sympathy with the counter culture than it was to depict realism.
I think a better marker for the end of the era was the death of the SLA members in the LA shootout in 1974. They were the last of the people who got caught up in the idea that it wasn't just a cultural revolution, but an actual overthrow of the existing government as the goal. They were an inept, dogma spewing group, and their fiery end closed forever the idea that the nation was about to change beyond recognition.
What's interesting to me & a few people have alluded to it above, is the difference that 2-3 years made in one's experience/attitude about the 60's counterculture. While there seemed to be a brief "jazz age" counter-culture very early on (20s-30s?) as far as music & fashion but it wasn't until the late 40s-50's that first older beatniks & then "teenagers" existed, teens were never really considered a separate (sub)culture until then. Suddenly music, fashion & "teen culture" was a thing separate from being a part of their families' identity in the 50s.
But when the 60's began the boomer teen culture merged the beat counterculture's social awareness consciousness into a socially rebellious counterculture & depending if one turned 14-17yo in 1960 or 1962 or 1965 or 1968 or 1971 the counterculture attitude was somewhat different for that individual. I always consider 1972 as the end point of "the 60's" counterculture, & I've seen others refer to it also, since things started changing rather than evolving. The war ended in '73 & that left a vacuum in momentum. I think young people affected by the hippie counterculture by that point found their interests - personal & societal, & followed those rather than being identified by any single movement.
Edit to add: in reference to the post above.. by 1973-74 my friends & I remarked to each other "Even the rednecks have long hair now." What was once a tribal identity became a mere fashion, a good friend got a buzz cut that year & I followed a year later.
I lived through the era and I would not mark 1969 as the end, it continued into the early '70's and left footprints through the rest of the decade. Look at films and television shows made from around '74 through '79, with particular attention paid to the older actors. What you will see is longish hair and sideburns and mustaches being sported by the likes of William Holden, William Conrad or Dean Martin, all actors who were not youngsters in the '60's. Even my father, born in 1919, let his hair grow out some during the '70's. M*A*S*H didn't go on the air until 1972, yet you may note for the entire run of the series, the actors sported inappropriately long hair, something you would have never seen in the actual Korean War. It was obviously more important to the actors or producers, to have the characters seem to be in sympathy with the counter culture than it was to depict realism.
I think a better marker for the end of the era was the death of the SLA members in the LA shootout in 1974. They were the last of the people who got caught up in the idea that it wasn't just a cultural revolution, but an actual overthrow of the existing government as the goal. They were an inept, dogma spewing group, and their fiery end closed forever the idea that the nation was about to change beyond recognition.
Hair styles and sideburns didn't mean anything. Just look at hair styles in the 1800's. What changed, if you were into it was everything. I recall travelling from LA to SF in the mid 60's. You could meet someone on the bus who would invite you to stay for free at a crash pad in SF. People slept on the floor, shared their drugs, wine, food, and bodies with strangers. By early 1970's the music changed from psychedelic music to soft rock. Hippie communes were no longer what people were interested in joining. People enjoyed partying, doing drugs after work and on weekends. People wanted a job, an apartment, a car, and the money to buy stylish clothes and have fun with. The Symbionese liberation front and the weather underground were anomalies. You are talking about a handful of people, totally unrepresentative of the widespread culture. Just like Tim McVeigh or Waco. These groups were basically cults. They had no effect on history any more than the assassination of McKinley did.
I still don't quite understand why some people think it was an easy time to be striking out on one's own with a cornucopia of good things awaiting. Like any other time it was what what one made of it.
One event in the late 60s emerged from the chaos to give people hope and that was the moon landing. Anything seemed possible after Man had landed successfully on the moon.
Counter culture is an ongoing movement noted throughout history of young people turning against the restraints and rigidity of adult authority figures. It permeates through every generation. Curiously once the youthful anti establishment crowd grows old they turn conservative and their children become the new counter culture perpetuating a never ending circle.
Sigh. No, we don't all become conservatives. I think that's obvious.
But it is surprising how the hippies became so materialistic and obsessed with parenting....
(our parents mostly ignored us and we loved it)
It in fact became a standard cliche to gripe about anything unaccomplished by saying "If they can put a man on the moon, then they can certainly...."
True, dat.
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