How to be a Hippie today

Back in the days when ideas of ‘peace and love’ defied the social norm and challenged the conventional ways of thinking;

back when bellbottom jeans were in and tie-dye was outrageous;

when John Lennon rivaled Jesus in popularity;

a new term was twisted into existence. Sprung from the ashes of the beatnik 50s, fed by rock and roll, nurtured by the sexual revolution, and destined to signify counterculture at its finest, the term ‘hippie’ was born.

In the 60s and 70s, a hippie was someone who opposed the war in Vietnam, who dressed expressively, experimented with hallucinogens, lived for music, died for peace, who maintained that sort of fixation with everything radical.

Some say that the Hippie died with the onslaught of Big-Hair Bands and the premiere of Flashdance (essentially, the 80s). But others believe that the hippie was just cocooning itself, undergoing a butterfly-esque metamorphous so that, come the new millennium, the term hippie would rise again. And rise it has. Even today, in a world of iPhones and bad Reality TV, ‘hippies’ can be found roaming the streets or changing the world.

A contemporary hippie will sustain the initial hippie beliefs, largely ideas of peace, love, freedom, and personal expression, but with a modern-day, 21st century twist. Neo-hippies are no longer defined as “defying the social norm”, like in the dictionaries, because a lot of what makes a 2007 is not rejected but embraced by today’s culture.

A belief in peace, as stereotypical of a hippie mannerism as it may be, is an imperative feature of hippie life that survived the metamorphic change from the 60s to the present.

The only difference is that today, fighting for peace is not so much a rejection of the social standard. Many people, hippies and otherwise, believe strongly that peace is the answer.

A modern day hippie, however, will most likely vote Barrack Obama for President, based on his beliefs that fighting terrorism with intelligence and not bombs is the way to go.

Hippies of today would also participate in events such as Live 8, a string of concerts timed with the G8 Summit in 2005, to help end poverty and raise money for Africa. The hippies in 2007 will be seen with “Make Love Not War” bumper stickers or Anti-Bush screen savers. Always opposing the man, always working for the greater good of humankind. That is the true hippie way, no matter which decade.

The majority of non-hippies in the 60s and 70s were horrible prudes. The sexual revolution was a huge part of hippie culture, illustrating the openness toward sex and all things lewd that was the natural manner of any hippie. Hippies were not at all obscene or vulgar; they simply took a different angle on love and convergence. It was thought to be beautiful and profound, not something to be ignored or disgusted with. The revolution did eventually catch on, and by 2000 one could not even turn on their television without being exposed to some form of bawdy inappropriate material.

The hippie of today is no longer the revolutionist in this category, but the old-fashioned conservative. The ideas of the hippie about sex and love are the same, but the perception by the rest of the world on these thoughts has changed drastically. A contemporary hippie would never pull a Britney and get married and divorced before the tabloids could even be printed. Nor would a modern-day hippie expose his or herself on a reality TV show. The hippies of today reject anything that contaminates the purity in love and the beauty in union, especially the exploitation and misuse seen today.

Freedom also remains a huge part of hippie life, though it has gone through a modernization as well. The difference from the 60s and 70s to today is in the controversial issues at hand, not the ideas of liberty behind them. It is 2007. Every civil fight has been fought and every civil right has been wrought by now. Hippies of today do tend to veer left-wing when it comes to political issues of freedom and justice. The contemporary hippie will be pro-choice, and all for gay and lesbian rights. Religion was replaced by rock ‘n’ roll a long time ago, in the mind of a 2007 hippie. Free speech and all of those issues will always be hippie-esque, but even more so in today’s media-ridden world, a hippie will fight for freedom from media corruption. It is all about not letting the corporations, the suits, the Man himself, get to you. It’s about not selling out, not owning up, not giving in to what the “rest of the world” defines as normal. Freedom from conventionalism takes the stand nowadays; freedom from mediocrity, tradition, and most of all, boredom.

Personal expression is a vital piece of every hippie’s mind-set. In the 60s and 70s it was done through newfangled ideas of art and music and color and fashion. Regrettably for our millennium, the Cultural Revolution is over. Counterculture fought the good fight and came out on top. What was counterculture then is now just plain old culture. Hippies of today express themselves personally the same ways, through art or music or the written word, but none of these methods of personal expression are judged or shunned upon as they once were. In fact, they are encouraged and enhanced by large portions of our country. Once again, hippies are no longer defying the social norm, but living by it. That does mean, in any way, shape, or form, that they are ordinary.

Personal expression, to a modern-day hippie, is all about reaching out to a new level of depth. Listening to the Beatles and feeling emotions instead of hearing melodies; using the words of Paul Simon to convey thoughts and ideas rather than lyrics; touching everyone and everything possible with simply a sound.

Music to a 2007 hippie is not just having a love for the tunes of the 60s and 70s, but loving and appreciating all music for what it truly is: a reflection of feelings.

The age of the neo-hippie has arrived. They are not simply cutouts of the 60s pasted into a new millennium, but different people with different lives. The impact of the 60s and 70s still holds strong in many branches of hippie life, especially through the principles of peace, love, freedom, and personal expression. The term ‘hippie’ did not die with the end of 70s. It has always been around, just waiting to be applied to a new era.

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