San Francisco was originally a port known for sailors stopping to do drugs, drink, and use prostitutes. In 1921, attempts were made to make the city more inviting and less of a pleasure-filling city (Hoshyns 11). Later, in the 1950s, counterculture called the Beats formed. They paved the way for the hippies by smoking weed and listening to jazz music (Sixties). The hippies took the Beats’ ideas and changed them to fit different standards. Haight-Ashbury was the beginning of the hippie movement and it changed the county with its music, community, and loving atmosphere. Haight-Ashbury is an area spanning out of Haight Street to the Golden Gate Bridge. With over fifteen-thousand hippies, one-thousand-two-hundred of them were teens that had run …show more content…
Ken and his friends took part in an experiment, taking drugs that caused hallucinations. When testing the new psychometric drugs, Kesey discovered the most popular drug used in the area, LSD. LSDs are lysergic acid diathylamide drugs, commonly referred to as acid. Later they experimented with the drugs on their own and more and more people joined in (Sixties). This drug was the most powerful for creating a temporary alternate reality. Kesey, who attended Stanford on a creative writing scholarship, not only housed those looking for free drugs, but also aspiring authors and musicians. Kesey thought the use of drugs helped artists of all kinds, since it appeared to help him write his book One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest (Hoshyns 31-33). Later, Kesey planned a music festival called “Trips Festival”, where over twenty thousand people dressed in costumes attended to join in the carefree lifestyle the hippies had. This caused Haight-Ashbury to become known for the hippies that lived there and the drug-filled atmosphere. A group called the Merry Pranksters formed in Kesey's house and they would go around organizing concerts and drawing in crowds to take the hallucinogenics (Sixties). The Merry Pranksters also bought a bus and painted it with patterns to create spiritual significance. This bus was the first example of the vans associated with hippies in modern times. They …show more content…
They associated the law with the anti Christ or a beast, since the numbers 666 stand out in the date. Exactly a year after the outlawing of LSDs, Haight had a parade called "The Death of Hippie." Many of the leaders in the hippie movement left Haight, and the parade was one last event. It ended in the burning of psychedelic sign and daisies being dropped on the Pentagon. Haight-Ashbury was a world class tourist attraction. The area was more well known than most other major cities in California. Tours of the area were given daily and very popular. At first, the hippies didn't mind the tourists, but as time went on, they wanted to stay out of the public’s eye (Anthony 118, 167, 27). In 1967, the loving atmosphere of Haight was interrupted when people came just to take drugs and were not interested in hippie lifestyle. Possibly even more discouraging to the residents, the neighborhood became a place people would pass through to see instead of a destination (Sixties). The hippies were different from other drug users. Although they used drugs to escape problems, they also used them to create the feeling they wanted society to be like, violence and sexist free in a world of peace and harmony. Just a year after Hashbury's height, the area was filled with drug abusers who did not care about love and camaraderie as the hippies, who now lived their separate
In 1967 the Beatles were in Abbey Road Studios putting the finishing touches on their album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. At one point Paul McCartney wandered down the corridor and heard what was then a new young band called Pink Floyd working on their hypnotic debut, The Piper at the Gates of Dawn. He listened for a moment, then came rushing back. "Hey guys," he reputedly said, "There's a new band in there and they're gonna steal our thunder." With their mix of blues, music hall influences, Lewis Carroll references, and dissonant experimentation, Pink Floyd was one of the key bands of the 1960s psychedelic revolution, a pop culture movement that emerged with American and British rock, before sweeping through film, literature, and the visual arts. The music was largely inspired by hallucinogens, or so-called "mind-expanding" drugs such as marijuana and LSD (lysergic acid diethylamide; "acid"), and attempted to recreate drug-induced states through the use of overdriven guitar, amplified feedback, and droning guitar motifs influenced by Eastern music. This psychedelic consciousness was seeded, in the United States, by countercultural gurus such as Dr. Timothy Leary, a Harvard University professor who began researching LSD as a tool of self-discovery from 1960, and writer Ken Kesey who with his Merry Pranksters staged Acid Tests--multimedia "happenings" set to the music of the Warlocks (later the Grateful Dead) and documented by novelist Tom Wolfe in the literary classic The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test (1968)--and traversed the country during the mid-1960s on a kaleidoscope-colored school bus. "Everybody felt the '60s were a breakthrough. There was exploration of sexual freedom and [...
Following the dot-com boom of the 1990s, the political and economical landscape of San Francisco greatly changed (Bourgois and Schonberg). At this time, Mayor Brown of San Francisco enacted neoliberal policies and reinstated law enforcement campaigns that directly targeted the homeless (Bourgois and Schonberg 221-222). The campaigns caused the Edgewater homeless to lose their few possessions, regular encampments, clean needles, and contact with the Department of Public Health’s mobile health van (Bourgois and Schonberg 222). Many addicts blamed themselves for the situation they were in, but the culture they were surrounded by had just as large of a role in prolonging their addiction and health problems. The previously mentioned governmental policies and drug use of the homeless caused a “syndemic” in their lives. A syndemic is “a cluster of [health] problems that work together, reinforcing and often exacerbating each other synergistically” (Sobo 193). Poor sanitation, use of dirty needles, and reduced access to healthcare created a complex system of health ...
Hippies were often portrayed as criminals, subversive to the morals and best interest of the public. Although misunderstood, the hippie had a great impact throughout the country, still surviving today in American culture. The term “hippie” itself became a universal term in the late 1960s. It originated in a 1967 article in Ramparts, entitled “The Social History of the Hippies.” Afterward, the name was captured by the mass media as a label for the people of the new movement.
Peering in from the eastern border of St. James Park, in the city of San José, you begin to get an essence of American life. From the upper echelons, to the lowly scum of society, St. James Park is known for its diversity. With the church at your back, you can observe the people pacing the station, glancing at their cell phones every other second as they wait for the train to arrive. An elderly man takes a leisurely stroll with the support of his cane. Kids playing soccer score between goal post marked by homeless bunker tree forts. Police reprimand a vagrant man for being naked while changing at his park bench. A used dirty tissue and old worn-in hooker boots lay carelessly on a picnic table inside the deserted playground area. The thugs make a quick score of some coke from their local street pharmacist. In the distance, bordering the western end of the park, are the steps leading to the Superior Court House: an everlasting symbol of justice and security presiding over American life. The frequenters of St. James Park are a part of a unique and complex subculture, in and of itself.
More than any other countercultural group, hippies reflected a deep discontent with technocracy- society’s reliance on scientific experts who ruled coldly and dispassionately and who wielded enormous power. Hippies said good-bye to that and hello to the mystical spirit, oneness with the universe- life as passion, passion as life, harmony, and understanding. The...
The general mindset of the 1960’s San Francisco scene is well summarized by Reebee Garafalo in his book Rockin’ Out: Popular Music in the USA when he states: “For the counterculture, the focus on mind-expanding drugs seemed to offer the possibility of greater self-awareness and consciousness, which would in turn lead to a world without war, competition, or regimentation.” The concept of expanding the mind in order to achieve a peaceful, utopian world naturally lends itself to the consumption of drugs. The image of half naked, marijuana smoking hippies dancing around in the park comes to mind when one thinks of the late 60’s Haight-Ashbury scene. Drugs help tremendously in creating an altered state, making one oblivious to the outside world. A great deal of the music was preaching peace, love,...
During the sixties Americans saw the rise of the counterculture. The counterculture, which was a group of movements focused on achieving personal and cultural liberation, was embraced by the decade’s young Americans. Because many Americans were members of the different movements in the counterculture, the counterculture influenced American society. As a result of the achievements the counterculture movements made, the United States in the 1960s became a more open, more tolerant, and freer country.
“Turn on, tune in, drop out”: These six words can instantly transport a rush of nostalgia to anybody who grew up during the 1960s and 1970s. This iconic phrase came from no other than Timothy Leary. Leary was a psychologist and writer who advocated for the exploration and use of Lysergic acid diethylamide, better known as LSD. Among other popular hippie figures such as the band Grateful Dead, or singers Joan Baez and John Lennon, Timothy Leary stood out as a strong leader in the movement. Of all the important figures in the Hippie Movement, Timothy Leary had the greatest impact on hippie culture.
Despite the early success of the “slow-growth antiregime,” that teamed government officials, investors and neighborhood grass roots organizations in directing the development of San Francisco’s Tenderloin District, these efforts were unsuccessful in modifying the gentrification of this geographically desirable, but poverty stricken section of the city (Robinson 484, 505). The Tenderloin, which had been plagued by drug epidemics, crime, and homelessness, has experienced a gentrification, which may be defined as “the transformation of a poor neighborhood by changes in population characteristics and/or changes in land uses” (Palen
If Ginsberg experimented with drugs I would also assume that many of his friends and people he associated were avid drug users. Line 9 reads, “who got busted in their pubic beards returning through Laredo with a belt of marijuana for New York.” Hipster was a term used to describe individuals who were interested in jazz and engaged in drug use. Many of these hipsters were easily recognizable by their long beards, compared to the clean, shaven appearance that was considered acceptable in their society. Ginsberg continues to write, “Peyote solidities of halls, backyard green tree cemetery dawns, wine drunkenness over the rooftops, storefront boroughs of teahead joyride neon blinking traffic light, sun and moon and tree vibrations in the roaring winter dusks of Brooklyn” (13). This line elaborates the extent of his drug use; that he has gotten high anywhere anyone can imagine, such as in a cemetery, on a roof, while driving, and in Brooklyn. And “sun and moon” could intend that he and the other Beats got high at any hour of the day, regardless whether daytime or nighttime. Just like excessive drinking causes one to get drunk and lose cognitive ability, drug use almost always results in the individual getting high. Depending on the severity of this high, one could experience bizarre and unexplainable hallucinations. Perhaps these trips and hallucinations are what inspired these writers’ creativity. And though drug use is not a societal norm, from Ginsberg’s point of view, drugs actually help to stimulate the best
“I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked, dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix,” This opening line of Allen Ginsberg’s 1955 poem Howl truly depicts what the Beat generation was really like. He writes that his ‘generation was destroyed by madness’ meaning that the people of his generation became the victims of drug abuse, alcohol addiction, and violence. The Beat generation, or beatniks for short, consisted of some of Americas most celebrated writers including William Burroughs, Allen Ginsberg, Neal Cassidy, and of course its leader, Jack Kerouac. The beats were a unique group of writers who strongly opposed social norm. They were very independent people who were known for breaking the law whenever they needed to. They were also drifters who spent most of their lives on the road, a motif which especially fascinated Jack Kerouac.
Wesson, Donald R. "Psychedelic Drugs, Hippie Counterculture, Speed And Phenobarbital Treatment Of Sedative-Hypnotic Dependence: A Journey To The Haight Ashbury In The Sixties." Journal Of Psychoactive Drugs 2 (2011): 153. Academic OneFile. Web. 23 Mar. 2014.
Unlike the society before this movement, the hippie did not try to change America through violence, the hippie tried to change things through peace and love. The Hippie Movement was a moment during the mid 1960s through the early 1070s where sex, drugs and Rock-n-Roll, was at the forefront of mainstream society. No one really knows the true definition of a Hippie, but a formal definition describes the hippie as one who does not conform to social standards, advocating a liberal attitude and lifestyle. Phoebe Thompson wrote, “Being a hippie is a choice of philosophy. Hippies are generally antithetical to structured hierarchies, such as church, government, and social castes. The ultimate goal of the hippie movement is peace, attainable only through love and toleration of the earth and each other. Finally, a hippie needs freedom, both physical freedom to experience life and mental freeness to remain open-minded” (Thompson12-13). Many questions are asked when trying to figure out how this movement reached so many of America’s youth, and what qualities defined a hippie as a hippie?
When people hear the term hippie, they think of men and woman in loose clothing with flowers weaved in their hair. Although these men and women did in fact wear these things, they left a significant impact on society. Hippies were a part of the Counterculture movement, which basic ideals were to reject the ideas of mainstream society. The movement itself began with the protesting of the Vietnam War. Eventually, the movement was more than just protesting the war. Hippies promoted the use of recreational drugs, religious tolerance; they also changed society’s views and attitudes about lifestyle and social behavior. The Counterculture movement was the most influential era in the 20th century because the people of this time changed society’s outlook, and broached the topics of drugs, fashion, and sexual freedom.
The sixties was a decade of liberation and revolution, a time of great change and exciting exploration for the generations to come. It was a time of anti-war protests, free love, sit-ins, naked hippie chicks and mind-altering drugs. In big cities such as San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York and Paris, there was a passionate exchange of ideas, fiery protests against the Vietnam War, and a time for love, peace and equality. The coming together of like-minded people from around the world was spontaneous and unstoppable. This group of people, which included writers, musicians, thinkers and tokers, came to be known as the popular counterculture, better known as hippies. The dawning of the Age of Aquarius in the late sixties was more than just a musical orgy. It was a time of spiritual missions to fight for change and everything they believed in. Freedom, love, justice, equality and peace were at the very forefront of this movement (West, 2008). Some wore beads. Some had long hair. Some wore tie-dye and others wore turtle-neck sweaters. The Hippie generation was a wild bunch, to say the least, that opened the cookie jar of possibilities politically, sexually, spiritually and socially to forever be known as one of the most memorable social movements of all time (Hippie Generation, 2003).