Guide to Berkeley Hippies in 2004
So those who are in and around Cal know about the various homeless individuals that roam the surrounding areas. Theres the guy who sells jokes for a quarter and also the infamous jackass on Durant and Telegraph who's asking for a beatdown. Then there are the hippies. Assuming the hippies were 19-23 during the sixties, they would be in their sixties now, which is an accurate guess since many of them look worn out. The big question is, however, not how old the hippies are, but rather why they are still here.
My theory to this conundrum is the following: Berkeley Hippies still in Berkeley are not hippies at all. I propose to show that the remnants of the counterculture movement are socially inept people who were left behind and not zealots who still believe in their cause 40 years later. We all know there are people out there with no friends who yearn to belong to some social sphere, but for one reason or another cannot make friends or keep friends. Yes, these are the loners. Loners are sad, loners are pathetic. The counter culture movement with its message of free love and love your fellow man (and the drugs) did the unthinkable. It opened the door for loners to join a social group. Where there was so called "love" to be shared by all. And what a rush it must have been. The brotherhood and closeness of it all and all the non showering goodness. At the end of the sixties, all the hippies who had been so angry woke up and realized how stupid they were. Many of them re-entered the system and got jobs. As they did so, they left behind the people they had embraced: the loners. So now these individuals roam the streets of Berkeley dreaming of what was and what will never be again. No these people are not zealots, they are sad sad lonely people.
What can we learn from this? The answer is simple. Never let loners into your social group, you never know what they're capable of. A hippie holding a 40 year vigil can easily snap and go nuts on the people who left him.
So those who are in and around Cal know about the various homeless individuals that roam the surrounding areas. Theres the guy who sells jokes for a quarter and also the infamous jackass on Durant and Telegraph who's asking for a beatdown. Then there are the hippies. Assuming the hippies were 19-23 during the sixties, they would be in their sixties now, which is an accurate guess since many of them look worn out. The big question is, however, not how old the hippies are, but rather why they are still here.
My theory to this conundrum is the following: Berkeley Hippies still in Berkeley are not hippies at all. I propose to show that the remnants of the counterculture movement are socially inept people who were left behind and not zealots who still believe in their cause 40 years later. We all know there are people out there with no friends who yearn to belong to some social sphere, but for one reason or another cannot make friends or keep friends. Yes, these are the loners. Loners are sad, loners are pathetic. The counter culture movement with its message of free love and love your fellow man (and the drugs) did the unthinkable. It opened the door for loners to join a social group. Where there was so called "love" to be shared by all. And what a rush it must have been. The brotherhood and closeness of it all and all the non showering goodness. At the end of the sixties, all the hippies who had been so angry woke up and realized how stupid they were. Many of them re-entered the system and got jobs. As they did so, they left behind the people they had embraced: the loners. So now these individuals roam the streets of Berkeley dreaming of what was and what will never be again. No these people are not zealots, they are sad sad lonely people.
What can we learn from this? The answer is simple. Never let loners into your social group, you never know what they're capable of. A hippie holding a 40 year vigil can easily snap and go nuts on the people who left him.
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