Being a native Austinite, I have heard a lot of things about hippies, and all of the things center around how carefree they are, and how they just want harmony for everyone. As a child, I fed on these stories and used them as a guide about who would be safe to approach since my parents raised my sister and me in predominantly white neighborhoods. I considered all environmentalists and their children to be safe, but once I demonstrated that I was academically competitive, I learned how wrong I was, and as an adult, I am thoroughly grateful that social media did not exist back then. Essentially, I have come to the conclusion that people who used to identify as “hippies” enjoy an undeserved reputation as being “good people,” when reality demonstrates something else.
Just like conservative parents raised their children in segregation, liberal parents raised kids in segregation, and taught them that some children “needed more help than others.” These children grew up to assume that affirmative action–and later diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI)–were programs that existed for people unwilling and unable to demonstrate real intelligence. Consequently, any Black person who has spent any time around the children of liberals can recognize that they taught their children to perpetuate bigotry just as much as conservative people did, only with “nicer” terms. Hence, there was a surge of, as my friend calls it, white ladies with masters’ degrees who were there to “make a difference.” Seeing non-white people as dependent and helpless is just as damaging as being afraid, especially since it conditions people to infantilize entire populations instead of respecting our autonomy.
One of the issues with “hippies” is how they speak nostalgically about “youthful indiscretions” when talking about their past, but widen their eyes in fear about how Black people behave when arguing for our human rights. Similar to rural populations, “hippies” talk about skinning dipping (indecent exposure for Black people), exploring abandoned buildings (breaking and entering), skipping school (truancy), and drinking and/or doing drugs at all ages (deviance). I remember knowing a former friend who drove her car without a license, but when I did the same, she chided me with, “I do not approve of your behavior.” This may seem like harmless judgmentalism, but it become a hypocritical lack of self awareness when coupled with the same authority to call the cops on Black people who might simply be existing without permission. After all, conservative individuals exhibit the same failure to self reflect when they behave abhorrently, so there truly is no difference between how such individuals see themselves.
As a result of their segregated upbringing, “hippies” have been just as denigrating to marginalized individuals as anyone else, and have developed an alarming capacity to “turn conservative” when they start acquiring any wealth–which, being white, they tend to do. Those same people who burned their bras will vote against school funding in Black and Latinx communities multiple times, and then say that we only have to apply ourselves to have the same opportunities. While smiling about pagan worship, those “hippies” will take away trees from non-white children, and then congratulate themselves for giving those children chances to be in nature. They will move into the middle of nowhere so that they can be “free” while refusing to acknowledge the environmental degradation required to make that lifestyle possible, since they are absolutely not asking Indigenous folks for any tips on land restoration. None of this behavior denotes a true understanding of what it means to genuinely be different from the dominant narrative, and a mindset that affirms it could be considered delusional.
Part of existing in a new world will require telling true and complete histories without catering to the egoic whims of beneficiaries and sycophants. Hitchhiking and toking may be seen as something fun, but if not enough of them were fighting for everyone’s right to enjoy the same, then they come off as spoiled brats incapable of doing the right thing. Telling ourselves happy stories about the past is not the same as working to undo the damage of atrocities, and history only repeats itself when incomplete history is treated as fact. We all have a responsibility to edit our understanding of how the world works so that we can effectively change it.
Chasing A Dying Empire 