Weekly St. Helena Star Column
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
AGED HIPPIES Part 2
Last week we confessed to the fact that Aged Hippies are getting many of us down. They make life tough in small towns.
It's not their numbers. It's their noise (Example: One man writes one letter, and a Flood Project which effects 200 families is put off for one year).
Way back (when Cal’s school cheer went from “Roll on You Bears” to “Ashes to ashes/Dust to Dust/ We hate to Shut it Down/But we Must, we Must”), elements of the far left realized that they could travel north, and find themselves in a small community where neighbors were willing to let other neighbors lead their own lives.
Unlike at the University level, or where they grew up, Aged Hippies discovered that they could move to small towns and execute electoral influence.
Remember the movement in San Francisco for counter culturists to move to Alpine County? The theory was that the population was so small, that “Revolutionaries” could move, control the ballots, juries, and institute a life style which was the dream of all Hippies. Drug, sex and Rock and roll would rule. The law would be on “their” side. They would elect the mayor, sheriff, city council and fill out the jury pool.
This counter-culture Camelot never took off. However, enough Aged Hippies from the Bay Area moved North to have a decided effect.
We feel it today, in St. Helena (See: Emily Park, Flood Control, The Boys & Girls Club, the Mennen Subdivision, The Stream Setback Ordinance, Self –Esteem in the schools).
Not all Boomers are Aged Hippies. However, all Aged Hippies are Boomers. Just to confuse the issue, there are a lot of Boomers who ordered from the “revolutionary” menu of the 60’s”, a la carte.
They picked what they liked. Maybe they wanted to be part of the country club establishment, but rather liked that free sex, or the drugs. They remained “politically right”, siding with business over labor, but sampled from the “sexual freedom, and drug offerings” on the plate.
Others, were political radicals, but eschewed drugs.
Aged Hippies have never forgotten that rush they got from demonstrating, from “bravely” standing up to the establishment—even if it was only via the length of one’s hair or the cut of one’s garb. We see them today at City Council meetings.
They can’t forget. Chicks dug it.
As Joan Baez told a crowd in Sproul Plaza after Spock, Coffin and Mitch Goodman led a draft card burning at Harvard Yard. “No woman should sleep with any man who has a draft card.” Care to know how many fires were lit that night?
One of the troubles with Hippies was that they were cowards. I count myself as one of them. They weren’t willing to pick up a gun and be real revolutionaries. They were play acting—like Spin and Marty on the Dude ranch—only rather than pretending to be real cowboys, they were pretending to be real revolutionaries.
They wanted to be Che without the danger of bombs and real bullets. (I remember. I was one).
It was always a game—only one that warped the cultural fabric of a nation in for years to come.
Aged Hippies were once Marxists. Today they couldn’t separate Dialectic from a Derelict.
They advocate communal resources like pools, parks, “victory gardens”—things they couldn’t earn on their own.
Due to the “If it feels good, do it,” mentality, they caused a lot of pain. When I grew up, I had never met a “Single Mom” (ok, one). It just wasn’t on.
Today, because one has to follow his feelings, and (one of the biggest lies ever told is) it will be “better for the kids if we split”, couples by the millions have abdicated their responsibilities and wrecked, not one, but two generations of kids lives because of it. Single Moms are the tragic result. They are Saints—but (with few exceptions) never had to be. Aged Hippie women, naturally, are huge man haters. They bought the party line.
“If it feels good do it.”—why be faithful to one’s husband? Or vice versa. Aged Hippies opted for “feelings” and tossed 2500 years of character building out the window.
Aged Hippies tried to tell us instant gratification was superior to Character. Character was largely defined by delayed gratification. Back then, that was off the table.
I’m sure my parents wanted to split two dozen times—but they weren’t allowed. It wasn’t on.
The ease of divorce, and yes it is true, I have many, many friends who are divorced and truly happily married after a second and even a third marriage (who knows what God has in store), has caused havoc with, now, two generations of kids.
Aged Hippies need a scapegoat. Hitler had already taken the Jews, so they laid all problems of the world at the feet of cruel white males.
Myth and legend were tossed out the window.
Aged Hippies have disparaged myth and legend and disputed the sacrosanct belief in the “Great Man” theory. To them, Washington and Jefferson were evil. Lincoln—nothing. If great men exist, then these “democratic” nothings, have no place.
Since Hippies couldn’t’ get what they wanted via the ballot box, they turned to the courts. After all, it may cost some dough, but it is a lot easier to convince 12 people who want to go back to their day jobs, or one judge, than it is an entire electorate.
St. Helena is still reeling from their effects.
Jeffrey Earl Warren
James Warren & Son
1414 Main St.
St. Helena, Ca.
94574
707-963-2748
Get a sneak peek of the all-new AOL.com.
It's not their numbers. It's their noise (Example: One man writes one letter, and a Flood Project which effects 200 families is put off for one year).
Way back (when Cal’s school cheer went from “Roll on You Bears” to “Ashes to ashes/Dust to Dust/ We hate to Shut it Down/But we Must, we Must”), elements of the far left realized that they could travel north, and find themselves in a small community where neighbors were willing to let other neighbors lead their own lives.
Unlike at the University level, or where they grew up, Aged Hippies discovered that they could move to small towns and execute electoral influence.
Remember the movement in San Francisco for counter culturists to move to Alpine County? The theory was that the population was so small, that “Revolutionaries” could move, control the ballots, juries, and institute a life style which was the dream of all Hippies. Drug, sex and Rock and roll would rule. The law would be on “their” side. They would elect the mayor, sheriff, city council and fill out the jury pool.
This counter-culture Camelot never took off. However, enough Aged Hippies from the Bay Area moved North to have a decided effect.
We feel it today, in St. Helena (See: Emily Park, Flood Control, The Boys & Girls Club, the Mennen Subdivision, The Stream Setback Ordinance, Self –Esteem in the schools).
Not all Boomers are Aged Hippies. However, all Aged Hippies are Boomers. Just to confuse the issue, there are a lot of Boomers who ordered from the “revolutionary” menu of the 60’s”, a la carte.
They picked what they liked. Maybe they wanted to be part of the country club establishment, but rather liked that free sex, or the drugs. They remained “politically right”, siding with business over labor, but sampled from the “sexual freedom, and drug offerings” on the plate.
Others, were political radicals, but eschewed drugs.
Aged Hippies have never forgotten that rush they got from demonstrating, from “bravely” standing up to the establishment—even if it was only via the length of one’s hair or the cut of one’s garb. We see them today at City Council meetings.
They can’t forget. Chicks dug it.
As Joan Baez told a crowd in Sproul Plaza after Spock, Coffin and Mitch Goodman led a draft card burning at Harvard Yard. “No woman should sleep with any man who has a draft card.” Care to know how many fires were lit that night?
One of the troubles with Hippies was that they were cowards. I count myself as one of them. They weren’t willing to pick up a gun and be real revolutionaries. They were play acting—like Spin and Marty on the Dude ranch—only rather than pretending to be real cowboys, they were pretending to be real revolutionaries.
They wanted to be Che without the danger of bombs and real bullets. (I remember. I was one).
It was always a game—only one that warped the cultural fabric of a nation in for years to come.
Aged Hippies were once Marxists. Today they couldn’t separate Dialectic from a Derelict.
They advocate communal resources like pools, parks, “victory gardens”—things they couldn’t earn on their own.
Due to the “If it feels good, do it,” mentality, they caused a lot of pain. When I grew up, I had never met a “Single Mom” (ok, one). It just wasn’t on.
Today, because one has to follow his feelings, and (one of the biggest lies ever told is) it will be “better for the kids if we split”, couples by the millions have abdicated their responsibilities and wrecked, not one, but two generations of kids lives because of it. Single Moms are the tragic result. They are Saints—but (with few exceptions) never had to be. Aged Hippie women, naturally, are huge man haters. They bought the party line.
“If it feels good do it.”—why be faithful to one’s husband? Or vice versa. Aged Hippies opted for “feelings” and tossed 2500 years of character building out the window.
Aged Hippies tried to tell us instant gratification was superior to Character. Character was largely defined by delayed gratification. Back then, that was off the table.
I’m sure my parents wanted to split two dozen times—but they weren’t allowed. It wasn’t on.
The ease of divorce, and yes it is true, I have many, many friends who are divorced and truly happily married after a second and even a third marriage (who knows what God has in store), has caused havoc with, now, two generations of kids.
Aged Hippies need a scapegoat. Hitler had already taken the Jews, so they laid all problems of the world at the feet of cruel white males.
Myth and legend were tossed out the window.
Aged Hippies have disparaged myth and legend and disputed the sacrosanct belief in the “Great Man” theory. To them, Washington and Jefferson were evil. Lincoln—nothing. If great men exist, then these “democratic” nothings, have no place.
Since Hippies couldn’t’ get what they wanted via the ballot box, they turned to the courts. After all, it may cost some dough, but it is a lot easier to convince 12 people who want to go back to their day jobs, or one judge, than it is an entire electorate.
St. Helena is still reeling from their effects.
(To Be continued) `
Jeffrey Earl Warren
James Warren & Son
1414 Main St.
St. Helena, Ca.
94574
707-963-2748
Get a sneak peek of the all-new AOL.com.
