Weekly Bulletin - June 23rd Meeting

 

 

Steve Glines, Assistant Governor

Andrew Goldstein, speaker

 

 

 

 

 

Our speaker was Andrew Goldstein, the Editor of Hippie, Inc. This book describes the original hippie community, which conceived or popularized innovative ideas and products that over the course of the next five decades, created employment for millions of Americans, pumped billions of dollars into the nation's economy, transformed U.S. consumer culture and business practices, and shaped the most commercially lucrative social movement in American history.

 

Andrew discussed three main points: that hippies were not what we think they were; that a lot of products and ideas they developed are now mainstream; and that there are similarities between that hippie movement and Rotary.

 

First, the media have gotten the hippie movement all wrong. Not one of the original hippies was a baby boomer. They were all born in the 1930s and early 40s—the Depression and the lean years of the war. Sometimes they’re portrayed as communists, but not one was a communist. Nor were they freeloaders, but very industrious. For instance, Phil Graham (the Fillmore Auditorium) won the bronze star and purple heart in the Korean War.  Stuart Brand, the publisher of the Whole Earth Catalog, once attired shirtless, wearing a butcher’s coat festooned with medals from the king of Sweden, was hardly the sort who looked like a forward-looking entrepreneurial type; but he demonstrated the computer mouse, hypertext, and other things that are now mainstream. He also coined the term “personal computer,” and was one of the founders of Wired magazine. Tie-dying (based on a Japanese technique) and whole grain bread were other business success stories introduced at this time.

 

As to the second point, yoga, women wearing jeans, eating fresh foods rather than boxed or refrigerated foods, all began in the early 1960s. Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s are all outgrowths of the hippie movement.

 

The last point is something that won’t be discussed anywhere else. “Rotary is an international service organization, whose stated purpose is to bring together business and professional people in order to provide humanitarian services, encourage high ethical standards in all vocations, and to advance good will and peace throughout the world.” “Service above self” is a Rotary motto. Here is some stuff from the hippies: “The original hippies embraced an ethos that included equality and self-knowledge. They believed that all things are connected to each other, nobody is better or worse, all have inherent value.” The Diggers (an offshoot movement) had as their motto, “Everything is free. Do your own thing.” Their purpose was to provide food, clothing, and medical care for everyone. At several stores in the Haight-Ashbury district, everything was literally free, and there were free concerts and other public events. To do good for the world is what allows Andrew to put Rotary and hippies together.

 

The sex and drugs associated with hippies are actually the “second wave.” The original people were much higher-minded. The term was coined by the columnist Herb Caen, and the general media seized on the name as referring to the sex and drugs, and ignored the spiritual basis.  The second generation didn’t grow up in the 30s and 40s, when there was no money; they were attracted by ideas of personal freedom, not by responsibility for their fellow man