Peace Not War: The Hippie Culture

What is the meaning of life? The fundamental question humanity has been asking since the beginning of their existence, but always left unanswered. So why does this question need to be solved? Why cannot all live in peace and freedom, where each one of us is happy and part of the flow? This new idea of peace and love appealed to many young adults in 1960s and created a subculture called “hippie”. As the hippies’ culture became prevalent in the society, their new unique perspective induced many Canadians to change their views in drugs, pacifism, and human rights.

The era of hippies was also the time period when teenage drug consumption was at the peak. Nonetheless, it was not a coincidence. The hippie culture promoted consumption of drugs—especially

LSD—as an aid for meditation in desire for self-exploration. This peculiar belief was introduced to the media through pop culture, affecting many Canadian young adults to go down the “rabbit hole”. An example of hippie influence in pop culture was the Beatles. Even though the Beatles was a group of British musicians, they gained fanatic popularity in Canada. In 1965, the London office of Beatle Fan Club International even announced “Canada had more card-carrying Beatlemaniacs than any other nation.” However, since the Beatles’ music was heavily influenced by hippies, drugs were an inevitable topic. In their song “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds”, the lyrics described the experience of a “trip” on mood-changing drugs. But ironically, only the young population was able to comprehend the actual meaning of the song. Thus, the Beatles exposed the stimulating experience of drugs to adolescents, causing them to become a part of the community. Moreover, hippies also caused the underground drug market to grow bigger in Canada. Hippies found new ways to distribute drugs by baking drugs in food or disguising drugs into familiar products. Consequently, this allowed drugs to be more accessible and popular in Canada. Later on, not only the hippies, but different groups of subculture advocated drug dose, and LSD was commonly used in parties. Therefore, hippies’ value in drugs had a great influence in young adults, making the drug market bigger. However, hippies influence to young adults also brought positive effects to society.
“Peace not war” was the best phrase to portrait the hippies in the 60s.

Their ideology in peace impacted many Canadians to participate in the peace movement and support pacifism. Hippies demonstrated passive resistance to violence by using “Flower Power” as their slogan. They wore flower in their hair and distributed flowers to the public to protest against violence. This odd movement proved citizens that peace can be achieved through non-violence and inspired many people to participate in the movement. As a result, hippies provoked a mood in society that guided many citizens to take part in the peace movement. Another symbol that represented hippies was the peace symbol. Even though hippies were not the creator of the symbol, hippies were responsible for creating a trend. Hippies wore peace symbol, and used it to express their idea of the society. And, later on, other groups used the peace symbol to show their rejection against possession of nuclear weapons. Therefore, many symbols used in the peace movement resembled hippies because of their

influence.
Hippies were at the core of civil rights movement in United States; in Canada, they played a significant role in protecting the human rights.

They believed in harmony and co-existence in nature, which are beliefs mostly adapted from eastern religion, especially Buddhism. And John Lennon, a popular hippie musician shared this philosophy on media, by singing “Imagine there’s no countries. It isn’t hard to do. Nothing to kill or die for. And no religion too. Imagine all the people living life in peace.” The lyrics from Imagine described how there should be no borders between people, and suggested all people should live together peacefully. As a result, many people took interest in issues related to violation in equality, and some stood up for the minority. Citizens, often university students, formed groups and demanded government for resolutions in unfair treatments. And by 1962, Ontario became the first province to protect Ontarians from any discrimination by passing the Ontario Human Rights Code. Even though not all the people in this group would define themselves as hippies, but they were certainly influenced by widespread hippies’ ideology in their age group. Furthermore, hippies who believed in free love brought up the sexual orientation issues to the public, and stood up for their rights. “The 1960s saw the first gay rights organization” , many people who were not part of the LGBT community, still stood up for the gay rights. Therefore, hippies’ counterculture

movement allowed the human rights issues that had been ignored to be confronted in public.
Hippies’ strange culture caught people’s attention and resulted to directly or indirectly influence the public. And, the younger generations who have more access to modern technology at that time were influenced more to the hippies. Therefore, young adults in 1960s Canada saw the world with liberal perspectives in issues relating drugs, pacifism, and human rights. Even though, hippies are not common in now a day, we still encounter their impact in our society.