Fucking Hippies

I guess that to be "punk" these days, at least among the younger types who just discovered it, you have to throw out frequent references to your complete and utter disdain for hippies. "What are you, some sort of hippie?" I hear, over and over again, every time I suggest that used baby diapers belong in the trashcan or that it's possible to go outside without strewing broken glass all over the sidewalk. "You talked to another human being without punching them? What are you, some kind of a fucking hippie?" "You read a book? What are you, a goddamn hippie?" The interrogation goes on endlessly, despite lacking historical consistency. For instance, even though I've never tried it, I get the idea that if I did something a first generation hippie may have actually done, like, say, take a big old stinky, hairy dump out in public, I'd be embraced as "punk" by today's hipster hooligans, whereas, if I were to do something that a first generation punker might have actually done, like, say, think, I'd be reviled as a worthless, bigfoot-felching hippie. Funny how times have changed.

Old punk, new look: Embrace your inner hippie

I didn't get into punk rock or skateboarding until the 1980s, so I'm no expert on their origins. But, when it comes to the punk rock scene I was aware of as a kid, I distinctly recall that, during that time, the basic attitude we embraced was one of social defiance, not of social conformity. In a nutshell, the opposite seems gratingly true in today's so-called "punk rock" scene, which conveniently misrepresents lethargy, disinterest, and mindless destruction as appropriate "punkness," in effect, as a way to represent a well-established, ultra-conformist, neo-conservative rationale for complete and utter capitulation to the dominant social values of greed and convenience. What can I say? Stupid, arrogant and lazy don't add up to "punk" to me. They add up to mindless, ignorant, hedonistic, conformity; you know, the type of shit we claim to hate? But if being a stupid, worthless, lazy piece of shit is "punk" to you and all your hippie-hating, "punk" homies, then please, by all means, consider me a Birkenstock-wearing, nature-loving, 'chuley-oiled, dingle-berry gargling hippie (just not a credit card hippie, please!). In the meantime, I already consider you a fucking kook.