The text from "The Flowering of the Hippies", which comes from a newspaper article published in 1967 by Mark Harris, pretty much does everything in its power to evoke feelings of disgust, disappointment, and even scorn for the Hippie Movement. Harris' use of Pathos highlights, in cutting detail, the short-comings and worthlessness of the hippie's "Summer of Love" which primarily took place on Haight Street.
He presents the hippies as the outcasts of society, going so far as to juxtapose them against African Americans and immigrants who were the primary outsiders. He describes the hippies as "dirty from head to toe". He calls their "hip-shop" products "nonsense". He presents them as ignorant fools who proudly wore Nazi swastikas just because they offended the "Establishment". This all works in tandem to elicit anger or shame. He painted the hippies as delusional brats who believed authority only existed to retrain humanity and withhold solutions to problems. His diction is harsh, using words such as "unreason", "devil theories", "inexperience of life", and "failures of perception" to describe their beliefs. He is sure to let us know that the hippies and their unhygienic lifestyle brought "mountains of garbage", an increasing amount of rats, food poisoning, hepatitis, pulmonary tuberculosis, and meningitis.
Perhaps his most powerful use of Pathos is when he compared the struggle of the Civil Rights Movement to that of the Hippie Movement. He makes the argument that if the hippies revolved around "community" and "love", what were they contributing to the African Americans in their district? He describes the overwhelming burdens of African Americans in great detail, saying that they "desired the attention of the health department, desired the attention of agencies whom hippies monopolized with appeals for food and housing for the "summer of love." The needs of African Americans were much more urgent than the "needs" of the middle-class, runaway, white hippies who had access to many things. He recalls seeing a young black child working hard to repair his bike next to a group of grown adult hippies just playing around the streets. Overall, through the author's description, the hippies come across as inconsiderate, aloof, irresponsible, immature and self-absorbed. The audience comes away from the reading feeling resentful.
This is a very interesting take on the hippie movement. Today most people want to praise hippies for the work. The pathos in this article certainly convinces people that the hippies actually did nothing.
ReplyDeleteReally interesting!
ReplyDeleteCan you guys please put your texts in the sidebar so we can access them while looking at these posts?
ReplyDeleteI have not seen an article yet that clearly outlines why the hippie movement was a detrimental movement in society. The naiveté of wearing swastikas and taking African American housing is an issue that I was unaware of. I can only wonder how society had responded to this argument and if the author was exaggerating.
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