HIPPIE ~ The New Revolution!

The hippie subculture was originally a youth movement that arouse in the United States during the mid-1960s, swiftly spreading to other countries around the world. The etymology of the term "hippie" is from hipster and was initially used to describe beatniks who had moved into New York City's Greenwich Village, San Francisco's Haight-Ashbury district,and similar urban areas. The early hippie ideology included the counter cultural values of the Beat Generation. Some created their own social groups and communities, listened to psychedelic rock, opposed the Vietnam War, embraced the sexual revolution and used drugs such as marijuana and LSD to explore alternatives states of consciousness.

Hippie fashions and values had a major effect on culture, influencing popular music, television, film, literature and the Arts. Since the widespread movement in the 1960s, many aspects of hippie culture have been assimilated by the mainstream society. The religious and cultural diversity espoused by the hippies has gained widespread acceptance, and Eastern philosophy and spiritual concepts have reached a wide audience. The hippie legacy can be observed in contemporary culture in myriad forms - from health food, to music festivals, to contemporary sexual mores, and even to the cyberspace revolution.

The foundation of the hippie movement finds historical precedent as far back as the countercultural of the Ancient Greeks espoused by the philosopheers like Diogenes of Sinope and the Cynics also as early forms of hippie culture. Hippie philosophy also credits the religious and spiritual teachings of Gandhi, Hillel the Elder, Buddha, Mazdak, St.Francis of Assisi, Henry David Thoreau, and Jesus Christ.