Episode 2

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0:00:03 > 0:00:08The summer of '67 was a moment that rewrote history.

0:00:08 > 0:00:12Nature Boys, truth-seekers and politicos

0:00:12 > 0:00:15converged on the Haight-Ashbury district of San Francisco

0:00:15 > 0:00:18to forge a new way of being.

0:00:18 > 0:00:20The hippie was born.

0:00:20 > 0:00:24People in the Haight-Ashbury are seekers of a more meaningful

0:00:24 > 0:00:26human experience.

0:00:26 > 0:00:30MUSIC: Eight Miles High by The Byrds

0:00:30 > 0:00:34Free love, free drugs and freethinking

0:00:34 > 0:00:38were the mantras of these cultural revolutionaries.

0:00:38 > 0:00:40And yet, no sooner had the party begun

0:00:40 > 0:00:42than it started to unravel.

0:00:43 > 0:00:46What started happening with the Summer of Love

0:00:46 > 0:00:50was a lot of hard drugs started coming into the Haight-Ashbury,

0:00:50 > 0:00:53and that changed things a lot.

0:00:53 > 0:00:56The atrocities that have yet to surface from women's treatment

0:00:56 > 0:01:00by the hippie movement are considerable.

0:01:02 > 0:01:06The US government mobilised to stamp out the first signs of an uprising.

0:01:08 > 0:01:11We were afraid. You know, those of us who are alive today can tell you

0:01:11 > 0:01:14that we all thought that we were going to get killed.

0:01:14 > 0:01:15We never imagined living past 30.

0:01:15 > 0:01:17GUNSHOT

0:01:17 > 0:01:21The hippie movement is like any other extreme action

0:01:21 > 0:01:23on the part of people.

0:01:23 > 0:01:26It'll die a natural death.

0:01:26 > 0:01:28But the hippies would not be beaten.

0:01:28 > 0:01:32We were gassed, but we were prepared to fight again.

0:01:33 > 0:01:37The Summer of Love lasted just a few idyllic months,

0:01:37 > 0:01:41and yet it launched the biggest cultural shift in living memory.

0:01:42 > 0:01:46The revolution it unleashed not only changed the way

0:01:46 > 0:01:49we think about ourselves, each other and our planet,

0:01:49 > 0:01:51but shaped the world we live in today.

0:01:53 > 0:02:00This programme contains very strong language.

0:02:10 > 0:02:15MUSIC: Let's Go To San Francisco by The Flowerpot Men

0:02:32 > 0:02:39June 1967, and San Francisco is on the brink of a hippie revolution.

0:02:39 > 0:02:43Thousands of dreamers have come to look for an alternative way of life,

0:02:43 > 0:02:47turning the city into the flower power capital of the world.

0:02:53 > 0:02:56It was an incredibly exciting time.

0:02:56 > 0:02:58Incredibly optimistic.

0:02:58 > 0:03:02And we felt, as young people, very empowered.

0:03:02 > 0:03:05People were inventing themselves

0:03:05 > 0:03:07and inventing the way they wanted to live.

0:03:07 > 0:03:13And there was a kind of implicit scale of revolution

0:03:13 > 0:03:16which went from the guys that wore little mullets -

0:03:16 > 0:03:19you know, their haircut looked normal from the front

0:03:19 > 0:03:21but they had a little pigtail, so, on the weekends,

0:03:21 > 0:03:23they could let it down and be hippies -

0:03:23 > 0:03:26to guys who were, like, tattooing their faces.

0:03:28 > 0:03:32There were head shops on Haight Street.

0:03:32 > 0:03:34There was the psychedelic shop.

0:03:34 > 0:03:37There was The Garden Of Earthly Delight.

0:03:37 > 0:03:42It was a wonderful place and it was, in a way, self-sustaining.

0:03:42 > 0:03:45We had established a tribe,

0:03:45 > 0:03:48a community that took care of each other

0:03:48 > 0:03:53and made money and distributed the money and made music.

0:03:53 > 0:03:56It was paradise.

0:03:57 > 0:04:00People in the Haight-Ashbury are practising

0:04:00 > 0:04:04what people have spoken about for centuries

0:04:04 > 0:04:07and it threatens to overthrow...

0:04:08 > 0:04:11..the rest of the American establishment,

0:04:11 > 0:04:14which is built upon motives of greed...

0:04:16 > 0:04:18..anger, lust...

0:04:19 > 0:04:22..and self-interest.

0:04:23 > 0:04:27At the heart of the community were an anarchist troop of artists

0:04:27 > 0:04:32and radicals called the Diggers, the Robin Hoods of Haight-Ashbury

0:04:32 > 0:04:35who stole from the rich and gave to...

0:04:35 > 0:04:37the beautiful people.

0:04:37 > 0:04:40Their plan was to turn the Haight into a living experiment,

0:04:40 > 0:04:44to create a money-free, self-sustaining anarchist community

0:04:44 > 0:04:47with a collective conscience.

0:04:47 > 0:04:49'A group of hippies called the Diggers

0:04:49 > 0:04:53'provide free food to hungry hippies in Panhandle Park.

0:04:53 > 0:04:56'Diggers are people who share, says their manifesto,

0:04:56 > 0:04:58'and their aim is a society where everything is shared,

0:04:58 > 0:05:00'everything free.'

0:05:00 > 0:05:03Initially, the free food started by putting out

0:05:03 > 0:05:05Digger stew.

0:05:05 > 0:05:08It was stew and it was actually hot food

0:05:08 > 0:05:10that was cooked in an apartment somewhere

0:05:10 > 0:05:13and then brought out onto the street and fed to people.

0:05:13 > 0:05:19And all we asked them to do was step through a frame, 6ft by 6ft,

0:05:19 > 0:05:23painted yellow and it was called the Free Frame of Reference.

0:05:23 > 0:05:25And when they stepped through it,

0:05:25 > 0:05:27we gave them a little one-inch-by-one-inch frame

0:05:27 > 0:05:30on a shoelace,

0:05:30 > 0:05:33hung it around their neck and just invited them to look at the world

0:05:33 > 0:05:36as if everything they saw was free.

0:05:37 > 0:05:41Most of these people had just discovered social change.

0:05:41 > 0:05:44They grew up in a soft, middle-class family or something,

0:05:44 > 0:05:46and then, all of the sudden,

0:05:46 > 0:05:48they found out there was injustice in the world.

0:05:48 > 0:05:52"Oh, my God! Oh, my God! There's injustice. Social injustice.

0:05:52 > 0:05:57"We've got to do something about it. I know, we'll give away...clothes.

0:05:57 > 0:05:59"Free clothes! Yeah, that'll be great!"

0:05:59 > 0:06:02You know? "And free food! That's what the people want."

0:06:02 > 0:06:03They can have the free food

0:06:03 > 0:06:05and, you know, if it's past its sell date,

0:06:05 > 0:06:07who the fuck gives a shit, you know?

0:06:07 > 0:06:10MUSIC: Happy Together by The Turtles

0:06:13 > 0:06:16By the height of the Summer of Love,

0:06:16 > 0:06:19half a million starry-eyed kids had defied their parents' wishes

0:06:19 > 0:06:21and descended on the Haight.

0:06:21 > 0:06:24Among them were two teenage runaways,

0:06:24 > 0:06:27Tadg Galleran and Kat Castro.

0:06:27 > 0:06:29Everybody... The place was just...

0:06:29 > 0:06:34It was like 1,000 people on every block. I mean, the street was

0:06:34 > 0:06:37- completely lined with bodies. You remember.- I do.

0:06:37 > 0:06:40- KAT LAUGHS - I do! Everywhere.

0:06:40 > 0:06:43And anything that you needed or wanted,

0:06:43 > 0:06:46you would just ask around and somebody would give it to you.

0:06:46 > 0:06:48Oh, yeah. It was a community. It was a community.

0:06:48 > 0:06:51If there was food, if you needed money,

0:06:51 > 0:06:54if you wanted something to drink, if you wanted a joint...

0:06:54 > 0:06:55It was all over the place.

0:06:55 > 0:06:58And everybody shared - that's what was really cool about it.

0:06:58 > 0:06:59It was a community. That's what I call it.

0:06:59 > 0:07:02It's when you share like... And that was a community.

0:07:02 > 0:07:04- It was a true community. - It was like family.- Yes. Yes.

0:07:04 > 0:07:07And it was better... More like family

0:07:07 > 0:07:08than the family I had at home.

0:07:08 > 0:07:12Exactly. Cos when I came up here, I had just turned 16

0:07:12 > 0:07:15and just put down my Barbie dolls a month before,

0:07:15 > 0:07:17so, I mean, I was pretty, pretty sheltered.

0:07:17 > 0:07:20They kept acid in their cupboard like vitamins.

0:07:20 > 0:07:24They did. I said, you know, "Can I get a hit of acid?"

0:07:24 > 0:07:26- "Yeah. Help yourself, Kathy. They're on the shelf."- Oh, really?

0:07:26 > 0:07:29I opened the cupboard and there's a little bottle. Pop, pop, pop.

0:07:29 > 0:07:32- SHE LAUGHS - Jeez.- I know.

0:07:36 > 0:07:38The Summer of Love wasn't actually a real thing.

0:07:38 > 0:07:39It was a media creation.

0:07:39 > 0:07:44It was describing the influx of teenagers to San Francisco...

0:07:45 > 0:07:50..who had heard about, or read about,

0:07:50 > 0:07:54the subculture in Haight-Ashbury and flocked there.

0:07:54 > 0:07:57You can be yourself. You don't have to be what adults want you to be

0:07:57 > 0:08:01- and everything like that, you know. - 'Well, what do you want to do here

0:08:01 > 0:08:04- 'that your parents wouldn't want you to do?'- Nothing! That's it.

0:08:04 > 0:08:07- 'Exactly.'- Nothing. I don't have to do anything.

0:08:07 > 0:08:12Underaged children poured into the Haight-Ashbury totally unprepared.

0:08:12 > 0:08:14No resources,

0:08:14 > 0:08:16no way to feed themselves, no way to live.

0:08:16 > 0:08:18Kids with no shoes, girls on the street,

0:08:18 > 0:08:2014, 15-year-old kids.

0:08:20 > 0:08:23What's the point in going around dirty?

0:08:23 > 0:08:24- Do these people bathe? - 'Are they dirty?'

0:08:24 > 0:08:27Yes. Half of them smell so bad, I don't want to stand next...

0:08:27 > 0:08:29'Well I've never got that close to them.'

0:08:29 > 0:08:31That was the one thing I hated about

0:08:31 > 0:08:34the whole period and the whole movement

0:08:34 > 0:08:36was girls with dirty feet

0:08:36 > 0:08:38and the same odour.

0:08:38 > 0:08:41They all put this, like... They thought it was perfume,

0:08:41 > 0:08:44and it smelled like hay from a horse shed

0:08:44 > 0:08:46with shit in it, you know. It was horrible!

0:08:46 > 0:08:50MUSIC: Heroin by The Velvet Underground

0:08:54 > 0:08:57Today, we went down to the city clinic

0:08:57 > 0:09:00and we talked to the people down there about the venereal disease

0:09:00 > 0:09:03that is spreading through Haight-Ashbury.

0:09:03 > 0:09:06They would have bad LSD trips, drug overdoses.

0:09:06 > 0:09:07They'd have gonorrhoea.

0:09:07 > 0:09:10They'd come from the Midwest to California

0:09:10 > 0:09:15thinking it was sunny California and they'd get pneumonia.

0:09:15 > 0:09:21We were seeing 250 patients a day with no government support.

0:09:21 > 0:09:25In fact, we asked the Health Department to,

0:09:25 > 0:09:28you know, help us because we had this public health crisis.

0:09:28 > 0:09:31There are a number of people in Haight-Ashbury who have this.

0:09:31 > 0:09:34They have the syphilis, gonorrhoea and the clap,

0:09:34 > 0:09:37and it has to be stopped because if isn't stopped now,

0:09:37 > 0:09:38it's just going to spread.

0:09:38 > 0:09:41And if it spreads, everyone here is going to catch it.

0:09:41 > 0:09:43If you're boning some chick and she's got it,

0:09:43 > 0:09:46you say, "Oh, that's cool," and you go get yourself fixed up,

0:09:46 > 0:09:48in the meantime, she's giving it to somebody else.

0:09:59 > 0:10:02Naive young kids living on the streets of Haight-Ashbury

0:10:02 > 0:10:07became easy prey for adults who hadn't come for peace and love.

0:10:08 > 0:10:14There were more and more unsavoury characters

0:10:14 > 0:10:19that started to exploit the drug culture,

0:10:19 > 0:10:22which had been primarily marijuana and LSD.

0:10:23 > 0:10:26And now, all of a sudden,

0:10:26 > 0:10:30amphetamines and other things were being hawked

0:10:30 > 0:10:34and so, you know, a much rougher element -

0:10:34 > 0:10:36more like organised crime -

0:10:36 > 0:10:40came as time progressed in there

0:10:40 > 0:10:42because there was a buck to be made, you know.

0:10:42 > 0:10:45I started to notice that there were people on the street,

0:10:45 > 0:10:49if you will, who seemed different.

0:10:49 > 0:10:51They kind of looked like a lot of people looked,

0:10:51 > 0:10:53but they were into different things.

0:10:53 > 0:10:56They had no interest in social activism,

0:10:56 > 0:10:58they had no interest in politics,

0:10:58 > 0:11:02they had no interest in helping other people

0:11:02 > 0:11:04for any reason whatsoever.

0:11:04 > 0:11:07They had no spiritual centre. They had no ethical compass.

0:11:07 > 0:11:10They were just there for the party and for the hard drugs.

0:11:10 > 0:11:13It became a nightmare. It was a nightmare.

0:11:13 > 0:11:18I mean, Charlie Manson was cruising the main strip

0:11:18 > 0:11:22just looking for those stoned hippie eyes

0:11:22 > 0:11:24on some little girl, you know.

0:11:24 > 0:11:27And he'd just, like, get them under his wing

0:11:27 > 0:11:30and give them more of the same

0:11:30 > 0:11:35and eventually they were going on creepy crawls with him and his gang,

0:11:35 > 0:11:38you know, out to kill people.

0:11:38 > 0:11:42Charles Manson and his cult of teenage followers

0:11:42 > 0:11:47would go on to murder seven people in a drug-fuelled frenzy.

0:11:47 > 0:11:50I find that I have to stay out of people that I know that are getting stoned

0:11:50 > 0:11:53because when I see them on it,

0:11:53 > 0:11:55then I know that I want to get on it too, you know?

0:12:00 > 0:12:06By August 1967, the Haight-Ashbury had turned into a human freak show.

0:12:10 > 0:12:13The tourists coming into the Haight-Ashbury, for me,

0:12:13 > 0:12:17was an indicator that this thing had turned the corner.

0:12:17 > 0:12:20We became a destination - a tourist destination.

0:12:20 > 0:12:22We'd hold up mirrors in front of the bus

0:12:22 > 0:12:26so they could see themselves in the mirror instead of looking at us.

0:12:26 > 0:12:30There was a blossoming of head shops and hippie stores.

0:12:30 > 0:12:33You know, you'd go into stores and you could buy hippie clothing.

0:12:33 > 0:12:35Right? You could buy beards and wigs and stuff

0:12:35 > 0:12:38and go to Haight-Ashbury for the weekend.

0:12:38 > 0:12:44My parents came here looking for me over the Fourth of July weekend.

0:12:44 > 0:12:47By then, I was in Milwaukee getting my ear pierced,

0:12:47 > 0:12:50but my parents dressed up like hippies.

0:12:50 > 0:12:53So did my dad! My dad tried on bell-bottoms...

0:12:53 > 0:12:58My mom had these, like, white, plastic go-go boots and a miniskirt.

0:12:58 > 0:13:02And my father, who was, like, you know, portly,

0:13:02 > 0:13:06got a Nehru jacket and a peace sign.

0:13:06 > 0:13:09The media attention to the subculture

0:13:09 > 0:13:12destroyed most of its meaning.

0:13:12 > 0:13:15And the external symbols by which we used to recognise each other -

0:13:15 > 0:13:19long hair on guys, long dresses on girls,

0:13:19 > 0:13:22this language using the word hip or cool or groovy

0:13:22 > 0:13:25or my pad or whatever -

0:13:25 > 0:13:27all of those things were completely drained of meaning

0:13:27 > 0:13:30and became kind of cartoon things

0:13:30 > 0:13:34that were easier to make fun of than to emulate.

0:13:34 > 0:13:38MUSIC: The Rain, The Park And Other Things by The Cowsills

0:13:45 > 0:13:49In October, just four months into the Summer of Love,

0:13:49 > 0:13:52the social experiment into an anarchist community

0:13:52 > 0:13:54had run its course.

0:13:54 > 0:13:56The Diggers staged a mock funeral in the Haight

0:13:56 > 0:13:58to symbolise the death of hippie,

0:13:58 > 0:14:02and to persuade the college kids and runaways to go back home.

0:14:04 > 0:14:08The death of hippie was an event

0:14:08 > 0:14:12basically to float this notion about hippie.

0:14:12 > 0:14:16You know, that it was a bad idea, that it was a contrived,

0:14:16 > 0:14:19conceptualised, now commercialised idea.

0:14:19 > 0:14:23This was street theatre that was meant, hopefully,

0:14:23 > 0:14:25to be evocative and provocative.

0:14:32 > 0:14:34This eye-catching and dramatic performance

0:14:34 > 0:14:37caught the attention of two politicos from the New Left.

0:14:37 > 0:14:41Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin had emerged

0:14:41 > 0:14:44out of the free speech and anti-war movements

0:14:44 > 0:14:49to form a new political party called Yippies in December 1967.

0:14:49 > 0:14:54To achieve their aims, they, too, staged spectacular stunts

0:14:54 > 0:14:58designed to attract maximum media attention.

0:14:58 > 0:15:01See, the dollar in American society

0:15:01 > 0:15:03is a symbol of property,

0:15:03 > 0:15:07and we believe that property is theft.

0:15:07 > 0:15:11And one of the things we like to do is burn up the money.

0:15:11 > 0:15:14It was the famous emergence of Abbie Hoffman

0:15:14 > 0:15:17into the public stage in '67

0:15:17 > 0:15:21when he and half a dozen friends went to the New York Stock Exchange

0:15:21 > 0:15:23and scattered dollar bills

0:15:23 > 0:15:25onto the floor of the New York Stock Exchange,

0:15:25 > 0:15:28and watched all of these millionaires scurrying

0:15:28 > 0:15:31to pick up a dollar as sort of a comment on materialism.

0:15:31 > 0:15:35The idea was that the system operated on a structure of logic,

0:15:35 > 0:15:38and if you undercut that structure and subverted it,

0:15:38 > 0:15:40the system could not function.

0:15:40 > 0:15:43So, when Abbie Hoffman went to the New York Stock Exchange

0:15:43 > 0:15:47and threw a barrage of dollar bills down from the visitor's gallery

0:15:47 > 0:15:49onto the floor of the stock exchange,

0:15:49 > 0:15:51it disrupted the proceedings.

0:15:51 > 0:15:54And brokers actually tried to pick up the money.

0:15:54 > 0:15:58They were serious anarchists, revolutionary anarchists.

0:15:58 > 0:16:03'And now I introduce a presidential candidate, Pigasus!

0:16:03 > 0:16:07'The Democratic Party is going to nominate a pig for president

0:16:07 > 0:16:08'and a pig for vice president,

0:16:08 > 0:16:11'and so we're nominating a pig for president.'

0:16:11 > 0:16:13CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

0:16:13 > 0:16:17Abbie and Jerry, they had to pick a pig to nominate for president.

0:16:17 > 0:16:21Their candidate for president was a pig called Pigasus.

0:16:21 > 0:16:24You know? Well, that's good theatre. I like theatre.

0:16:24 > 0:16:28Theatre's really great. But they got in a fight over...

0:16:28 > 0:16:30One of them wanted a good-looking pig,

0:16:30 > 0:16:32and one of them wanted an ugly pig.

0:16:32 > 0:16:37So, they really were not talking to each other that night, you know?

0:16:37 > 0:16:41And I thought, "Wow, these guys are a little..."

0:16:41 > 0:16:43HE HUMS

0:16:43 > 0:16:45MUSIC: You Showed Me by The Turtles

0:16:45 > 0:16:48'Political pigs, your days are numbered.

0:16:48 > 0:16:50'We are the second American Revolution.

0:16:50 > 0:16:52'We are winning. Yippie!'

0:16:55 > 0:16:57With the support of hippie heavyweights

0:16:57 > 0:17:00like Allen Ginsberg and John Lennon,

0:17:00 > 0:17:03Abbie Hoffman was one of the most charismatic leaders

0:17:03 > 0:17:07of the revolution, but not everyone fell for his impish charms.

0:17:08 > 0:17:12Yippie was an anarchistic, you know, do-what-you-want.

0:17:12 > 0:17:14And I must say, at first, I was taken by their style

0:17:14 > 0:17:19because their style seemed insouciant and witty,

0:17:19 > 0:17:24and was not rhetoric-filled.

0:17:24 > 0:17:27But the hypocrisy of Yippie...

0:17:27 > 0:17:30You know, the revolution is about free everything.

0:17:30 > 0:17:33Free food and free drink. Well, that sounds good.

0:17:33 > 0:17:36Free housing and free grass. OK.

0:17:36 > 0:17:38And free women.

0:17:38 > 0:17:42Many women, who were free, sexually, in the '60s,

0:17:42 > 0:17:44that consent was too easy to come by,

0:17:44 > 0:17:46and that there was this feeling

0:17:46 > 0:17:49that they sort of had to go along with this.

0:17:49 > 0:17:51Men, especially in the hippie counterculture,

0:17:51 > 0:17:55especially in Haight-Ashbury, used - quote, unquote -

0:17:55 > 0:17:58free love as an excuse

0:17:58 > 0:18:01for violence against women.

0:18:01 > 0:18:04Groping, raping - there was an awful lot of that

0:18:04 > 0:18:05that was hidden at the time.

0:18:05 > 0:18:09MUSIC: You Don't Own Me by Lesley Gore

0:18:15 > 0:18:20The New Left and the hippie movement were led by white men.

0:18:20 > 0:18:22Were led by men.

0:18:22 > 0:18:27So, the women mostly rolled joints and made coffee.

0:18:27 > 0:18:30And if you said no, it was like, "Why are you being so bitchy?

0:18:30 > 0:18:33"Why are you being so counterrevolutionary?"

0:18:33 > 0:18:36Everything was defined by guys as what was revolution or not.

0:18:36 > 0:18:39So, I decided, "OK, well, I'll just learn to roll a..."

0:18:39 > 0:18:42Nobody will want my joint, and I just...

0:18:42 > 0:18:44They fell apart the minute you got hold of them,

0:18:44 > 0:18:46and I was never asked to roll a joint again.

0:18:48 > 0:18:51Robin Morgan formed a breakaway guerrilla theatre group

0:18:51 > 0:18:55to give women an independent voice in the revolution.

0:18:55 > 0:18:57WITCH stood for

0:18:57 > 0:19:01Women's International Terrorist Conspiracy From Hell.

0:19:01 > 0:19:05I mean, when we hexed the stock exchange of New York,

0:19:05 > 0:19:06we announced it to the press.

0:19:06 > 0:19:09We were going to go on such and such a morning

0:19:09 > 0:19:10and hex the stock exchange.

0:19:10 > 0:19:12And the stock exchange would not open,

0:19:12 > 0:19:14and the doors did not open because,

0:19:14 > 0:19:16at four o'clock in the morning the night before,

0:19:16 > 0:19:21two of us, three of us, went and oozed Krazy Glue in the locks.

0:19:21 > 0:19:25There's a picture over there of me and my supporters -

0:19:25 > 0:19:26my women supporters -

0:19:26 > 0:19:29all of us dressed as a version of WITCH,

0:19:29 > 0:19:31because WITCH was an idea.

0:19:31 > 0:19:33In a sense, it was like Yippie. Anyone could be a Yippie.

0:19:33 > 0:19:35- Right.- Any woman could be a WITCH.

0:19:35 > 0:19:37WITCH was actually very important.

0:19:37 > 0:19:41I think it was, in terms of putting an alternate identity

0:19:41 > 0:19:45for women out - for radical women - out in the world.

0:19:45 > 0:19:48MUSIC: Respect by Aretha Franklin

0:19:56 > 0:19:59As the hippies took on the American establishment,

0:19:59 > 0:20:02America's corporations responded in kind

0:20:02 > 0:20:04by buying into the one hippie commodity

0:20:04 > 0:20:07they thought they could sell - the music.

0:20:10 > 0:20:13Before the record companies came in,

0:20:13 > 0:20:15you could just go to the Sons Of Champlin

0:20:15 > 0:20:17or Big Brother And The Holding Company.

0:20:17 > 0:20:19They were just the guys in the neighbourhood.

0:20:19 > 0:20:22And they would hold these parties and we would celebrate ourselves.

0:20:22 > 0:20:24It was quite wonderful.

0:20:25 > 0:20:27But then the record companies came in

0:20:27 > 0:20:30and they started giving out 100,000 advances.

0:20:30 > 0:20:33And the musicians were ambivalent.

0:20:33 > 0:20:35They were getting 100,000 as an advance,

0:20:35 > 0:20:39which is about 700,000 today, maybe more.

0:20:39 > 0:20:41And they were told, "You can do whatever you want.

0:20:41 > 0:20:42"We're not going interfere.

0:20:42 > 0:20:45"You have the studio. Do whatever you want."

0:20:45 > 0:20:47So they took the deal.

0:20:47 > 0:20:50And I don't think any of the groups

0:20:50 > 0:20:52that were at all significant resisted.

0:20:52 > 0:20:58When the record companies showed up, it was the end of that golden era

0:20:58 > 0:21:04of three-day concerts and unity and that kind of feeling,

0:21:04 > 0:21:08because the thing about being a recording artist is that

0:21:08 > 0:21:10you become a personality along with it

0:21:10 > 0:21:12because they're marketing you.

0:21:12 > 0:21:16If it's Moby Grape, then you try to make them seem like

0:21:16 > 0:21:19the American Beatles or the American Stones.

0:21:19 > 0:21:22"The bad boys of San Francisco."

0:21:22 > 0:21:25The bad girl of San Francisco, Janis Joplin,

0:21:25 > 0:21:28was another artist to be signed up,

0:21:28 > 0:21:31but she wasn't going to bow down before the man -

0:21:31 > 0:21:36in this case, Columbia Records' overlord Goddard Lieberson.

0:21:36 > 0:21:40There was a party in Goddard Lieberson's room.

0:21:40 > 0:21:42So, Janis is there, and...

0:21:43 > 0:21:47- Oh, man. I don't know if I should tell this story.- 'Go on!'

0:21:47 > 0:21:51Well, she went into the bathroom, you know,

0:21:51 > 0:21:54and found that he had all of these...

0:21:54 > 0:21:57Like, a hairbrush and comb that had his initials on there,

0:21:57 > 0:21:59G-O-D - God.

0:21:59 > 0:22:01And she didn't like that.

0:22:01 > 0:22:04She went in and piled them on floor, and then...

0:22:05 > 0:22:10..and then came out and said, "Go and check what I did, dude."

0:22:10 > 0:22:12You know, I walked in there she'd peed

0:22:12 > 0:22:15on these toiletries of this guy.

0:22:15 > 0:22:18And I thought, "Well, that's really a cool thing to do,

0:22:18 > 0:22:21"but it's not something I wanted to see in particular.

0:22:21 > 0:22:24"But that's cool. I mean, if you can get on...

0:22:24 > 0:22:27"If you can not care enough about your career

0:22:27 > 0:22:30"to do something like that to the head of Columbia Records,

0:22:30 > 0:22:32"I'm right there with you."

0:22:32 > 0:22:35MUSIC: Me and Bobby McGee by Janis Joplin

0:22:37 > 0:22:39Big Brother And The Holding Company's

0:22:39 > 0:22:41Cheap Thrills album with Janis, starring Janis,

0:22:41 > 0:22:44became the first number-one album

0:22:44 > 0:22:47to come out of the Bay Area in 1968.

0:22:47 > 0:22:50So, that was a real change that someone could actually produce

0:22:50 > 0:22:52a number-one album from the Bay Area.

0:22:52 > 0:22:55No-one in Bay Area music had ever done anything like that before.

0:22:58 > 0:23:02As San Francisco's musicians were enjoying commercial success,

0:23:02 > 0:23:07by 1968, the revolutionary edge of the hippie music scene

0:23:07 > 0:23:12had moved to Detroit with a band called the MC5.

0:23:12 > 0:23:14We used to say that

0:23:14 > 0:23:17the Summer of Love didn't make a stop in Detroit.

0:23:17 > 0:23:19HE LAUGHS

0:23:19 > 0:23:22I was underwhelmed by the West Coast music.

0:23:22 > 0:23:25It didn't move me.

0:23:25 > 0:23:27We would open for them.

0:23:27 > 0:23:31If they were lame and they got up and started playing some lame...

0:23:33 > 0:23:37..sunbeams-and-flower, folky crap,

0:23:37 > 0:23:39we'd yell at them from the side of the stage,

0:23:39 > 0:23:42"Hey, kick out the jams, motherfucker!"

0:23:42 > 0:23:45- RECORD SCRATCHES, MUSIC STOPS - Kick out the jams, motherfucker!

0:23:45 > 0:23:49MUSIC: Kick Out The Jams by MC5

0:23:49 > 0:23:52The difference between MC5 and the other rock bands

0:23:52 > 0:23:54is that they were openly political

0:23:54 > 0:24:00at a time when most rock bands did not feel that it was wise.

0:24:00 > 0:24:02We know that Lyndon Johnson, as president,

0:24:02 > 0:24:06would call up owners of television or radio stations and tell them,

0:24:06 > 0:24:10you know, "Make sure that that particular record isn't played."

0:24:10 > 0:24:14But MC5 performed songs that were openly political,

0:24:14 > 0:24:17and actually revolutionary in the words.

0:24:17 > 0:24:19# Just trying to make it satisfactory

0:24:19 > 0:24:20# Over and over

0:24:20 > 0:24:24# But all these inclinations toward manic frustration

0:24:24 > 0:24:27# I want my vaccination against castration

0:24:27 > 0:24:30# Vietnam, what a sexy war

0:24:30 > 0:24:34# Uncle Sam's a pimp, wants us to be whores

0:24:34 > 0:24:35# I said no... #

0:24:35 > 0:24:37The MC5 were closely connected

0:24:37 > 0:24:40to the revolutionary White Panther Party,

0:24:40 > 0:24:43the white counterparts of the Marxist Black Panthers.

0:24:43 > 0:24:46The band would often carry rifles onto stage,

0:24:46 > 0:24:49and their uncompromising political stance

0:24:49 > 0:24:53was exactly the type of music needed to kick off the revolution.

0:24:55 > 0:24:57We thought of ourselves as revolutionaries

0:24:57 > 0:25:02because we wanted to use this music to change the society.

0:25:03 > 0:25:06We wanted to overthrow the government with rock and roll.

0:25:06 > 0:25:10- HE CHUCKLES - You know what I'm saying?

0:25:10 > 0:25:13So, we threw ourselves at the wall, you know?

0:25:23 > 0:25:29We had a government that was waging a war in our name

0:25:29 > 0:25:32at home against black people,

0:25:32 > 0:25:36which had been going on for quite some time -

0:25:36 > 0:25:38a couple of hundred years -

0:25:38 > 0:25:41and then another war abroad in Vietnam...

0:25:43 > 0:25:48..waging a war against Vietnamese people.

0:25:48 > 0:25:53So, we were saying, "No. Not in our name."

0:25:53 > 0:25:57Young people had just reached a point where they said, "Enough."

0:25:57 > 0:26:00The hypocrisy of the older generation

0:26:00 > 0:26:04was not tolerable any more, and we weren't going to stand for it.

0:26:04 > 0:26:06We were going to raise our voices,

0:26:06 > 0:26:10we were going to raise our guitars, and at some points...

0:26:11 > 0:26:14..some of us said, "We'll raise our rifles and our pistols."

0:26:14 > 0:26:18That was the idea - total assault on the culture,

0:26:18 > 0:26:21by any means necessary,

0:26:21 > 0:26:24including rock and roll, dope, and fucking in the streets.

0:26:24 > 0:26:27That was our slogan.

0:26:27 > 0:26:31MUSIC: Something In The Air by Thunderclap Newman

0:26:37 > 0:26:41By the summer of '68, one year on from the Summer of Love,

0:26:41 > 0:26:44word of revolution had spread across the world.

0:26:44 > 0:26:47Wave after wave of student uprisings,

0:26:47 > 0:26:51from Mexico to Tokyo, promised to sweep away the old order

0:26:51 > 0:26:55and usher in a new age of freedom and equality.

0:26:57 > 0:27:01In America, the Yippies made an alliance with the Black Panthers,

0:27:01 > 0:27:05and arranged for the MC5 and a number of Californian bands

0:27:05 > 0:27:10to play a free concert in Chicago in front of 15,000 hippies.

0:27:10 > 0:27:13It would coincide with the Democratic National Convention

0:27:13 > 0:27:16being held in the city at the same time,

0:27:16 > 0:27:20and culminate in a huge, anti-Vietnam War demonstration.

0:27:21 > 0:27:26They were going to have an alternative rock festival in Chicago

0:27:26 > 0:27:30to counterbalance the Democrats' convention.

0:27:30 > 0:27:32They would be the convention of death,

0:27:32 > 0:27:34and we would be the convention of life,

0:27:34 > 0:27:36and did we want to come and play?

0:27:36 > 0:27:37And we said, "Of course."

0:27:37 > 0:27:41We wanted to invite rock bands from all around the country,

0:27:41 > 0:27:44like the Grateful Dead, Country Joe And The Fish,

0:27:44 > 0:27:46the Motor City Five,

0:27:46 > 0:27:49and we were going to have literary figures speak

0:27:49 > 0:27:52and comedians and theatre people.

0:27:52 > 0:27:56- It was going to be a joyous occasion.- It was.

0:27:56 > 0:27:58"We're going to go there and we're going to do this.

0:27:58 > 0:28:00"Man, it's going to be great, you know?

0:28:00 > 0:28:02"What could possibly happen?"

0:28:02 > 0:28:04What could happen?!

0:28:04 > 0:28:08They'll beat the shit out of you and throw you in jail -

0:28:08 > 0:28:10that's what can happen.

0:28:10 > 0:28:12Actually, I think Country Joe came...

0:28:12 > 0:28:15- Country Joe was... - ..and he was in an elevator,

0:28:15 > 0:28:18- and somebody punched him out or something?- Right. Right.

0:28:18 > 0:28:19- And then...- BOTH:- He left.

0:28:19 > 0:28:22We were the only band that showed up and played,

0:28:22 > 0:28:25and from my experience,

0:28:25 > 0:28:28when the band stops playing is when the riot starts.

0:28:28 > 0:28:30Once the crowd doesn't have anything to focus on,

0:28:30 > 0:28:35then the tension between them and the police explodes.

0:28:45 > 0:28:47The Chicago police,

0:28:47 > 0:28:50they were the most brutal police force in the country.

0:28:50 > 0:28:52And they, you know,

0:28:52 > 0:28:56took out their clubs and wailed away at people on camera.

0:28:56 > 0:29:00And that made the demonstration an incredible success.

0:29:00 > 0:29:03However, if you were in the middle of this, as I was,

0:29:03 > 0:29:05you were in terrific danger.

0:29:07 > 0:29:11Tear gas, if it does not knock you out, it deranges you.

0:29:11 > 0:29:15So everybody was crazy from the tear gas

0:29:15 > 0:29:17and mace and all of that, and I had...

0:29:17 > 0:29:21You know, I had a T-shirt around my mouth and nose for the tear gas.

0:29:26 > 0:29:29- We WERE gassed.- Oh, yeah.

0:29:29 > 0:29:31We ran from that, and that gas was...

0:29:31 > 0:29:34You know, you couldn't breathe.

0:29:34 > 0:29:37Tears ran down your face and the gas stuck to our clothes,

0:29:37 > 0:29:39it stuck to our eyes.

0:29:39 > 0:29:41And we would come back the next day sort of...

0:29:41 > 0:29:43But we were prepared to fight again.

0:29:43 > 0:29:46Finally, they called out the National Guard. The troops arrived.

0:29:46 > 0:29:48There are pictures of hippies putting flowers

0:29:48 > 0:29:51in the rifle barrels of the troops who, you know,

0:29:51 > 0:29:54understood perfectly what these kids were up to.

0:29:54 > 0:29:57So, the troops actually saved us

0:29:57 > 0:30:00from the most horrible possibilities,

0:30:00 > 0:30:04and what happened then was the hippie movement lost its quietism

0:30:04 > 0:30:07and began to become combative.

0:30:07 > 0:30:12MUSIC: Street Fighting Man by The Rolling Stones

0:30:49 > 0:30:52The Chicago riot was a huge turning point in the revolution.

0:30:52 > 0:30:54Eight of the festival organisers,

0:30:54 > 0:30:57including Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin,

0:30:57 > 0:31:01were tried and convicted for incitement to riot, and imprisoned.

0:31:01 > 0:31:05The manager of the MC5, John Sinclair,

0:31:05 > 0:31:08also got ten years for selling a single joint

0:31:08 > 0:31:09to an undercover police officer.

0:31:12 > 0:31:15But far from stopping the revolution in its tracks,

0:31:15 > 0:31:20the New Left reorganised themselves into even more militant groups,

0:31:20 > 0:31:24many of whom were prepared to fight fire with fire.

0:31:24 > 0:31:27The most extreme of these were the Weather Underground.

0:31:29 > 0:31:31There's no way to be committed to nonviolence

0:31:31 > 0:31:33in the middle of the most violent society

0:31:33 > 0:31:34that history's ever created.

0:31:34 > 0:31:37I'm not committed to nonviolence in any way.

0:31:37 > 0:31:42The United States was the greatest force against humanity

0:31:42 > 0:31:44and justice and peace in the world

0:31:44 > 0:31:50that we had to oppose it with every tool at our disposal,

0:31:50 > 0:31:52and that it was...

0:31:52 > 0:31:54That we were part of a global struggle.

0:32:00 > 0:32:04In 1969, the Weather Underground declared war

0:32:04 > 0:32:06on the government of the United States

0:32:06 > 0:32:11and launched a bombing campaign to try and force political change.

0:32:11 > 0:32:13Their terrorist actions were echoed

0:32:13 > 0:32:15by other anarchist groups around the world,

0:32:15 > 0:32:18including, in Britain, The Angry Brigade,

0:32:18 > 0:32:22and the Baader-Meinhof Gang in Germany.

0:32:22 > 0:32:24The Weather Underground had planted a bomb

0:32:24 > 0:32:27inside the US Capitol Building and the Senate staircase.

0:32:27 > 0:32:29Did quite a bit of damage to the building.

0:32:29 > 0:32:33Perhaps most famously, they blew themselves up -

0:32:33 > 0:32:35three of them - in a New York City townhouse

0:32:35 > 0:32:38where they were trying to actually build bombs,

0:32:38 > 0:32:40but something went awry with the dynamite,

0:32:40 > 0:32:43and so they managed to destroy the entire building

0:32:43 > 0:32:45and themselves, as well.

0:32:45 > 0:32:47Comrades of ours were killed -

0:32:47 > 0:32:52killed themselves in an explosion in New York that March,

0:32:52 > 0:32:57and I disappeared along with a lot of other people.

0:32:57 > 0:33:00Well, I was a fugitive for 11 years.

0:33:00 > 0:33:04MUSIC: She's Not There by The Zombies

0:33:07 > 0:33:11People took those "wanted" posters off Post Office walls

0:33:11 > 0:33:14and put them in their windows and said, "Welcome here."

0:33:14 > 0:33:18You know, we felt protected by a bigger scene.

0:33:19 > 0:33:23Some hippies were only too happy to offer the Weather Underground

0:33:23 > 0:33:27and other revolutionaries on the run safe haven in their houses.

0:33:28 > 0:33:30The American government took the threat

0:33:30 > 0:33:32of guerrilla groups so seriously

0:33:32 > 0:33:36that President Nixon launched a national counterterrorism campaign

0:33:36 > 0:33:38to try and stop them.

0:33:40 > 0:33:43J Edgar Hoover developed a programme

0:33:43 > 0:33:47to discredit American dissent.

0:33:47 > 0:33:50It was called COINTELPRO,

0:33:50 > 0:33:54and it targeted every opposition group

0:33:54 > 0:33:58that was functioning in the country in those years -

0:33:58 > 0:34:01the Black Panthers, the Yippies, the anti-war movement,

0:34:01 > 0:34:03the civil rights movement -

0:34:03 > 0:34:09anyone that opposed the Nixon administration's policies,

0:34:09 > 0:34:11as benign as the group might be,

0:34:11 > 0:34:15or as militant as the group might be.

0:34:15 > 0:34:18And they sent in undercover operatives,

0:34:18 > 0:34:21so you kind of didn't know who to trust.

0:34:21 > 0:34:24MUSIC: Gimme Shelter by The Rolling Stones

0:34:24 > 0:34:27One of the models for all would-be revolutionaries

0:34:27 > 0:34:31were the Marxist-Leninist Black Panther Party.

0:34:31 > 0:34:35Under the joint leadership of the charismatic Fred Hampton,

0:34:35 > 0:34:38their armed struggle was seen as inspirational

0:34:38 > 0:34:39by other guerrilla groups.

0:34:48 > 0:34:51When it came to the Black Panther Party,

0:34:51 > 0:34:55Hoover decided, and stated, in 1968,

0:34:55 > 0:34:58that the Black Panther Party represented the greatest threat

0:34:58 > 0:35:02to the internal security of the United States.

0:35:02 > 0:35:05Now, what J Edgar Hoover said made us so dangerous

0:35:05 > 0:35:07was that we were getting other people

0:35:07 > 0:35:13to be aligned with this philosophy of revolutionary change.

0:35:13 > 0:35:18The Black Panther Party not only had coalitions with white organisations,

0:35:18 > 0:35:20starting with the Peace and Freedom Party,

0:35:20 > 0:35:22which was mostly white...

0:35:22 > 0:35:26SDS was a partner at one point with the Weather Underground.

0:35:26 > 0:35:30At that point, everything was done to,

0:35:30 > 0:35:33as Hoover said, disrupt,

0:35:33 > 0:35:36discredit or destroy the Black Panther Party.

0:35:36 > 0:35:39And in December of 1969,

0:35:39 > 0:35:42with the murder of Fred Hampton in Chicago,

0:35:42 > 0:35:45it was really horrible.

0:35:46 > 0:35:49The people who felt the stomping most

0:35:49 > 0:35:51- were actually people of colour. - That's right.

0:35:51 > 0:35:56They assassinated Fred Hampton and Mark Clark in their sleep.

0:35:56 > 0:36:00- Right.- A joint task force of the FBI and local police.

0:36:00 > 0:36:05So, we took some losses, but not like that.

0:36:05 > 0:36:06Right, exactly. I mean,

0:36:06 > 0:36:09they said they were going to prevent the rise of a black messiah,

0:36:09 > 0:36:10and that was...

0:36:10 > 0:36:14And to destroy and neutralise - these are FBI terms -

0:36:14 > 0:36:18destroy and neutralise the Panthers, destroy and neutralise the New Left.

0:36:18 > 0:36:21I think that the reason that I was under so much surveillance

0:36:21 > 0:36:23at the end was - and I know this from my files -

0:36:23 > 0:36:26they were looking for Abbie, who was underground.

0:36:26 > 0:36:28And so it had...

0:36:28 > 0:36:32There's no question it had a chilling effect.

0:36:32 > 0:36:34Those of us who are alive today can tell you that

0:36:34 > 0:36:36we all thought that we were going to get killed.

0:36:36 > 0:36:38We never imagined living past 30.

0:36:38 > 0:36:40Or 25, in some cases!

0:36:41 > 0:36:45And so...we were afraid.

0:36:51 > 0:36:54People realised, if they went head-to-head with America,

0:36:54 > 0:36:56they would be shot,

0:36:56 > 0:37:00and we were not in such a hurry to start a revolution.

0:37:00 > 0:37:02You could see what it would be.

0:37:05 > 0:37:07When a student protester was shot dead

0:37:07 > 0:37:11at a sit-in at the People's Park in Berkeley in 1969,

0:37:11 > 0:37:13and 50 others were injured,

0:37:13 > 0:37:16it was clear that the government wasn't going to back down.

0:37:18 > 0:37:21This convinced many would-be revolutionaries

0:37:21 > 0:37:24to abandon going head-to-head against the state.

0:37:27 > 0:37:32I was under surveillance, and it became...

0:37:33 > 0:37:35..uncomfortable to live

0:37:35 > 0:37:39feeling as if somebody was listening to my life.

0:37:39 > 0:37:43So, at a certain point, I felt...

0:37:44 > 0:37:48..like going out of their reach.

0:37:50 > 0:37:53Harriet Beinfield sought refuge in the Black Bear commune

0:37:53 > 0:37:56in the remotest reaches of California.

0:37:56 > 0:37:59Those who once dreamed of changing society

0:37:59 > 0:38:03now opted to reject it and start afresh.

0:38:03 > 0:38:05Between 1966 and 1973,

0:38:05 > 0:38:08as many as a million Americans became involved in communal living,

0:38:08 > 0:38:11many of them heading back to the land to do it,

0:38:11 > 0:38:12as they said at the time -

0:38:12 > 0:38:14moving to rural areas, buying a patch of land,

0:38:14 > 0:38:17living with something between five and 50 friends.

0:38:17 > 0:38:22MUSIC: The Cost Of Freedom by Crosby, Stills, Nash And Young

0:38:28 > 0:38:31A sociologist handed out questionnaires

0:38:31 > 0:38:34to 60,000 residents of rural communes,

0:38:34 > 0:38:36and he asked a very interesting question.

0:38:36 > 0:38:39"Have any of you been arrested for protesting

0:38:39 > 0:38:42"in an anti-war movement or a civil rights protest?"

0:38:42 > 0:38:45And half said that they had,

0:38:45 > 0:38:47but the other half said they had not.

0:38:47 > 0:38:50And then he said, "Since moving to the commune,

0:38:50 > 0:38:53"have you been arrested?" And everyone said no.

0:38:53 > 0:38:56The new communalist critique of society, in many ways,

0:38:56 > 0:38:59was not perceived as a threat by the central state.

0:38:59 > 0:39:01If they want to go live in Colorado, grow their hair long,

0:39:01 > 0:39:03smoke dope, I mean, big deal, right?

0:39:03 > 0:39:05That's rural Colorado - I don't really care.

0:39:13 > 0:39:17Black Bear Ranch was really deep in the woods,

0:39:17 > 0:39:23and many miles on old logging roads to get there.

0:39:23 > 0:39:27When we arrived, there was one house.

0:39:27 > 0:39:28There were 60 of us.

0:39:28 > 0:39:33So we had to build shelters for ourselves

0:39:33 > 0:39:36out of the materials that were there.

0:39:37 > 0:39:39And you had, you know,

0:39:39 > 0:39:4350 urban people who'd never lived in the wilderness before,

0:39:43 > 0:39:45and every hour and a half,

0:39:45 > 0:39:50they would run around the house beating frying pans and pots

0:39:50 > 0:39:52to scare away the bears and the mountain lions.

0:39:52 > 0:39:57MUSIC: Hole In My Shoe by Traffic

0:39:57 > 0:39:59The communes had first been created

0:39:59 > 0:40:02by the Nature Boy tribe of the hippies.

0:40:02 > 0:40:05Here at Black Bear, they were determined to implement

0:40:05 > 0:40:08the hippie experiment in alternative living,

0:40:08 > 0:40:12based on ecological and communal values.

0:40:12 > 0:40:14We shared our money, we shared our food,

0:40:14 > 0:40:18we shared our bodies, we shared our children.

0:40:18 > 0:40:23You know, we shared everything and we were trying to figure out...

0:40:24 > 0:40:26..how far we could take that.

0:40:26 > 0:40:30Black Bear was so distant

0:40:30 > 0:40:34that strange ideas could spread like a virus through it.

0:40:34 > 0:40:35So, for instance...

0:40:37 > 0:40:40..a group of radical women took over one winter,

0:40:40 > 0:40:42and they passed a law that

0:40:42 > 0:40:46you could only sleep with the same woman twice

0:40:46 > 0:40:49because, otherwise, you were encouraging coupling,

0:40:49 > 0:40:53which was too bourgeois. So, for instance, that would...

0:40:53 > 0:40:56When I had slept with all the women that I wanted to sleep with,

0:40:56 > 0:40:58I would figure out a reason

0:40:58 > 0:41:00to run back to the city and do a food run.

0:41:02 > 0:41:04But one aspect of communal living

0:41:04 > 0:41:09continuously threatened to undermine the experiment in a sharing society.

0:41:09 > 0:41:14In the winter, 60 people slept in one space,

0:41:14 > 0:41:21and the sort of habits of patriarchy meant that...

0:41:23 > 0:41:26This is going to sound a little harsh.

0:41:26 > 0:41:30That the men were predators and the women...

0:41:31 > 0:41:37..were under sort of peer pressure to oblige.

0:41:37 > 0:41:42I mean, women were literally hauling firewood at those communes

0:41:42 > 0:41:47and being the property of six men and not using birth control

0:41:47 > 0:41:49because the men didn't want them to and it was natural.

0:41:49 > 0:41:52I mean, the atrocities that are yet to surface

0:41:52 > 0:41:59from women's treatment by the rural hippie movement

0:41:59 > 0:42:00are considerable.

0:42:00 > 0:42:05MUSIC: Different Drum by Linda Rondstandt

0:42:08 > 0:42:12Old patriarchal prejudices had plagued the hippie movement

0:42:12 > 0:42:15since its earliest days.

0:42:15 > 0:42:18Now women formed consciousness-raising groups,

0:42:18 > 0:42:20where they could share their experiences of sexism

0:42:20 > 0:42:22with other women.

0:42:23 > 0:42:26I went to my first consciousness-raising group,

0:42:26 > 0:42:31and I said, "I have to admit that I have sometimes,

0:42:31 > 0:42:33"on occasion,

0:42:33 > 0:42:38"like, more than once, faked an orgasm."

0:42:38 > 0:42:42And every woman in the room said, "Oh, you, too?"

0:42:43 > 0:42:45And I cannot tell you...

0:42:45 > 0:42:48I can laugh about it today, but, my dear...

0:42:50 > 0:42:52..my posture changed, you know?

0:42:52 > 0:42:54I sat up in a different way. I...

0:42:54 > 0:42:56I...

0:42:56 > 0:42:59Such a weight was lifted from me,

0:42:59 > 0:43:04and the "it's not just me" was huge.

0:43:04 > 0:43:06And, of course, if it's not just you,

0:43:06 > 0:43:08then what is it?

0:43:10 > 0:43:14Robin Morgan finally broke her ties with the hippie movement

0:43:14 > 0:43:17when she wrote a damning expose of sexism in the New Left

0:43:17 > 0:43:20called Goodbye To All That,

0:43:20 > 0:43:22urging other women to break away, as well.

0:43:24 > 0:43:26"Goodbye forever, counterfeit left,

0:43:26 > 0:43:31"counterfeit, male-dominated, cracked-glass-mirror reflection

0:43:31 > 0:43:33"of the American nightmare.

0:43:33 > 0:43:35"Women are the real left.

0:43:35 > 0:43:37"We are rising with a fury

0:43:37 > 0:43:42"older and potentially greater than any force in history."

0:43:42 > 0:43:45She named all the names

0:43:45 > 0:43:49of the men who ran all the different organisations,

0:43:49 > 0:43:52and she pointed out some of their problems.

0:43:52 > 0:43:57- Quite clearly.- Clearly. But I also didn't like it.

0:43:57 > 0:44:00I mean, I was incredibly uncomfortable when it came out

0:44:00 > 0:44:04- and felt really defensive about it...- Well...

0:44:04 > 0:44:07- ..cos I knew it was right! - Yeah, there you go.

0:44:07 > 0:44:10It was another version of "You, too?"

0:44:10 > 0:44:13It was the first time a woman had blown,

0:44:13 > 0:44:16with leftist credentials,

0:44:16 > 0:44:20known and respected by the guys, so she must be good,

0:44:20 > 0:44:22who had just...boom!

0:44:22 > 0:44:26We were surrounded by all kinds of liberation movements -

0:44:26 > 0:44:28black liberation, Chicano liberation,

0:44:28 > 0:44:31the National Liberation Front of South Vietnam -

0:44:31 > 0:44:33all these various liberation movements

0:44:33 > 0:44:38that we admired and emulated, but where were women?

0:44:38 > 0:44:40And then, light bulb! Well, OK.

0:44:40 > 0:44:42And that's where the phrase women's...

0:44:42 > 0:44:45That's why we started out - before feminism,

0:44:45 > 0:44:48we called it women's liberation because it was, in a sense...

0:44:48 > 0:44:51We were inspired by all these various other liberation movements.

0:44:51 > 0:44:54It was like a series of steps

0:44:54 > 0:44:59that were an advancement in consciousness.

0:44:59 > 0:45:01There's no question, at least for me,

0:45:01 > 0:45:04that Goodbye To All That - the title of that piece -

0:45:04 > 0:45:06was, as I said, germinal.

0:45:06 > 0:45:09It was one in a series of steps that...

0:45:09 > 0:45:11And, ultimately, at a certain point, I said,

0:45:11 > 0:45:14"All right, I am, in fact, saying goodbye to all that."

0:45:14 > 0:45:16MUSIC: Woodstock by Crosby, Stills, Nash And Young

0:45:16 > 0:45:19Whilst women's liberation was a response

0:45:19 > 0:45:21to the chauvinism of the hippie movement,

0:45:21 > 0:45:24the message of peace, love and music

0:45:24 > 0:45:27was reaching out to an even bigger audience.

0:45:35 > 0:45:38In August 1969, plans were hatched

0:45:38 > 0:45:42to stage a massive three-day concert outside New York.

0:45:42 > 0:45:45When revellers broke through the fence,

0:45:45 > 0:45:48it became the biggest free festival of all time,

0:45:48 > 0:45:54symbolising all the hope and chaos of the hippie movement in one event,

0:45:54 > 0:45:55as immortalised on film.

0:45:57 > 0:46:00Woodstock was a very interesting experience.

0:46:00 > 0:46:02When we were flying over it,

0:46:02 > 0:46:05it looked like an encampment of the Macedonian army.

0:46:05 > 0:46:09When you get, you know, 400,000, 500,000 people all together

0:46:09 > 0:46:12and you're flying over them in a helicopter

0:46:12 > 0:46:15and there's fires and rain and mud and music,

0:46:15 > 0:46:17it was a fascinating experience.

0:46:21 > 0:46:23Oh, Woodstock was great.

0:46:23 > 0:46:26It was like Monterey, only bigger.

0:46:26 > 0:46:29I mean, I watched lots of the show... The sing...

0:46:29 > 0:46:30You know, the other acts.

0:46:30 > 0:46:33I saw them perform, and they were great.

0:46:33 > 0:46:37The music was great, the vibe was great, the audience was great.

0:46:37 > 0:46:41HE PLAYS THE STAR-SPANGLED BANNER

0:46:42 > 0:46:48I mean, Hendrix was just so emblematic of the...

0:46:49 > 0:46:51..emergence of the Woodstock Nation.

0:46:51 > 0:46:57His presence at Woodstock summarised the lifestyle, the freedom,

0:46:57 > 0:47:00the brash resistance to conformity,

0:47:00 > 0:47:04status quo, the sexual threat,

0:47:04 > 0:47:06you know, kind of a black sexual threat

0:47:06 > 0:47:08and a countercultural sexual threat

0:47:08 > 0:47:12that mainstream America saw embodied, you know, in Hendrix.

0:47:15 > 0:47:17I saw him, I stayed,

0:47:17 > 0:47:20and I was standing there in the mud when he played Star-Spangled Banner

0:47:20 > 0:47:23and I thought, "Oh, fuck, this is like...

0:47:23 > 0:47:27"This is an incredible musical moment,

0:47:27 > 0:47:31"and he is the best guitar player that ever lived."

0:47:31 > 0:47:34He shredded the national anthem. He shredded it!

0:47:34 > 0:47:36I mean, he tore it to bits.

0:47:36 > 0:47:39It was fucking mind-blowing!

0:47:39 > 0:47:40It's still mind-blowing today.

0:47:45 > 0:47:50The Star-Spangled Banner performance just seems to be the piece of music

0:47:50 > 0:47:52that just spoke to the chaos, the zeitgeist

0:47:52 > 0:47:54of the moment, you know, the most authoritatively,

0:47:54 > 0:47:58the most disruptively. Very heraldic

0:47:58 > 0:48:00of an apocalypse, in the sense of,

0:48:00 > 0:48:03you know, something that removes the veil.

0:48:05 > 0:48:08Jimi Hendrix's performance of Star-Spangled Banner

0:48:08 > 0:48:10in the Woodstock film

0:48:10 > 0:48:13both encapsulated the distorted, dystopian vision

0:48:13 > 0:48:16of a nation caught up in a war it didn't believe in,

0:48:16 > 0:48:19and, at the same time, was a requiem

0:48:19 > 0:48:22for a political revolution that was not to be.

0:48:24 > 0:48:27MUSIC: Both Sides Now by Joni Mitchell

0:48:28 > 0:48:32The confrontational attitude of the hippies

0:48:32 > 0:48:34had given way to a new sense of reflection.

0:48:39 > 0:48:41The political became personal,

0:48:41 > 0:48:44and this found a voice in a new, laid-back sound

0:48:44 > 0:48:48emerging from a community of inward-looking singer-songwriters.

0:48:48 > 0:48:51And it came not out of San Francisco,

0:48:51 > 0:48:54but the affluent, leafy canyons of LA.

0:48:54 > 0:48:57It's all very close together, hodgepodge.

0:48:57 > 0:49:00You know, little cabins and little windy streets,

0:49:00 > 0:49:02and you literally walk out of your door

0:49:02 > 0:49:05and walk over to Danny Hutton's house,

0:49:05 > 0:49:07walk up to see The Turtles,

0:49:07 > 0:49:10go down to see Joni Mitchell and Alice Cooper.

0:49:12 > 0:49:16Laurel Canyon was a small area of beautiful countryside.

0:49:16 > 0:49:18It's very close to the centre of Los Angeles,

0:49:18 > 0:49:23but there, there was this collection of musicians and artists

0:49:23 > 0:49:26that lived close to each other that would interact.

0:49:26 > 0:49:29And that's what everyone was doing - it was what Jackson was doing,

0:49:29 > 0:49:32it was what Joni was doing, some of the Eagles, you know,

0:49:32 > 0:49:34and la-la-la-la-la.

0:49:34 > 0:49:37It was a great time in Laurel Canyon in those days.

0:49:37 > 0:49:41# Tears and fears and feeling proud

0:49:41 > 0:49:46# To say "I love you" right out loud

0:49:46 > 0:49:48# Dreams and schemes... #

0:49:48 > 0:49:52Joni Mitchell was typical of a new generation

0:49:52 > 0:49:54of Laurel Canyon artists

0:49:54 > 0:49:57who took the peace-loving spirit of the hippies

0:49:57 > 0:49:59and turned it into music that conquered the world.

0:50:01 > 0:50:04Laurel Canyon is in the Hollywood Hills

0:50:04 > 0:50:07and became a magnet for the hip, young gunslingers

0:50:07 > 0:50:09of the LA film industry

0:50:09 > 0:50:13who felt a natural affinity with the hippie movement.

0:50:13 > 0:50:15There were also, of course, at the time,

0:50:15 > 0:50:17the new young bucks of Hollywood,

0:50:17 > 0:50:21like the producers of The Monkees, Bob Rafelson and Bert Schneider,

0:50:21 > 0:50:26and they were indeed creating the new Hollywood film industry.

0:50:26 > 0:50:30MUSIC: Born To Be Wild by Steppenwolf

0:50:30 > 0:50:34With brilliant improvised direction by Dennis Hopper,

0:50:34 > 0:50:38Easy Rider tells the story of two hippie drug dealers

0:50:38 > 0:50:40on a road trip across the Midwest.

0:50:40 > 0:50:43# Get your motor runnin'

0:50:43 > 0:50:45# Head out on the highway... #

0:50:47 > 0:50:49Easy Rider was a smash hit

0:50:49 > 0:50:52at the box office and paved the way

0:50:52 > 0:50:54for an explosion of new

0:50:54 > 0:50:56Hollywood directors as antiestablishment

0:50:56 > 0:51:00films flooded out of Tinseltown's dream machine.

0:51:00 > 0:51:04MUSIC: Stairway To Heaven by Led Zeppelin

0:51:10 > 0:51:13The hippies were transforming American culture

0:51:13 > 0:51:16with their music and their values.

0:51:16 > 0:51:19Now the pioneering psychological experiments

0:51:19 > 0:51:24of the truth-seeking hippie tribe promised the ultimate dream -

0:51:24 > 0:51:26a revolution of the mind.

0:51:26 > 0:51:30The mystical experiences that enough people had on LSD

0:51:30 > 0:51:34led them to seek out other ways of looking at the world.

0:51:34 > 0:51:37I read a statistic that you'd have to verify,

0:51:37 > 0:51:40that the I Ching went from selling 1,000 copies a year

0:51:40 > 0:51:43to 50,000 copies a year by the end of the '60s.

0:51:43 > 0:51:48And there were all sorts of mystical texts and books

0:51:48 > 0:51:51that entered the culture very, very quickly.

0:51:51 > 0:51:55The centre of what would become known as the New Age movement

0:51:55 > 0:52:00first established itself in 1962 in a former spa hotel

0:52:00 > 0:52:04on the coast road outside San Francisco.

0:52:04 > 0:52:06Here, at the Esalen Institute,

0:52:06 > 0:52:09intellectual gurus of the hippie movement,

0:52:09 > 0:52:11like Aldous Huxley and Timothy Leary,

0:52:11 > 0:52:15had used their experiments with LSD to create new models

0:52:15 > 0:52:19of psychological and philosophical enquiry.

0:52:20 > 0:52:22People were coming for a weekend

0:52:22 > 0:52:25or for five days or for several months

0:52:25 > 0:52:30to deepen your understanding of yourself and others.

0:52:30 > 0:52:34How to become, you know, a better person.

0:52:34 > 0:52:37How to try out new ways of being.

0:52:37 > 0:52:39That's central to what Esalen's about.

0:52:39 > 0:52:42It's not to withdraw from the world,

0:52:42 > 0:52:45it's to help the world come to a greater birth,

0:52:45 > 0:52:47to give rise to a greater life.

0:52:49 > 0:52:52We were catalytic for the dispersion of these practices.

0:52:52 > 0:52:55I mean, a lot of people said that, when we started,

0:52:55 > 0:52:57there were about 20 yoga studios in America.

0:52:57 > 0:52:59Now there are 20,000.

0:52:59 > 0:53:02None of us had ever heard of the word mindfulness,

0:53:02 > 0:53:05in the way it's used now, in 1962.

0:53:05 > 0:53:08And we're actually experiencing right now,

0:53:08 > 0:53:10I must say, Esalen, with a...

0:53:10 > 0:53:14This is kind of like we're having a second beginning, a new beginning,

0:53:14 > 0:53:18because we have so many young people now coming in.

0:53:18 > 0:53:23And there is a kind of marriage afoot with Silicon Valley.

0:53:23 > 0:53:28Our new executive director has sold an algorithm to Google,

0:53:28 > 0:53:31and there's kind of a new marriage in the making.

0:53:31 > 0:53:35MUSIC: New World Coming by Mama Cass Elliot

0:53:38 > 0:53:42The hippie experiment to explore new ideas and consciousness

0:53:42 > 0:53:46and human connection was first reimagined in Silicon Valley

0:53:46 > 0:53:49by the pioneers of the Information Age.

0:53:49 > 0:53:53And although the means they used were not chemical, like LSD,

0:53:53 > 0:53:55but digital, like computer code,

0:53:55 > 0:53:59the spirit of invention and adventure was pure hippie.

0:54:02 > 0:54:06Silicon Valley required sort of this proto state

0:54:06 > 0:54:10of hippiedom, a California mentality,

0:54:10 > 0:54:12a California perspective

0:54:12 > 0:54:15where you didn't ask permission - you just did it -

0:54:15 > 0:54:18where there was a bias to the open and sharing

0:54:18 > 0:54:21rather than to the proprietary,

0:54:21 > 0:54:25where there was the expectation that you would try things

0:54:25 > 0:54:27and do it yourself and the fact that,

0:54:27 > 0:54:29when people get rich...

0:54:30 > 0:54:35..what they do with their money is they invest into other crazy ideas.

0:54:39 > 0:54:41Perhaps the most famous hippie

0:54:41 > 0:54:45to turn their ideas and values into a business

0:54:45 > 0:54:49was a Zen Buddhist LSD advocate who went on to become

0:54:49 > 0:54:53one of the most successful computer magnates of all time.

0:54:54 > 0:54:56Steve Jobs, who was very much a hippie

0:54:56 > 0:54:59living in the Bay Area,

0:54:59 > 0:55:04was involved in an early computer co-op project in Menlo Park

0:55:04 > 0:55:08that was only six blocks from where Jerry Garcia was living.

0:55:08 > 0:55:13And Jobs and others were interested in developing a personal computer

0:55:13 > 0:55:17because, at the time, computers meant IBM and Honeywell

0:55:17 > 0:55:20and other giant computer corporations.

0:55:20 > 0:55:23And what the inventors of the PC - the personal computer -

0:55:23 > 0:55:27had in mind was that they could put an IBM on everybody's desk

0:55:27 > 0:55:29and that they could give everyone that power,

0:55:29 > 0:55:32that they could take it away from IBM

0:55:32 > 0:55:35and democratise it and, indeed, democratise it globally,

0:55:35 > 0:55:37not just in the United States.

0:55:37 > 0:55:42Computer designers, marketers, users begin to imagine the microcomputer

0:55:42 > 0:55:44as a tool for personal transformation

0:55:44 > 0:55:48in terms set by LSD, in terms set by the counterculture.

0:55:48 > 0:55:52We begin to imagine the internet and network computers

0:55:52 > 0:55:54as the kind of community

0:55:54 > 0:55:57that communes were once supposed to be.

0:55:57 > 0:56:00Communes didn't work out, but now, with interlinked computers,

0:56:00 > 0:56:03we can make a world of interlinked minds,

0:56:03 > 0:56:05just as we hoped once

0:56:05 > 0:56:08to make a world of interlinked consciousnesses.

0:56:08 > 0:56:12MUSIC: Teach Your Children by Crosby, Stills, Nash And Young

0:56:13 > 0:56:19We are connected today in ways the hippies first imagined only on LSD.

0:56:19 > 0:56:22The revolution of the mind that was unleashed

0:56:22 > 0:56:26has given birth to the cyberspace generation.

0:56:26 > 0:56:29The hippie vision of creating a global community

0:56:29 > 0:56:31based around sharing and not profit

0:56:31 > 0:56:36is now being acted out through Facebook and YouTube.

0:56:36 > 0:56:39It has come about through a technological innovation,

0:56:39 > 0:56:42a cognitive, not political, revolution.

0:56:43 > 0:56:47It's probably fair to say that the counterculture lost

0:56:47 > 0:56:49all the political arguments.

0:56:49 > 0:56:51All of them. We didn't end racism.

0:56:51 > 0:56:54We didn't end imperialism. We didn't end war.

0:56:54 > 0:56:58We didn't end misogyny. We just lost them all.

0:56:58 > 0:57:03But on a cultural front, we won every single one.

0:57:03 > 0:57:05And there's no place you can't go today

0:57:05 > 0:57:08where there's not an organic food movement,

0:57:08 > 0:57:11a slow food movement, a women's movement,

0:57:11 > 0:57:13an environmental movement,

0:57:13 > 0:57:15alternative medical practices

0:57:15 > 0:57:19like homoeopathy and naturopathy and acupuncture,

0:57:19 > 0:57:22alternative spiritual practices like Tibetan Buddhism,

0:57:22 > 0:57:25Vietnamese Buddhism, Hinduism.

0:57:25 > 0:57:31So, culture runs a lot deeper than politics.

0:57:36 > 0:57:40The things that the hippies stood for still apply.

0:57:40 > 0:57:42Peace IS better than war.

0:57:42 > 0:57:45Love IS better than hate. It really is.

0:57:45 > 0:57:50And those ideals are still as strong today as they ever were.

0:57:50 > 0:57:53I still believe it. I'm still a hippie, really.

0:57:54 > 0:57:57There's the big thing, see? We won a fight.

0:57:57 > 0:58:01Now we're allowed to grow marijuana legally.

0:58:01 > 0:58:05Five big, bushy plants!

0:58:05 > 0:58:08And the cops can come and look at them and they can walk away,

0:58:08 > 0:58:12scratching their heads, saying, "How did we ever let this happen?"

0:58:12 > 0:58:14I believe in hippie values -

0:58:14 > 0:58:19inclusion rather than exclusion,

0:58:19 > 0:58:23be kind rather than unkind.

0:58:23 > 0:58:27"Remember your hippie days," Jerry Garcia used to say.

0:58:27 > 0:58:29"Have more fun than anyone else!"

0:58:30 > 0:58:34# Well, you can tear a plane

0:58:34 > 0:58:38# In the falling rain

0:58:38 > 0:58:41# I drive a Rolls-Royce

0:58:41 > 0:58:43# Cos it's good for my voice

0:58:43 > 0:58:48# But you won't fool the children of the revolution

0:58:48 > 0:58:54# No, you won't fool the children of the revolution

0:58:54 > 0:58:56# No, no, no

0:58:58 > 0:58:59# Yeah! #