# Were hippies in the 1960s really discriminated against? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [July 24, 2009, 1:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-hippies-in-the-1960s-really-discriminated-against/504116 "2009-07-24T13:08:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![md2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2014, 5:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-hippies-in-the-1960s-really-discriminated-against/504116/81 "2014-04-27T05:21:45Z")
> [@Hari\_Seldon](#): > > … > > It is still the case, AFAIK, that Disney will not employ anyone with facial fair. And notoriously, neither will the New York Yankees. I will not patronize either one. My boss was given a back-stage tour of Disney world in 1993 - this was arranged by the software company that was trying to sell us an enterprise management package, and Walt was one of their references. He was about 45 years old, with a small goatee. Quite a number of people they ran across in the tunnels told him he needed a shave, obviously mistaking him for a Disney employee. ---
**Author:** ![md2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2014, 5:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-hippies-in-the-1960s-really-discriminated-against/504116/82 "2014-04-27T05:27:35Z")
> [@LC\_Strawhouse](#): > > Long hair may have been unacceptable, but weren’t big greasy pompadours and duck tails A-OK back then? Or did that only work if you were in a NYC street gang? The difference was that they did end at the traditional male haircut point, above the ears and above the collar; and they did tend to have less “fluff” on the sides and back, being slicked down. As mentioned, they were a big deal in the 50’s, but by the time of “hippy” style long hair, the fuss about the Elvis look was over. The big deal in the early 60’s (especially with the Beatles’ American tour in 1963) was the “mop top” look, essentially hair over the ears and over the collar and certainly not greased down, like they’d had a bowl cut using a large bowl. It was the precursor to the hippy/jesus look (which the Beatles also went on to model, like every rock star of the late 60’s.) ---
**Author:** ![yawuntz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/a5b964/32.png) [@yawuntz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yawuntz)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2014, 5:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-hippies-in-the-1960s-really-discriminated-against/504116/83 "2014-04-27T05:52:19Z")
As a young long-haired dope-smoking hedonist with a casual attitude toward monogamy, employment and - pretty much everything else - I guess I qualified as a “hippie”, though I must admit I never really felt that I quite fit in with my hippie brothers and sisters somehow…yeah “hippies” were hassled and discriminated against regularly. To be fair, we had pretty much defined ourselves as being outside of (and by implication, better than) the mainstream. - got pulled over for speeding, cop grabbed me by the hair and said, "you goddam hippie I oughta punch your lights out. - was refused service in a restaurant, despite being clean, shirted and shod. - and I’ll never forget the time I went into a bar in 100 Mile House, in rural BC, hair down to my ass, and walked up to the counter to wait for the bartender to show up and take my order. There’s only four other guys in the joint - big beefy guys who looked like Hoss Cartwright - and one of them said, “hey get outa here!” And another one chimed in, “yeah get that woman outa here!” Pretty scary, but it was hilarious how that worked out. ---
**Author:** ![SirGalahad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/71c47a/32.png) [@SirGalahad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SirGalahad)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2014, 6:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-hippies-in-the-1960s-really-discriminated-against/504116/84 "2014-04-27T06:38:38Z")
> [@DrFidelius](#): > > More conservative regions? Heck, except for California I recall those dirty hippies being hustled off by the cops where ever they showed their filthy, drug-addled. pervert faces. Southern California was (and still mostly is) very conservative. In the beach towns, which had a large Navy and Marine population (both active and retired), “Hippies” were regularly hassled by the fuzz and also by the local bullies. I remember being pulled over while walking, and I was a young teenager. The cops were sure everyone with long hair was carrying LSD and best friends with Charles Manson. (Admittedly, Timothy Leary was my neighbor for a while). > [@seal\_cleaner](#): > > I came home from college for a weekend back in the draft-dodging days. Hair down to my belt. My family had gone to my younger sister’s track meet, so I headed over there. When my Dad saw me, he yelled, in front of the whole crowd, “SON! You’re back from Canada, I’m so thrilled!” > > BTW, we called ourselves “freaks,” not hippies. This. “Freak” was the word. Check Frank Zappa for that, and Hendrix " … wave my freak-flag high." (If 6 was 9, 1967) ---
**Author:** ![Urbanredneck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ea5d25/32.png) [@Urbanredneck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Urbanredneck)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2014, 10:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-hippies-in-the-1960s-really-discriminated-against/504116/85 "2014-04-27T10:00:30Z")
I find it funny that they have kids halloween costumes where kids dress in hippy outfits which include the long wild hair. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2014, 1:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-hippies-in-the-1960s-really-discriminated-against/504116/86 "2014-04-27T13:30:35Z")
> [@Urbanredneck](#): > > I find it funny that they have kids halloween costumes where kids dress in hippy outfits which include the long wild hair. I’m pretty sure they had those in the '60s too. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2014, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-hippies-in-the-1960s-really-discriminated-against/504116/87 "2014-04-27T15:55:11Z")
> [@SirGalahad](#): > > This. “Freak” was the word. Check Frank Zappa for that, and Hendrix " … wave my freak-flag high." (If 6 was 9, 1967) “Freak” may have been a California regionalism. I don’t remember the word being used locally in upstate New York. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2014, 4:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-hippies-in-the-1960s-really-discriminated-against/504116/88 "2014-04-27T16:11:19Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > “Freak” may have been a California regionalism. I don’t remember the word being used locally in upstate New York. I seem to recall it in Texas. although I admit I may just be remembering reading those old Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers comics. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2014, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-hippies-in-the-1960s-really-discriminated-against/504116/89 "2014-04-27T16:33:10Z")
> [@SirGalahad](#): > > This. “Freak” was the word. Check Frank Zappa for that, and Hendrix " … wave my freak-flag high." (If 6 was 9, 1967) Alright, if all the hippies cut off all their hair, I don’t care, I don’t care. Hendrix- same song 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2014, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-hippies-in-the-1960s-really-discriminated-against/504116/90 "2014-04-27T16:39:10Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > “Freak” may have been a California regionalism. I don’t remember the word being used locally in upstate New York. It was definitely used when I went to college in upstate New York from 1969-1973. Certainly some people in the crowd I hung out with referred to themselves as freaks. (Mostly the ones who did a lot of acid.) I’m sure I had heard it by 1967 in high school in NYC because of the Hendrix and Zappa references. ---
**Author:** ![cjepson](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a9adbd/32.png) [@cjepson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cjepson)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2014, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-hippies-in-the-1960s-really-discriminated-against/504116/91 "2014-04-27T16:58:05Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > It was definitely used when I went to college in upstate New York from 1969-1973. Certainly some people in the crowd I hung out with referred to themselves as freaks. (Mostly the ones who did a lot of acid.) I’m sure I had heard it by 1967 in high school in NYC because of the Hendrix and Zappa references. I think people pretty much stopped calling \*themselves \*“hippies” after 1967… it became a word used by the “straights”. (Sort of like the way the term “beatnik” was used to refer to the people who called themselves “Beats”.) In southern New England in the early 70s, “freak” seemed to be the usual term. Also, to me anyway, “hippie” refers specifically to people who actually dropped out of the whole school/work culture, whereas “freak” more broadly meant anyone who wore long hair, did drugs, had leftist politics, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2014, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-hippies-in-the-1960s-really-discriminated-against/504116/92 "2014-04-27T17:13:43Z")
> [@cjepson](#): > > I think people pretty much stopped calling \*themselves \*“hippies” after 1967… it became a word used by the “straights”. (Sort of like the way the term “beatnik” was used to refer to the people who called themselves “Beats”.) In southern New England in the early 70s, “freak” seemed to be the usual term. Also, to me anyway, “hippie” refers specifically to people who actually dropped out of the whole school/work culture, whereas “freak” more broadly meant anyone who wore long hair, did drugs, had leftist politics, etc. I agree with all of this. I don’t recall anyone actually referring to themselves as a hippie. I hung out with people who were mostly still in school, and so hadn’t dropped out. “Freak” was a more general term. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2014, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-hippies-in-the-1960s-really-discriminated-against/504116/93 "2014-04-27T17:15:10Z")
> [@Siam\_Sam](#): > > I seem to recall it in Texas. although I admit I may just be remembering reading those old Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers comics. > [@Colibri](#): > > It was definitely used when I went to college in upstate New York from 1969-1973. Certainly some people in the crowd I hung out with referred to themselves as freaks. (Mostly the ones who did a lot of acid.) I’m sure I had heard it by 1967 in high school in NYC because of the Hendrix and Zappa references. I remember references to freaks and it was big in Californian popular culture - add David Crosby’s “letting my freak flag fly” to the list - but I don’t remember it being part of ordinary conversation. That could be my memory. Talking about something normally jobs my memory if there were a memory to be jogged, though, so maybe it could have been just a regionalism \*not \*to use it in my circles. ---
**Author:** ![susan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/susan/32/17537_2.png) [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2014, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-hippies-in-the-1960s-really-discriminated-against/504116/94 "2014-04-27T19:35:52Z")
On the east coast, I certainly remember people referring to themselves as hippies (and, of course, some were yippies as well). Some of my students still refer to anyone who looks like a love the planet/question authority/eat organic-type person as a hippie. It’s clear that it’s not intended to be a compliment. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2014, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-hippies-in-the-1960s-really-discriminated-against/504116/95 "2014-04-27T19:45:03Z")
> [@susan](#): > > Some of my students still refer to anyone who looks like a love the planet/question authority/eat organic-type person as a hippie. It’s clear that it’s not intended to be a compliment. Them and [Eric Cartman.](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F2ZwJiK0fJ0) ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2014, 7:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-hippies-in-the-1960s-really-discriminated-against/504116/96 "2014-04-27T19:53:13Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > I agree with all of this. I don’t recall anyone actually referring to themselves as a hippie. I hung out with people who were mostly still in school, and so hadn’t dropped out. “Freak” was a more general term. In high school we were ‘freaks’. At the start of the 70s the furor had died down a little, but there were still plenty of people who considered the hippie stereotype a primal threat to America. As for discrimination, I didn’t personally experience much directly, but I needed to cut my hair to get jobs. Mostly what I faced was insults and some empty threats. By the mid 70s the whole thing was largely over, disco was rising as rock waned, the war was over and the protest movement ended, and by that time the original hippies were parents and getting more conservative themselves. It was a great time to live through, but I think exagerrated in the media, there were plenty of people who opposed the war, liked rock music, and took drugs who didn’t fit the hippie image, it was just easier to ascribe all these behaviors to a single sub-culture instead of addressing the cultural changes that were actually in the mainstream. ---
**Author:** ![Ranger\_Jeff](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranger_jeff/32/2065_2.png) [@Ranger\_Jeff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranger_Jeff)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2014, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-hippies-in-the-1960s-really-discriminated-against/504116/97 "2014-04-27T20:27:50Z")
“Freaks” was popular in Northern Delaware at the time. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2014, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-hippies-in-the-1960s-really-discriminated-against/504116/98 "2014-04-27T21:47:34Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > “Freak” may have been a California regionalism. I don’t remember the word being used locally in upstate New York. It had made it to northern Virginia by 1970. Also, you will recall, the name of the comic strip in the alt papers was NOT “The Fabulous Furry Hippie Brothers.” 😃 ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2014, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-hippies-in-the-1960s-really-discriminated-against/504116/99 "2014-04-27T22:10:42Z")
> [@Jonathan\_Chance](#): > > The single most memorable bit from Robert Heinlein’s ‘The Day After Tomorrow’ a - mostly forgettable - book about building a revolution in the United States after the ‘Pan Asians’ conquer it? > > The fact that the man leading the revolution, a non-professional military officer whose main business is PR and advertising tells his recruiters that he wants solid citizens and ‘no long haired men or short haired women.’ > > And this was written in 1941 and published in book form in 1949! However, that was rather the point of the 60s issues. Long hair on men and short hair on women was considered outside the mainstream throughout the first half of the twentieth century. (While it did not hold true for the entire intervening 1900 years, by mid-twentieth century North America, citations to Paul’s letter to the Corinthians (I Cor 11:14, 15), was considered normative.) Up until the 1950s, long hair on men was considered merely unkempt. This was re-enforced on the grounds that many beatniks were unkempt, although other artists and musicians might be given a pass as _artistes_. However, the D.A. style and the similar style adopted by Elvis Presley was less tolerated, partly because it was associated with gangs and hoodlums in the cities. Surfers were associated with long hair by the end of the 1950s, but were dismissed as a tiny group of eccentrics. When the Beatles brought long hair to the hordes of middle class American boys, the “movement” was regarded as threatening by a population that had never seen so many long haired young men. With the rise of the anti-war movement and the counter-culture (related but not identical phenomena), long hair became more of a social statement to the people with short hair, although the vast majority of long-haired guys wore it as a fashion statement. Of course, with all the talk of “teen-age rebellion” in the popular media, there were guys who wore it long to show their “rebellious” spirit. As to “freaks” vs “hippies,” freaks was a slightly later term (mid-70s?), but the big difference was that “freaks” was used by those who were or by those who were not bothered by long hair while “hippies” was used by those who were offended. Actual hippies were rather few and far between if one meant people who actually tried to separate from society, live in communes, and eschew standard employment. (Dressed like a hippie, standard employment was not an option, of course. 😃 ) Were guys with long hair genuinely hassled? Absolutely. There is ample evidence (anecdotal as it might be) in the previous posts. In addition, it was not just a “1960s” phenomenon. Refusal of service and hassle from cops continued through the 1970s and you can probably find examples in the early 1980s, although by then so many different lengths of hair styles were prevalent that it was far less of an issue. (In fact, it was amusing in the 1980s and 1990s to see uptight school principals leveling sanctions against kids with shaved heads when it was almost a certainty that those principals had been scorned as “long hairs” some time in their lives.) ---
**Author:** ![Tethered\_Kite](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a5b964/32.png) [@Tethered\_Kite](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tethered_Kite)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2014, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-hippies-in-the-1960s-really-discriminated-against/504116/100 "2014-04-27T22:22:03Z")
We were a gaggle of self-righteous P(s)OS and it would have been deeply offensive to us if we hadn’t been discriminated against. You know, man. Like a bummer. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-hippies-in-the-1960s-really-discriminated-against/504116.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-hippies-in-the-1960s-really-discriminated-against/504116.md?page=6)