Kids who ran away to 1960s San Francisco

I have a great uncle that moved to Haight Ashbury to chase the whole spiritual open your mind idea. He said it was nothing like the media or nostalgia portrayed it. Lots of homeless drugged out kids who were completely lost. No jobs, panhandling for food and money, no direction, just spaced out druggies. Said it was fairly sad and he left within a year. He is an old hippy type as well, it was not what I was expecting to hear. I remember seeing an interview of George Harrison saying something similar.

George Harrison went to the Haight with his then-wife Pattie Boyd, and walked around, eventually finding people recognized him and followed him around. He played guitar in the park. He wrote a large check to fund the Haight Ashbury Free Clinic.

IIRC he said he had expected some kind of alternate hippie-economy based on genuine values and having ownership of the neighborhood, and was disappointed that he didn't see any evidence of that. Just a bunch of idle people.

Yep, pretty much. Found it - https://youtu.be/_I-ThafU1e4?si=dwZfCpNkDtnz2onb

My uncle had the same description. Disappointed that it was just stoned people and not a lot of real substance.

kinda of the idea that I got from reading Phillip K Dick novels...

Frank Zappa made his (similar) feelings pretty clear.

https://genius.com/The-mothers-of-invention-who-needs-the-pe...

When was this? It's changed a lot (in both directions) over the years. For example, after Prop 64 legalized weed, the field in GGP by Haight and Stanyan that was previously staffed 24/7 by a morass of weed salespeople and their groupies (maybe 50-300 at any given time) emptied out overnight.

Then there's the fact that even the 18-20yo "Hippie Pilgrim" demo, which has held up pretty well for generations, is secretly stratified by the socioeconomic status of the parents. One's take on it depends on the specific cliques they're exposed to.

This brings back memories. I low key miss the drug market on hippie hill. We used to have the 'nugs' game where you had to try to sell the bums weed before they offered you drugs.

FWIW, the parent's comment matches my dad's sentiments about the city in the 60s/70s, but I wouldn't start a bar fight to defend his honor on this point. I would be genuinely curious to hear you elaborate on the changes. I live around the corner from the Upper Haight and it has always been one of my favorite parts of the city, but it has always had a lot of loafers doing nothing but drugs as long as I can remember.

Rich-kid hippies houseshare, hang out indoors after dark, and don't panhandle or shoplift groceries. They do smoke weed and maybe more, but their safety net is functioning. In their case, this life stage can reasonably be described as a cultural experience. Other than aesthetics, there's not much crossover with poor-kid hippies, because mooching tension is a major bummer.

Before the citywide affordability crisis, I think you were more likely to end up outdoors because you hit bottom than the other way around. The outdoor segment and the weed-dealing segment have always been more visible, though.

1969, he was prob about 30.

Alan Watts, Gary Snyder, etc. were there, he just didn’t meet them.

The community of people that were actually serious about that stuff was as far as I can tell pretty small and exclusive.

I felt the same, of moving to Los Angeles in the 80's and seeing the AIDS crisis take its toll on the street life. It was harsh, man. But then, the 90's happened.