Counterculture
Counterculture
Noun
A group of people with a set of ideas and behaviors that set themselves against an idea, or group with more social power.
History & Etymology
Last time when I covered the origin of the word of culture I discussed its relation to agriculture and religion. So this time let’s take look at the prefix at the beginning of counterculture, counter-.
It originally came from Latin contra- meaning against or in opposition. In English its modern form counter- has become a common prefix indicating when one thing is opposed to or balancing another. Like counterbalance, counterintuitive, and counterinsurgency.
In the late 60s and early 70s people began noticing certain segments of society in the United States and England began... not fit in.
The word counterculture was popularized by Theodore Roszak in his book “The Making of a Counter Culture”. In the book he describes the growth of Vietnam War protesters and the hippy movement, and compares the similarity between the two groups and their rejection of what he called technocracy, a system of government where decision-makers are selected for their expertise. I’ve never read his book so I can’t make any judgement on it’s accuracy, but it seems to be the unanimous origin of the popularity of the word counterculture.
Prescription & Commentary
The counterculture in the 1960s and 70s was not one solid coherent monolithic movement. It was a whole lot of people with different groups and movements that sometimes had different goals and different ideas and attitudes, but they all had the same “enemy” so to speak. The hippies, the anti-war protestors, the civil-rights activists, and the free speech protesters all kind of get lumped together in the counterculture movement when really they all had different aims. The only thing they really had in common was their opposition to authoritarianism, and as Theodore Roszak put it technocracy.
When BitChute recommended counterculture as a word for me to investigate it was due to a Buzzfeed article about the new conservative counterculture on college campuses. Much like the counterculture in the 60s and 70s most of them are against unnecessary wars and foreign intervention, opposing hawkishness in both the Republican and Democratic parties, are very accepting of homosexuality, cheering on a man in drag talking about sucking black dick, they are fighting for free speech against those who would silence them, and they’re even championing the legalization of drugs...
Also like the sixties and seventies this new counterculture is also made of many groups ranging from conservatives, classical liberals, liberalists, and libertarians. All of these groups stand against the status quo in some way. So right now we all fall in the category of counterculture. One thing I see in common between the counterculture of the then and now is the rhetoric of freedom and liberty. For the past it was free speech, civil rights, free love, and now it’s free speech, freedom of association and so on. Just like I mentioned in my last video freedom and liberty are American culture. The American spirit is one of rebellion and counterculture, fighting for liberty.
This spirit of counterculture goes back to the founding of this country and the American revolution. We’re even fighting similar battles. In 1760s when England still ruled over the colonies and levied taxes and duties, traditionally as a way to regulate trade and commerce, but in 1765 the British Parliament expanded the range of taxes on the colonies with the Stamp Act. This required that every piece of paper that was sold have a stamp that was paid for as a tax. This tax included newspapers, pamphlets, posters, books, legal documents, and even playing cards. Many of these amount to the equivalent of the internet today, and who ever controlled the paper controlled the flow of information.
I fear the more totalitarian members of this current counterculture will use this movement to grab power for themselves instead of leaving it to the individuals. This seems to have happened with the counterculture from 50 years ago. The more totalitarian communist/socialist types have either acquired power or somehow those in power began using terms that appealed to the counterculture to pass their policies. I’m afraid this could happen this time around.
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