What triggered the hippie movement?

[Mysterious]

Drugs, sex and rock and roll. :o)

[staisil]

Hippies were members of the 1960s counterculture movement who adopted a communal or nomadic lifestyle, renounced corporate nationalism and the Vietnam War, embraced aspects of Buddhism, Hinduism, and/or Native American religious culture, and were otherwise at odds with traditional middle class Western values. They saw paternalistic government, corporate industry, and traditional social mores as part of a unified establishment that had no authentic legitimacy.

The term derived from hipster which referred to white people in the US who were 'hip' or became involved with black culture, e.g. Harry "The Hipster" Gibson. September 6, 1965, marked the first San Francisco newspaper story, by Michael Fellon, that used the word 'hippie' to refer to the younger bohemians (as opposed to the older Beat Generation). The name did not catch on with the establishment press until almost two years later.

The hippie movement was at its height in the late 1960s. The July 7, 1967 issue of TIME magazine had for its cover story: 'The Hippies: The Philosophy of a Subculture.'

The touristic influx that accompanied the highly-publicized San Francisco Summer of Love did nothing to intensify counterculture. In fact, by the time Hippiedom became commercialized, mid-late 1967, being a hippie had lost its real purpose. The people responsible for the Summer of Love held a "Funeral for Hippie" at the end of the summer. The last publication of the Diggers was the anthology of street news, manifestoes and articles titled The Digger Papers, that came out in August 1968. Co-published as an edition of The Realist, the Diggers distributed 40,000 free copies.

Though they were a genuine counterculture movement, the early hippies were not particularly tolerant of homosexuality (although later, they became more and more tolerant to it.). They were also prone to what some people would now deem highly unacceptable sexism. This changed rapidly as hippie culture embraced feminism and egalitarian principles.

The term is also associated with participation in peace movements, including peace marches such as the USA marches on Washington and civil rights marches, and anti-Vietnam War demonstrations including the 1968 Democratic Convention. The Yippies represented a highly politically active sub-group.

Hippie political expression often took the form of dropping out of society to implement the changes they sought. The back to the land movement, cooperative business enterprises, alternative energy, free press movement, and organic farming were all political in nature at their start.

Philosophically, hippie thought drew upon the earlier Beat Generation. Some hippies will insist that "hippie" was a marketing tool created by 'the establishment', and that hippies, per se do not exist.