Changes in youth culture and student protest
Young Americans growing up in the 1950s and 1960s developed their own distinctive youth cultureDescribes the way of life, behaviours and beliefs of a particular group of people. which was very different from that of their parents. They disagreed with many of the ideas of the older generations. As a result, younger people became more involved in protests against racial and sexual discriminationTo treat someone differently or unfairly because they belong to a particular group. as well as the Vietnam War.
Teenage rebellion
Before the 1950s, young people were expected to follow the fashions and interests of their parents. The baby boom of the 1940s and 1950s had increased the number of young people in American society. At the same time, increased affluentHaving a lot of money or owning a lot of things. and better educational opportunities had freed people from the need to go straight from school into work.
Many young people began to rebel against the values that their parents thought were important. For example, they dressed in a distinctive way, listened to music that reflected their lifestyle but that their parents disliked, drank alcohol and hung out in gangs with others who had similar interests. Additionally, at this time, people were living with the threat of a nuclear war that could kill them at any time so they decided to enjoy the present day.
Youth rebellion was influenced by the writings of the Beat Generation, rock’n’roll music and films that were aimed specifically at young people. One example of such films is Rebel Without a Cause (1955), starring James Dean, which was about teenage drinking and illegal car races. Another is The Wild One (1953), starring Marlon Brando, which was about teenage motorcycle gangs.
The generation gap
Baby boom teenagers had very different attitudes from their parents, who had lived through the difficulties of the DepressionA prolonged economic downturn, beginning after the Wall Street Crash, that affected the whole world. and World War Two. A difference in attitudes of this kind is called a generation gapThe difference in attitudes between younger and older people. It can include attitudes about personal issues such as clothing choices, musical taste, alcohol consumption, drug-taking and sexual activity.
During this period, the generation gap increasingly included political subjects, such as nuclear disarmamentThe process of reducing the amount of nuclear weapons a country owns, preferably down to none.civil rightsRights everyone is entitled to regardless of the colour of their skin, their beliefs, sexuality, gender or other personal characteristics. These rights could include the right to vote, or the right to a good education etc.feminist Someone who supports the belief that women should have the same rights and opportunities as men. and the Vietnam War. In the 1960s, protest singers such as Bob Dylan influenced teenage attitudes with songs about racism, nuclear war and the generation gap.
Counterculture and hippies
In the 1960s, the gap between the traditional values of parents and the countercultureIdeas or beliefs that go against society’s norms. views of teenagers increased. For example, the contraceptive pillA drug that helps women to control when and if they have children. allowed young people greater sexual freedom and illegal drug-taking increased.
Some young people went further and dropped out of mainstream society altogether. These people were known as hippieA member of the 1960s counterculture who rejected traditional American values. Hippies were often associated with sexual freedom and drug-taking. They developed an alternative lifestyle where they lived in communities, frequently travelled from place to place together and dressed differently from people in mainstream society. They became known as the ‘flower children’, as many of them wore flowers in their hair to represent their support for peace in the world.
San Francisco was the spiritual home of the hippie movement, especially during the ‘Summer of Love’ in 1967. The hippie movement’s values are perhaps best represented by the free music festival that took place at Woodstock in 1969. An audience of nearly half a million people lived together outside for four days, looked after each other, listened to rock music and shared a desire for world peace.
However, people often reacted violently to hippies. For example:
- the police targeted them for their drug use
- politicians such as the then governorA person who is elected to lead a state’s government in the USA. of California, Ronald Reagan, criticised their rejection of American values
- others were angered by their refusal to work
While the hippie movement never had widespread support in its attitudes towards drugs and sex, it did become quite common in America.
Student protests for civil rights and freedom of speech
Young people who went on to study at college and university became increasingly involved in protest movements. Young people were an important element of the growing support for the civil rights movement in the early 1960s. Many were disgusted by racism in America and got involved in a number of ways to try to end discrimination. These included:
- taking part in the sit-inWhen protesters sit inside or outside a business to protest against its rules. at segregatedSituation of people or objects kept apart and separate from each other. restaurants and lunch counters that began in Greensboro in 1960
- getting involved in the Freedom Rides in 1961
- marching as part of the Children’s Crusade in Birmingham, Alabama, in 1963
- travelling through the southern states encouraging and helping black Americans to register to vote as part of the Freedom SummerA student campaign to get black Americans to register to vote in the summer of 1964. movement in 1964
The SNCCThe Student Non-violent Co-ordinating Committee was a student group that peacefully campaigned for civil rights. was a civil rights organisation for young people, set up in 1960 as the sit-in campaign spread across the southern states. Its membership included future black American leaders such as John Lewis and Stokely Carmichael.
Young people also began to protest for their right to freedom of speech at university as they rebelled against the rules and restrictions imposed on them. SDSStudents for a Democratic Society. An organisation that campaigned to allow students to have more say over what they were taught and how they were treated at university. began at the University of Michigan in 1959. It initially focused on enabling students to have more say in how the univeristies and their courses operated.
In 1964, members of the SDS were involved in setting up the FSMFree Speech Movement. A student organisation that campaigned against restrictions on students being involved in civil rights and anti-war protests. at the University of California, Berkeley. It was founded because students had been banned from protesting in support of the civil rights movement. By the end of the 1960s, there were around 100,000 SDS members in 150 colleges and universities.
The anti-war movement
By the mid-1960s, the USA was heavily involved in the war between North and South Vietnam. As American casualties increased, more and more young people were draftThe process where men were selected for compulsory military service. into the armed forces. The average age of an American soldier in Vietnam was 19. Young people did not understand this war. It seemed to be unnecessarily cruel to Vietnamese civilians and was risking the lives of young Americans for something that they did not think had anything to do with them.
- Young people, still at college and university, protested in increasingly large numbers against American involvement in the war. The SDS openly spoke out against the war in 1965.
- In 1968 there were over 100 protests by young people against the war involving more than 400,000 students.
- In 1969 around 700,000 people marched in a demonstration against the war in Washington, DC.
- During protests, young people would publicly burn their draft cardsThe document that said that a person had been recruited into the armed forces by the government. or even the American flag, which was a criminal offence.
Police responses to these demonstrations could be very violent. At Kent State University, Ohio, in 1970, four students were killed and 11 more injured when the authorities tried to end an anti-war protest. Around 2 million students went on strikeA situation when workers refuse to work - as an act of protest - often because of disagreements about pay or working conditions. across America in response. Pressure from young people over the Vietnam War was one of the reasons why President Lyndon B Johnson did not stand for re-election in 1968.
