Mr. Holden, comments about "...haul[ing] around cultural luggage from 40 years ago", (or popular sloggers simplistically saying 'hippies' are the reason we've been unable to decriminalize an intoxicating plant, "full-stop") are designed to provoke a response. You looked, you saw, and poked a stick into hive; you're bound to be stung once or twice. Enjoy the easy fact that the PNW can even hold something called "Hempfest" and not have participants tazed and arrested by over-zealous police officers. Have fun and enjoy the festivities.

@4 - They don't call it Boozefest, silly, they call it Oktoberfest.

I'm not sure many ever bought the line about celebrating the many uses and glories (there are many - historic and eco-beneficial) of the hemp plant. I'm afraid most people see Hempfest and, indeed, NORMAL as, "I want to get baked with impunity." And although I see nothing wrong with that stance in principle and practice if that's the road one chooses, it isn't going to win over people who are in the way of progress on the issue.

Dom is right. The less counter-culture involved in hemp promotion, the better. Save the hippie stuff for rock festivals and Burning Man.

I went down & got the same feeling. Enough with the hippie-dippy crap. Heehee, weed dude...does nothing to help the cause.
I am all for legalizing pot, but seeing most of those folks just kinda bums me out.

Ugly people getting high. Pass.

Get over the anti hippie shit! I wear tie dye when ever or where ever I choose and I will never have to answer to The Stranger or anybody under any circumstances.

No one is telling you what to wear, Heather. Dominic was pointing to the emphasis that festival places on tie dyes and hippie stuff as a problem for its effectiveness in attaining its stated goals. He wasn't telling you what to wear.

Get it? It's like, if I were to say that a peace demonstration loses its appeal if it appears to only be anarchist street kids with bandannas over their faces. I'm not saying that bandanna-wearing anarchists should be eliminated. I'm saying that peace demonstrations led by such people are less effective than demonstrations led by, say, doctors and lawyers.

You are incorrectly assuming that the general public is hostile to hippies or tie-dye. I think they are for the most part neutral about both and I would bet they do not have the intolerance that The Stranger and others project them to have.

I do understand and agree that marijuana should not remain so closely associated with "hippie" culture alone and it is a problem I had with hempfest when I went years ago. But at the same time hippie bashing is very tired and makes no sense, although hip in this "liberal" city. Go figure though, this is America, an insanely dysfunctional country that would rather ravage itself than live more wisely

Let's at least acknowledge that the hippies, the real ones anyway, have been right about damn near everything since they emerged in the 60's. Environmentalism, their values for peace, love, patience, staying chill, keeping an open mind, deflating the ego, resisting discrimination in any form, organic farming, sharing, minimalism, annoying the squares, resisting fascist pigs, protesting wars that should have never been started in the first place, taking timeless, usually harmonious LSD trips through the cosmos at massive jam band concerts, on and on. These are all good things. The hippies are a noble people who should have begun running this country decades ago

@14: You have no idea of the depths of disgust the general public has for hippies. Why, if my daughter brought a hippie home to meet me, I'd disown her and run him out of town.

Hippies make Jesus puke.

Oh...wait...

@15--well said. @16--you have no more idea what people think than I do. Speak for yourself.

At a time when we should all be embracing and encouraging tolerance. At a time when we may be facing a ballot fight against intolerance here in Washington it is self defeating to be preaching intolerance against a harmless social trend and whatever people are still living that way. I would prefer any children of mine bring home a hippie than some intolerant urban hipster.

@ Laurence Ballard & Heather,

Hippies and Hempfest made me vote Republican for the better part of a decade. Hippies and Hempfest made me vote down decriminalizing medical marijuana. Yes, that's right! You patchouli-stained, tie-dyed dinosaurs made me deprive medical marijuana from people dying of cancer! Yes, you did! Dominic Holden told it to you straight and you can't handle the damn truth!

I was driving an out of town friend to eat in South Lake Union area and happened upon about 20 naked bike riders bearing hempfest signs..

the Missourian was completely shocked.. I love living here.

Hippies made you vote Republican!? That really makes me take your other views seriously...Not!

@ 21,

I was a pissy, rebellious teenager (and college student). I knew it would totally torque them.

@Heather: Look, it's hard to respond to you at this point. Massive Attack and Y.F. Redux both made completely sarcastic comments aimed at Dominic and those of us who more or less agree with him, and you respond with shock and horror. So, it's hard to take you seriously in this conversation.

That said: I'm not against hippies existing. I "tolerate" them and judge them by the same standards as I would anyone else. I've had many friends who either consider themselves hippies or would be considered so by mainstream types. But: this is not about whether hippies have a right to exist. It's about where the symbols of hippie culture fit into the political landscape, and how that can be used very effectively against a movement like marijuana legalization.

Basically, a lot of us are saying: we think marijuana prohibitions should be lifted, and here's something that's standing in the way. And you're like: I have a right to exist!

Of course you do, dear, but that's not what anyone is discussing.

@ Heather,

And by "them", I mean my parents....who are hippies.

I love Dominic. I'm not giving him any kind of sauce at all! Jesus. You must be a hippie!

@26: You and SWM should totally hook up.

Dom, did you know your brother is a hippie. Or hasn't he come out to you yet?

And while we're on the subject of fashion, the T-shirt/long sleeve combo died in 1994 along with Grunge. Please make a note of it:

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2194/1697…

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/co…

I had a blast. Got there early, left before the crazy crowds. Loved the hippie vibe. Loved the vendors and the food. Had so much fun. Not too many cities are able to host an event like HempFest, so glad that Seattle is one of them.

After three years of using The Stranger to criticize this aspect of HempFest, are you gonna be done with this topic now?

Hot chicks with douchebags central. When did frat boys who like Dane Cook take over the wigga movement.

The disassociation between hippies and hipsters, especially from the Stranger's viewpoint, is entirely one of fashon and/or attitude. Hipsters wear porkpie hats and beanies to hide their male-pattern baldness, whereas hippies wear hats to hide their stash.

Hipsters wear socks, hippies don't.

Hipsters like to closely scrutinize everything you say to them in order to properly judge you, compartmentalize you, then dispose of the need to interact with you. Hippies are too loud and verbose to hear what you're saying.

Both like to smoke shitloads of dope, and need to remain closely associated, in order to properly play the provider / customer game. A smart hipster will remain close to their hated hippie associates, if for no other reason then to keep the bud coming in.

Other than that, they are equally annoying and easy to ignore, as they literaly wear their 'differences' on their sleeve.

Holy Roller - A: in 1965.