Hippies/treehuggers

[Groundtotem]

seems to be an insult for many people, i would like to know why some people here seem think it's bad a thing to be. After all is it not good to care for nature and fellow humans? is it not good to want no more wars?

So again why is the word"hippie and treehugger" used by many people as an insult and why do some people despise these fellow humans?

I don't know if i would fall under any of these "titles" but i would not feel insulted or angry if people saw me as a hippie or treehugger.

[Tiberius Tosi]

Because some of them value a tree more than a humans' life or well being. Treehuggers are also unrealistic and impractical.

As for hippies, they are stinky, smelly, freeloaders who want others to do work and they live off it. Also their communes always fail because not even hippies can stand hippies.

[Groundtotem]

Because some of them value a tree more than a humans' life or well being. Treehuggers are also unrealistic and impractical.

As for hippies, they are stinky, smelly, freeloaders who want others to do work and they live off it. Also their communes always fail because not even hippies can stand hippies.

WOW dude talk about making generalisations, how can you know that treehuggers value trees more than humans? Just because someone care for nature does not mean that they think that nature is always more important than humans. Humans is of course very important but that does not mean that nothing else can be important.

Hippies stinky,smelly,freeloaders? come on you are talking about the standard profile of these people that i have come to realize not to be true for one bit.

[Tiberius Tosi]

WOW dude talk about making generalisations, how can you know that treehuggers value trees more than humans?

A key word there in my sentence is "some"...

Just because someone care for nature does not mean that they think that nature is always more important than humans. Humans is of course very important but that does not mean that nothing else can be important.

Yes but they believe in sacrificing human advancement (and indirectly therefore human life altogether in just about every sense) for the sake of nature, and yet many of them live so hypocritically that it is not even funny.

Hippies stinky,smelly,freeloaders? come on you are talking about the standard profile of these people that i have come to realize not to be true for one bit.

I think you are mixing up actual hippies with just straight up lazy potheads or people who call themselves hippies today who actually aren't. Hippies will even describe themselves as stinky and smelly, but their freeloading will be called "escaping the materialistic [consumeristic] world" or or something along those lines.

Well you wouldn't get angry if you were a hippie you would be too busy laying around in an unwashed state stoned on pot listening to Enya for that.

[Groundtotem]

=Tiberius Tosi

Yes but they believe in sacrificing human advancement (and indirectly therefore human life altogether in just about every sense) for the sake of nature, and yet many of them live so hypocritically that it is not even funny.

I would like to see people stop cutting down the rain forest, is that sacrificing human advancing? We can't just do as we wish with the earth, we really need to start to take better care of it if we wish to be able to live here in the future. If that means sacrificing some of our advancements then that's the price we have to pay. I don't really think that taking better care of the environment will slow us down that much, we would just have to look at different and better ways to harness nature.

[boofhead]

=Tiberius Tosi





I would like to see people stop cutting down the rain forest, is that sacrificing human advancing? We can't just do as we wish with the earth, we really need to start to take better care of it if we wish to be able to live here in the future. If that means sacrificing some of our advancements then that's the price we have to pay. I don't really think that taking better care of the environment will slow us down that much, we would just have to look at different and better ways to harness nature.

Take away the money-grubbing planet-raping corporations who exist on the share-market values of human hope or distrust and we may have a chance. These people get rich off betting upon human moods.

[MaximiIian]

The negative connotations come from associating modern "hippies" with the excesses of the original hippie generation during the late 1960's and early 1970's. That, and an unfamiliarity with many of the ideas espoused by hippies, usually relating to Eastern mysticism and the closely-related New Age movement, which causes a negative reaction in most coming from a Western philosophical and cultural background.
Which I can understand. A lot of "Eastern" ideas are peculiar and come from an entirely different worldview than ours. It's not helped by the fact that hippies and new-agers usually bungle the understanding of those ideas when trying to present them to others.
New Ageism in particular is annoying to deal with, because it is syncretic and eclectic to the point of inaccuracy and excess.

"Treehugger" is used as a negative epithet due to the perceived alien-ness of the radical environmentalist movement in such a modern, (post)industrial era. These are mostly, again, reactions to the, real or imagined, excesses of that social movement.
Now, unlike the New Age movement, I don't see anything wrong with environmentalism. Something needs to be done, before it comes to the point that radicalism is actually necessary. And it doesn't have to mean curtailing our own growth and technological progress.

[ShADoW]

To them the words have a negative connotation.

[Groundtotem]

I think it's sad to see that for some people animals and the nature means so little. Nature and animals is a huge joy to experience. I love taking walks in the middle of a forest, listening to birds and the silent. Both nature and animals is important, not only for us people but for the earth it's self. If caring about these two things is negative then im truly at loss on what is going to happen to earth in the near future. If this makes me a hippie and a treehugger then ill happily be just that!

[Phier]

As shocking as this will seem to some on the left, I am an environmentalist. I got my first degree in it. My first ever science project when I was 10 was the effect of acid rain on annelids (that was THE hot button issue at the time).

The difference between being an environmentalist and a treehugger (hippie is something else), is treehuggers are not rational. These are the people who cry when they see someone hunting, or a tree cut down. An environmentalist can look at the data and say 'well if you harvest X amount of trees from Y area, its ok as long as you replant X amount and limit harvesting to no greater than X). A treehugger says logging is evil and does whatever they can from legal abuses of the endangered species act to chaining themselves to trees.

Treehuggers treat people as the problem, and environmentalist figures out how people can live without overly taxing the environment.

[Groundtotem]

As shocking as this will seem to some on the left, I am an environmentalist. I got my first degree in it. My first ever science project when I was 10 was the effect of acid rain on annelids (that was THE hot button issue at the time).

The difference between being an environmentalist and a treehugger (hippie is something else), is treehuggers are not rational. These are the people who cry when they see someone hunting, or a tree cut down. An environmentalist can look at the data and say 'well if you harvest X amount of trees from Y area, its ok as long as you replant X amount and limit harvesting to no greater than X). A treehugger says logging is evil and does whatever they can from legal abuses of the endangered species act to chaining themselves to trees.

Treehuggers treat people as the problem, and environmentalist figures out how people can live without overly taxing the environment.

I must admit i thought treehugger meant that people cared for nature in a realistic way, guess i was wrong there. Nice to here that someone else seem to care for nature though, sometimes it seems like there's just a small group that actually do.

[basics]

" I must admit i thought treehugger meant that people cared for nature in a realistic way, guess i was wrong there. Nice to here that someone else seem to care for nature though, sometimes it seems like there's just a small group that actually do."

Groundtotem,

In the beginning, at least in the West, it was seen as an innocent agenda of freedom from the norm for many people, mostly young. For the most of us others they were a bit over the top, nonetheless harmless or so we thought, until some used it for political purposes. By that I mean some used these kids as a tool to incite near riots where much damage has been done and still is seen to be done whenever any meeting of the great and powerful happens.

The terms hippie and treehugger came about from their willingness to live by nature aided and abetted by gurus further afield in India. For a great while it was all clean fun and a lot of us associated ourselves to it with things such as the free love aspect, because the pill had become widely available, so why not? As age kicked in most, but not all, realised that the world couldn't live as they wanted so we grew up, took on jobs which, as taxpayers, makes the world go around.

[Lord Rahl]

As shocking as this will seem to some on the left, I am an environmentalist. I got my first degree in it. My first ever science project when I was 10 was the effect of acid rain on annelids (that was THE hot button issue at the time).

The difference between being an environmentalist and a treehugger (hippie is something else), is treehuggers are not rational. These are the people who cry when they see someone hunting, or a tree cut down. An environmentalist can look at the data and say 'well if you harvest X amount of trees from Y area, its ok as long as you replant X amount and limit harvesting to no greater than X). A treehugger says logging is evil and does whatever they can from legal abuses of the endangered species act to chaining themselves to trees.

Treehuggers treat people as the problem, and environmentalist figures out how people can live without overly taxing the environment.

You speak the truth.

Treehuggers care for nature irrationally. They don't say, "Here is [rational and practical idea] and it will help us use less trees for paper." Instead, they say, "Don't kill the trees! You're murdering Mother Nature!" One makes sense and is rational. The other makes no sense and is fanatical.

Even some environmentalists can get irrational. In Alaska there was a meeting between many industries and an alternative energy representative talked about how the mining industry was bad because it was destroying the environment. After that was said a mining representative stood up and explained how mining was getting the precious metals needed for batteries and solar power technology. Alternative energy cannot be a reality without the mining industry. People rarely think about these sorts of things.

As for hippies: http://www.southparkstudios.com/episodes/103815

I would like to know though why nature in general seems to be so unimportant for people, when i still was in school people seemed to despise to even talk about forest and animals almost like it was sissy to walk in forest's or care for nature at all. That's why i have great concerns for the future, what will happen if this attitude don't change? Will earth become a dead rock where only we humans will live and wild life gone?

Nature is unimportant to many because they've never lived near it. Most people live in urban or suburban areas where their 'nature' is a park, planted trees, squirrels, etc. If they never are around nature then they won't find it to be important. I've lived in places where nature is only a 15 minute drive, like in Alaska, where I could drive for 15 minutes and climb a mountain with no one else around. Suburbians rarely experience that, so why should they appreciate something they've never experienced?

[MaximiIian]

so why should they appreciate something they've never experienced?

Because it's a crucial and beautiful part of the world around them. They should experience nature more. They should be outside and enjoying it. They should be appreciating our environment. This isn't fanaticism or radicalism, it's basic understanding of how we and our surroundings interact. There is a difference between environmental appreciation and conservation, and "treehuggery".

[Lord Rahl]

Oh, I agree that everyone should go out and experience nature and therefore appreciate it, but I was simply stating fact, not making an argument that some people inherently shouldn't appreciate nature.

[MaximiIian]

And, as shocking as it will be for a lot of people, I agree with Phier on this.
While my religion does strongly support environmentalist initiatives, I don't believe it should be done beyond any semblance of reason, or to the large-scale detriment of human growth and progress.

Remember, while an emphasis on nature is a big part of paganism, so is an emphasis on the benefits of civilization, especially agriculture. It would be inaccurate and insulting to ignore one and overemphasise the other.

[Groundtotem]

I would like to know though why nature in general seems to be so unimportant for people, when i still was in school people seemed to despise to even talk about forest and animals almost like it was sissy to walk in forest's or care for nature at all. That's why i have great concerns for the future, what will happen if this attitude don't change? Will earth become a dead rock where only we humans will live and wild life gone?

[Arch-hereticK]

And, as shocking as it will be for a lot of people, I agree with Phier on this.
While my religion does strongly support environmentalist initiatives, I don't believe it should be done beyond any semblance of reason, or to the large-scale detriment of human growth and progress.

Remember, while an emphasis on nature is a big part of paganism, so is an emphasis on the benefits of civilization, especially agriculture. It would be inaccurate and insulting to ignore one and overemphasise the other.

I told you you were a hippy.

[InsaneHanz]

Well peace rallies have never done anything to help stop war. I think John Lennon is a tool for his bed-in stunt. Laying in bed not doing anything does nothing to promote peace. Promoting free trade helps way more.

[Habelo]

Cause hippies claim that they care and then all they do is smoke pot and bathe in their own apathy.