Did the women in the rock and roll scene help change the world in the 60's?

Hard question to ask my self

 

Over the years I have come to recognize that in affirming oneself it is not enough just to be critical of where one comes from and it sure is important to be compassionate to one's younger self. It is also important to acknowledge the mores of the time. At the same time, it is instructive to be clear about what we did and did not do. We learn as we grow and we learn more from our mistakes than our successes. That is the lens I use to answer this question.

As for the roles of women during the 60’s and early 70s, I was so busy trying to keep my head above water (Haight Ashbury, Slide Ranch, having kids, attempting to make a dysfunctional relationship work, and trying to find a way to deal with the eccentricities of being a hippie) that I never allowed myself the time to think about gender issues and the complex relationship between gender and rock and roll. However, as I look back at my time in the extended GD family there are three aspects that stand out for me.

The first is the sexual revolution in the 60’s. To a large extent it came about because contraception became available to a large number of relatively affluent young women.  In those days we girls could work, or not, we could travel cheaply (remember student fares), and rents and the general cost of living were inexpensive. The economy was booming and we could get The Pill. We, as young women, felt we were free of old standards and mores. We felt we could reinvent the world. Sex with friends was okay, pot and LSD were “good" drugs and cheap, and we explored new ideas as enthusiastically we did our dress. We wanted foods that were “natural” (now called organic). We stopped shaving our legs and armpits, didn’t wear bras. We tie dyed or bought at thrift stores. It is if we thought that by talking about new ideas, changing our appearance, taking drugs and having sex we could move the world into a different place, the Age of Aquarius. The mantra “make love not war” held profound meaning for us. Our hedonism was idealistic and it was optimistic and fun. But as a prescription for change it was profoundly naive. It may have been fun, even sweet for a time, but it wasn’t a way to sustain change. 

Looking back at the time, notwithstanding the sexual revolution, our fanciful dress and our naive belief that we were creating a new world order, the roles of women basically were not much changed from the 1950s. We were either “sex objects” as characterized by groupies, or “ole ladies” as in some kind of partnership with a man. Some women did hold down jobs, but jobs were seen as just a way to make money for survival. With some notable exceptions, most women in the GD family did not have a career or even express an interest in one, much less explore it. The guys were the important ones. We women were in a auxiliary role, to serve, help, support and be willing sexual partners. This new order was clearly great for the guys; harder for the girls because we bore most of the risk and had all the responsibility of raising the kids.

The second aspect I want to address is the social turmoil that swirled around us. Vietnam and civil rights, urban riots, student riots, teach-ins, assassinations, Black Panthers, the draft all were part of our lives. Then, when the first big oil spill hit the coast of California protecting the environment became another issue. It may seem like none of these issues had much in common and had little effect on the GD and rock and roll more generally, but we all watched TV, listened to the music and the sounds and sights became part of our subconscious. These issues affected us all even those of us who wanted to ignore these truths and disdained them as politics. Many of us in the GD scene took drugs and played loud music to escape (turn on, tune in and drop out). By the mid 1970's hard drugs (cocaine and heroin) arrived on the scene; I ran away and immigrated to Canada.

This brings me to the third aspect I want to address, the role of women and the complicity of silence. Throughout the social turmoil of the 60's and early 70's we women in the rock and roll scene had no more influence, nor did the women in the advocacy groups that formed around civil rights, anti-war and/or women in business or the media than most of our mothers did as wives in the 50’s. Sitting silent and being an ornament in a meeting (which was the norm back then) while the boys talked smart was oppressive, whether discussing rock and roll, or politics.

In my opinion, the GD office girls were a metaphor for this dynamic. They kept the office running, typed, did the books, fetched coffee and drugs for the guys but had little input into the workings of the band. Profit sharing with the office staff I doubt was ever considered.  Their work was not that valued - maybe it was later but not when I was around.

Worse yet, while we girls complained about a guy's behaviour (or bitched as the guys said), I don’t think we wives or girlfriends felt secure enough to seriously talk about this phenomena because we were just a breakup away from being excluded from the scene. Yes, the music was transcendent and could take us to wonderful unexplored places but for women, silence - being seen and not heard - was the name of the game.

That silence extended into our relationships. What was the band’s credo? It was okay to fuck a groupie if they were 500 miles away. That is elitism and misogyny at its worse. And, we women knew which guys were playing around but we kept quiet. We also kept silent about the children who were ignored by their fathers. We laughed-off this irresponsibility. We believed our silence proved our strength.

Ultimately this conspiracy of silence blew up in our collective face. Self-indulgent male behaviour was not, as advertised, a new model of family. Rather, the moral ambiguity, faithlessness and dishonesty not only supported old forms of male power and privilege but it was a clear indicator we in the hippie (GD) scene were not creating something new or special.

For me the complicity of support for this kind of behaviour destroyed my belief that we in our “alternative culture” could create something lasting that was good and greater than ourselves. Yes, the music was great, and is still great, but the real challenge (at least as I remember the rhetoric) was to disassemble old roles and create something new that was lasting. We may have smoked dope, danced up a storm, stopped wearing bras, breastfed in public, and raised our babies with absent fathers but we lived by a set of rules that were nothing less than a male fantasy of their domination.

Only later, and often because of life's adversity, did some of us came to trust ourselves enough to have dreams of our own and pursue them. In my view that is when we as women started to grow.

I loved parts of my life in the 60's and 70's and hug those experiences close to my heart. Certainly the playfulness and the music of the GD are a big part of who I am. But my many new beginnings, different lifestyles and my varied experiences with diverse people and cultures have enabled me to grow in ways I would have never done if I had stayed nestled in the Bay Area.

Today, my self esteem as a woman comes from a place of openness of the heart, a belief in transparency of decision-making, and accountability in relationships. Secrecy and the cult of exceptionalism have no place in my life. I suspect this is true for many women.

Roles of women have changed over the past 50 years. We have assumed more responsibility and expect more from our partners. However, I still find it is always a challenge to find the balance in managing one's responsibilities. We thought we could move the world (and perhaps we did open some of the world marginally) but in the end we only changed ourselves. This may be the legacy of the 60's. We have come to recognize that becoming the people we want to be is our life's work.

As for the future, I trust my children.