The Stranger: A Few Words About Hempfest
Thursday, August 13th, 2009 at 9:10 am | By: Radical Russ
Dominic Holden, a writer for the Seattle Stranger and former director at Hempfest, opines on the event in this week’s edition:
Hempfest, which pioneered the movement in these parts, is regressive and archaic. Tie-dyes hang from the stages, and reggae-rock fusion blares from the amplifiers. There’s nothing advantageous about sticking a pressing political issue in a countercultural time warp, and there’s nothing attractive about a rally that looks more interested in satisfying its own indulgences than effectively advocating for political reform. As it is now, Hempfest drives away unknown numbers of would-be supporters—politically engaged city folk. Here’s what Hempfest can do to avoid squandering its potential.
Lose the cultural baggage: Hippies are the stigma of the pot movement. There’s nothing wrong with hippies, mind you, and Hempfest itself is wonderful. (I was a director and permit holder for many years, fighting from the inside for Hempfest to ditch the hippie accessories.) But countercultural celebrations and drug-legalization advocacy are mutually undermining ambitions. In truth, the crowd at Hempfest is mostly mainstream folks, freakishly hot guys without shirts, and perky little emo kids. But clichéd hippie artifacts and music—chosen by the organizers—make people who don’t identify with a tiny cultural niche want to run screaming.
Hempfest doesn’t need to lose the “hippie vibe” any more than gay pride parades need to lose the drag queens, any more than “God & Country” festivals need to lose the Confederate flags, any more than block parties need to lose the baggy-pantsed teenagers, any more than DC cocktail parties need to lose the Brooks Brothers stick-up-the-ass WASPs.
Hempfest is what it is. 150,000 or so marijuana aficionados peacefully gathering to smoke pot, listen to music and speakers, maybe buy a piece of glass or a t-shirt. The magnitude of the event is enough of a political statement.
As we face global warming, corporate rule, rising obesity, pharmaceutical stupor, and digital overload, I look back and realize the hippies were right about sustainability, local control, organic diet, herbal medicine, and music and art. Those ethics are worth celebrating.
The sad thing is that because of marijuana’s illegality, only those with true dedication and nothing to lose could come out of that cannabis closet and make something like Hempfest happen. Because hippies in tie-dye weren’t shackled by corporate drug tests for employment and would lose no face in their community by openly supporting marijuana, they are the ones who became the standard bearers for legalization. But now that the mainstream wants to legally enjoy 4:20, you want the tie-dyed hippies to get in the back of the bus?
We’ve discussed this before, Dom, and we do have some similar personal views regarding Hempfest; I too recoil from the scent of patchouli and body odor, the mundanity of drum circles and reggae, and the freakishly pierced/tattooed/dreadlocked. Then I get onstage to speak and look over the mass of humanity on the waterfront all sharing one dream – legalized cannabis and hemp – and find that the positive far outweighs negative at Hempfest.
The marketing could be tweeked, the speakers could be more well-known, but all-in-all 150,000 people gathered for two days smoking pot without any major incident gives lie to the reefer madness about amotivation and criminality among cannabis consumers. Until the short-haired, polo shirt, respectable job mainstream pot smokers put on an event that attracts 150,000, let Hempfest be Hempfest. It’s a party, y’all; don’t try to read too much into it.
(Besides if you want a serious button-down political examination of marijuana policy, there’s always NORML National Conference in San Francisco, Sep. 24-26, chock full of doctors, lawyers, political strategists, media personalities, professional athletes, researchers, and celebrities. And very little tie dye.)
Topics: Dominic Holden, Seattle, Seattle Hempfest, The Stranger, Washington
[...] appreciated the back-and-forth we had on this topic over at the Stash. I’m still of the opinion that 200,000 people gathered [...]
[...] Stranger, Seattle’s Only Newspaper: Slog – http://slog.thestranger.com/blogs/slog/|||The Stranger: A Few Words About Hempfest | NORML Daily Audio StashDominic Holden, a writer for the Seattle Stranger and former director at Hempfest, opines on the [...]
Here’s a little thought experiment: Re-read Dominic’s article and our discussions and replace the word “hippie” with “Jew” or “Jewish”. Replace “tie-dye” with “Jewish art”. Replace “counter-cultural” with “Judaic”. See how that reads?
Russ,
Your analogy doesn’t hold up; hippies at Hempfest are different than drag queens at gay pride. The whole point of gay pride is for gay people to shamelessly put their sexuality and culture on display. Cross dressing drag queens are doing that.
The point of Hempfest, however, is to articulate the message for drug policy reform and for pot smokers to come out of the closet. But not just hippie pot smokers–all pot smokers. And hippie flags, tie dyes and cliched music drive away all the other pot smokers who would want to come to the event.
Mind you, I think hippies are great and the counterculture movement of the late ’60s is largely to thank for the progressive politics in America today. Furthermore, hippies worked hard to get Hempfest where it is. I’d know–I was one of those hippies.
But none of those things change a simple fact: Hippies stigmatize the drug policy reform movement. That’s because hippies are infamous drug users, and, thus, a festival that wraps itself in hippie artifacts and imagery appears to be motivated by the desire to legalize its vice.
But if this country reforms drug policy, it will be because society sees it as an overall benefit–freeing police resources, generating tax revenue, saving money on incarceration–not because the general population thinks hippies have a right to use drugs.
I don’t necessarily think Hempfest is about articulating drug policy reform, I think it is closer to marijuana-using people to shamelessly put their hedonism and culture on display. I think DPA, MPP, and NORML Conferences are more about articulating drug policy reform.
I just don’t think the hippie vibe is that stigmatizing anymore. We see it popping up in all sorts of mainstream advertising and entertainment. Hippies are so retro they’re chic.
Besides, even if there were no hippie flags, tie dyes, and all the music was jazz, the crowd itself would be hippies, dreadlocks, pierced and tattooed. I think mainstreamers turned off by Hempfest are more turned off by the enormity of the event, the crowds, the heat, and the dust.
I just don’t think it has to be an either-or thing; either we lose the counterculture or we lose the mainstream. I think both can exist. I think society can simultaneously say “ew, tie dye stinky hippies” and “hey, let’s stop wasting police resources on busting them and tax them instead.” Trying to get Hempfest to change the vibe is tilting at windmills; it is as huge as it is because it is what it is.
Nice rebuttal, Russ.
I think we need to keep alive that colorful era where people were happy and unmolested (yet) by Nixon’s bullshit war on hippies. That’s all it was, and I can’t believe Obama would allow any of this prohibitive policy to live on.
It’d be nice if some people bathed more frequently, but maybe they have their reasons…cops are more likely to want to deal with clean-cut, friendly, sweet-smelling youngsters from middle class families…as illustrated by your recent interview
@ NYC arrests.
Also, anything that ends in “fest”, come on…
You have theories, Russ, but they don’t hold up in practice. Whereas you claim the event isn’t about articulating drug policy reform, Hempfest’s own mission statement says the event “seeks to advance the cause of Cannabis policy reform through education.” You say the hippie vibe isn’t stigmatized anymore. That’s ludicrous. Most people in Seattle who smoke pot–people who want to reform marijuana laws and want to help somehow-are turned off by Hempfest’s hippie vibe, which I can say confidently having lived my entire life in Seattle. You say mainstream folks are turned off by the crowd–not the image problem–but huge crowds of progressive mainstream folks flock to other large events in Seattle.
The organizers perpetuate the hippie stereotype by failing to create an event that speaks to a broader cross-section of progressive society. And in doing so, it fails the movement and it fails its own mission. Hempfest has an image problem, and if the organizers want to support the movement, they will work to fix it.
I just can’t see how 150,000 people peacefully gathered in the park is anything but a success, that’s all. I can’t see how people flocking to it from all around the country – not just Seattle – makes it a failure.
If the progressive types you speak of were so progressive, they wouldn’t be prejudiced against “hippies”. I speak there; I’m no hippie. Madeline’s no hippie. Dancesafe stage’s rave electronica certainly isn’t hippie music.
This thread is full so feel free to reply in a new comment: what would the Holden-approved Hempfest look like? Would all dreadlocked people be banned from entry? No hair past shoulder length on anyone speaking from stage? No banners containing any more than two colors, which must be muted pastels? No glass sales, period? Has it occurred to you that the reason it is the most successful rally in the world is because it is a “hippie” rally? Is there any rally you feel better speaks to this allegedly-progressive mainstream cross-section?
I just don’t get this undercurrent of disgust you have for “hippies”, the ’60s, and “counter-culture”, Dom. So white-and-uptight mainstreamers are turned off and won’t attend. So what? They don’t go to the marches either. They don’t volunteer their time at NORML chapters. And this effort to send the hippies to the back of the bus isn’t going to bring them out and it will offend the one group of people who have been most dedicated and most diligent about ending prohibition.
What I’m saying is there can be both a Hippie Hempfest and a Mainstream Let’s Legalize Potfest. There are 51 other weekends on the calendar, but I haven’t seen these mainstreamers put the effort into producing this Potfest nor will I; they seem too intent on just ragging on the hippies’ success.
Thanks Russ! I’m not a hippie any more but it’s still in my heart. I’ll return to those roots as soon as I can retire! I guess that’s regressive huh?