How to create a Conservative Counter Culture

I've been mulling over an idea for a pop-culture oriented timeline, and some of my ideas have been themed around a conservative counter-culture in the US arising in the fifties and flourishing in the late sixties and seventies, in place of the Beatniks and later the hippies.

I was hoping to create a POD no earlier than 1944, though if I have to go earlier, that'd ultimately be fine.

Here are some ideas I had:

-the nation's establishment would almost certainly have to be left-wing, with a more liberal, progressive president (Henry Wallace?), a more moderate leader of the USSR (precipitated by an earlier death of Stalin), and better USSR/USA relations and an avoidance of the Red Scare. I considered having Zhukov take power in the USSR following some leadership crisis in 46 or 47, and developing a strong working relationship with a democratic Eisenhower in the fifties.

-An earlier civil rights movement in the fifties with a strong backlash in the sixties

-A fifties/sixties civil war in Mexico resulting in a "Hispanic scare" whipped up by fear mongers.

-Fascism taking on a role as a revolutionary force in the the postwar world. Ideas being Jose Primo De Rivera's survival (along with a greater spread of his brand of Falangism), and/or Mussolini's neutrality in WWII (obviously both of these would be POD prior to 1944), allowing Fascism a better chance to continue as an ideology viewed as legitimate. Castro would become a full fascist after visiting Spain (he already admired Mussolini and Peron) and would overthrow Batista, founding a fascist Cuba, and would still be seen as a revolutionary hero. A independent Fascist Bloc might be established; Strasserism might become more popular.

-a "Second Great Depression" in the fifties

-a strong isolationist backlash against a neoconservative president (Henry Jackson?)

-a backlash against an especially authoritarian presidency (potentially a worse LBJ or Nixon)

-The Korean War is even more brutal and ends with little gained and is generally overlooked even more than it is in OTL, resulting in veterans feeling more disenfranchised and forgotten by the public and the government

-Or libertarian ideals simply take hold in place of those that appealed to the New Left (eg Ayn Rand and Barry Goldwater instead of Marx and McGovern).

-Or some combination of all of the above.

I've trolled the archives and found several threads related to this, but none were very conclusively discussed. As you can see, I've scraped together several ideas, but nothing that I've been able to wrap my head around. What are your thoughts? Could any of this work, or is it all too far out there?
 
I admire your thoroughness and the idea is a really appealing one to me.

I wonder what your counterculture would look like and what its relationship would be to its antecedents. You've mentioned Rand and Goldwater as influences but I'd like to see where else the counterculture would develop. Think about IOTL and the way that, say, Bob Dylan placed himself in a lineage that included musicians like Woody Guthrie and writers like John Steinbeck, that enabled Dylan to present himself as a revival or continuation of older ideas and in some respects, deepening his arguments. A conservative counterculture might place an even greater emphasis on appealing to tradition and you may find that the blueprint for your counterculture can be found in grassroots conservative culture from even earlier periods.
 
Wasn't conservatism the counter-culture of the 1950's and 1960's - with the likes of William F. Buckley leading the 'charge' of modern conservatism?
 
I support this discussion, but there is a criticism to be had in the idea. By it's nature, Conservatism favors traditionalism and/or the established order of things. Even in the face of a Liberal Consensus, Conservatism was in favor of "traditional" Americanism and the status quo, as it would define it.
 

Deleted member 94680

So would this TL have "laid back" adults and authority figures (shirt collars unbuttoned, free love in their private lives, a friendlier attitude to narcotics) becoming concerned by youngsters that find it fashionable to wear three-piece suits, buttoned up, less tolerant to drink and drugs?
 
In a way the Eisenhower Presidency was a conservative swing after some 20-years of Democrats in the White House, albeit the Democrats are not as strictly progressive or liberal and Ike was not a hard line conservative. Perhaps a less bright line Cold War and a greater isolationism in the Fifties, thus a departure in the way the Second World War unfolded and ended, such as no war in the Pacific, then America slides into a very Fifties conservative mold. Perhaps a Taft Presidency without Eisenhower running. To get a Conservative "Counter-culture" your suggestion of a deeper New Deal or perhaps LBJ gets his Great Society (especially if the War in Vietnam is butterflied away), then you have a backdrop to a revived Conservatism as we have seen countering leftward swings. And without Vietnam the generational culture shift in the Sixties might be as polarized, you might see a far different brand of conservatism as a result. The only wildcard as I see it would be Civil Rights in that era, with a more liberal GOP the Democrats might end up the staunch conservative party for a twist.
 
I admire your thoroughness and the idea is a really appealing one to me.

I wonder what your counterculture would look like and what its relationship would be to its antecedents. You've mentioned Rand and Goldwater as influences but I'd like to see where else the counterculture would develop. Think about IOTL and the way that, say, Bob Dylan placed himself in a lineage that included musicians like Woody Guthrie and writers like John Steinbeck, that enabled Dylan to present himself as a revival or continuation of older ideas and in some respects, deepening his arguments. A conservative counterculture might place an even greater emphasis on appealing to tradition and you may find that the blueprint for your counterculture can be found in grassroots conservative culture from even earlier periods.

Thanks for your interest. I imagine that in broad-strokes, especially in its initial stages, this libertarian/conservative counterculture I am describing would have a lot of similarities to the New Left, Hippies, Beatniks, etc., owing to the libertarian influence. There would be lots of drug use, free love, a general aversion to and contempt for authority, anti-war, and so on. Some would be religious, others not at all. The main differences would be a greater identification with traditional Americana culture and even American exceptionalism to an extent, a general aversion to Communism and more sympathy towards Fascism, a general feeling that government programs from the New Deal/Great Society have failed the American people in general as well as minorities, and so forth. There would be a lot of room for division and contradiction, which would result in the counterculture dividing and sub-dividing, just like it did in OTL. Libertarian socialism vs the Libertarian Right, Neofascists vs paleoconservatives, etc; I envisioned a division amongst the youth not unlike the Mods and Rockers of Britain sweeping the US. Ultra-stylish, sharp cut youth vs rough and tumble rebels, both parts of the same disenchanted demographic yet still at each other's throats, so to speak.

I imagine a lot of influence would come from writers like John Dos Passos, Ernst Junger, Jack Kerouac, the Southern Agrarians and Heinlein, and musicians like Elvis, Eddie Cochrane, Gene Vincent, and later bands like The Byrds, Clapton, Zappa; basically with country/Americana influences being more dominant in the music scene, but British invasion and psychedelia (primarily psychedelia; British invasion bands would not be nearly as successful) still influencing the way music changes over time. Malcolm X and other members of the Nation of Islam would preach more about the failure of the government to help the black community and the disastrous effect government programs have had on blacks; likewise Lincoln Rockwell will enjoy more popularity with his "race-realist" views advocating the separation and self-governance of different races for their own good. Politicians like Pat Buchanan and the aforementioned Goldwater would be championed by paleoconservative and libertarian right elements of the counterculture. Fascist leaders like Salazar and Castro will be paradoxically championed as examples of authoritarianism done right. Just some ideas, nothing very refined.

I support this discussion, but there is a criticism to be had in the idea. By it's nature, Conservatism favors traditionalism and/or the established order of things. Even in the face of a Liberal Consensus, Conservatism was in favor of "traditional" Americanism and the status quo, as it would define it.

I agree. Like I mentioned above, I don't see this proposed counterculture as being a mirror-image of the OTL counterculture; there's definitely overlap. But its a distinct flavor that is more predisposed to conservatism and libertarianism and even fascist propaganda (which will not serve it well in years to come), and adverse to government management, marxism, communism, and neoconservatism. That's the idea anyways, I hope that makes sense.

So would this TL have "laid back" adults and authority figures (shirt collars unbuttoned, free love in their private lives, a friendlier attitude to narcotics) becoming concerned by youngsters that find it fashionable to wear three-piece suits, buttoned up, less tolerant to drink and drugs?

That would be funny, but not what I had in mind. Like I mentioned above, I imagined a portion of the youth becoming obsessed with meticulous fashion (ala Mods), and perhaps there could be a portion of them that become "straightedge", strictly anti-drug and whatnot. I imagine most of the establishment population would remain conservative in the sense of drugs, though maybe not.

In a way the Eisenhower Presidency was a conservative swing after some 20-years of Democrats in the White House, albeit the Democrats are not as strictly progressive or liberal and Ike was not a hard line conservative. Perhaps a less bright line Cold War and a greater isolationism in the Fifties, thus a departure in the way the Second World War unfolded and ended, such as no war in the Pacific, then America slides into a very Fifties conservative mold. Perhaps a Taft Presidency without Eisenhower running. To get a Conservative "Counter-culture" your suggestion of a deeper New Deal or perhaps LBJ gets his Great Society (especially if the War in Vietnam is butterflied away), then you have a backdrop to a revived Conservatism as we have seen countering leftward swings. And without Vietnam the generational culture shift in the Sixties might be as polarized, you might see a far different brand of conservatism as a result. The only wildcard as I see it would be Civil Rights in that era, with a more liberal GOP the Democrats might end up the staunch conservative party for a twist.

Interesting ideas, I like them.
 
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Folks seemed to have missed the fact that there is a conservative counter-culture in the United States. Indeed, there a number of them. Elements include the Christian Identity movement, the 2d Amendment extremist, the knuckleheads who showed up to support Clive Bundy, tax protestors, the birther movement extremists, and readers who take the left behind series too seriously.
 
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Folks seemed to have missed the fact that there is a conservative counter-culture in the United States. Indeed, there a number of them. Elements include the Christian Identity movement, the 2d Amendment extremist, the knuckleheads who showed up to support Clive Bundy, tax protestors, the birther movement extremists, and readers who take the left behind series too seriously.

As I see it, the extreme fringe you are talking about has a place in the movement I am postulating; after all May 19th, Weather Underground, and the Black Liberation Army grew from the New Left. But not everyone will be on the fringe, I am going for a fairly broad movement mostly populated by middle-class activists and alienated youth.
 
Folks seemed to have missed the fact that there is a conservative counter-culture in the United States. Indeed, there a number of them. Elements include the Christian Identity movement, the 2d Amendment extremist, the knuckleheads who showed up to support Clive Bundy, tax protestors, the birther movement extremists, and readers who take the left behind series too seriously.

I'm glad you mentioned that. This thread has got me thinking about the current wave of right wing populism in Europe -AfD/Pegida in Germany, the Swedish Democrats, UKIP in the UK, the Front Nationale in France and so on. In particular, I've been thinking about how a lot of these groups deliberately employ the methods of the counterculture, positioning themselves as a 'natural and organic' counterweight to an out-of-touch establishment elite.

Of course, populism and reactionaries are nothing new, but it's striking just how anti-establishment these movements are; their members regard 'The Man' with the same degree of cynicism and scorn as did the hippiest hippie of the 1960s.

They are more representative of the social-economic side of culture, rather than the artistic (heard any good UKIP bands? Me neither) but they do seem to provide a clue to how a conservative movement might arise in opposition to traditional government.

What is even more striking is how much support these groups draw from the same cohort (born 1940s-50s) that were the base of the 1960s-70s counterculture.
 
Two historical precedents come into my mind.

In revolutionary France, you had the the post-Jacobin jeunesse dorée, a youth movement with royalist principles and aggressively pronounced bourgeois values turned into a lifestyle. They even had an armed wing: the muscadins, who were beating up left-wing sansculottes.

Much later in the 1980s, there were the young fogeys in the UK. They were sceptical of both the values of the Old Left and the nouveau riches that Thatcherism produced.

However, both of these movements - in the case of the young fogeys, 'movement' is an exaggeration - sort of embodied old-style values against revolutionary changes. So in their very own way, they were not really counterculture, but remnants of an older era taken up by younger people.

A conservative counterculture would have to define itself against a culturally liberal establishment. So one could argue that the Islamists in 1970s Iran were exactly something like that: they didn't identify with the Western values propagated by the Pahlavi regime, and instead opted for their own, staunchly conservative ideas.


I'm glad you mentioned that. This thread has got me thinking about the current wave of right wing populism in Europe -AfD/Pegida in Germany, the Swedish Democrats, UKIP in the UK, the Front Nationale in France and so on. In particular, I've been thinking about how a lot of these groups deliberately employ the methods of the counterculture, positioning themselves as a 'natural and organic' counterweight to an out-of-touch establishment elite.

Of course, populism and reactionaries are nothing new, but it's striking just how anti-establishment these movements are; their members regard 'The Man' with the same degree of cynicism and scorn as did the hippiest hippie of the 1960s.

Well, there is the French generation identitaire who have some followers in Austria and Germany. What they realised was that old-style nationalist conservatism couldn't reach the typical representative of the younger generation anymore, which is why they play around with pop cultural references generally confined to liberal pop culture. However, I don't think they actually have a big following (but watching videos like this suggests that there's nothing that doesn't exist...)
 
Some of the ideas espoused by these groups are pretty mainstream--far more than the few yahoos in the Weather Underground. For example, pro-gun dogma has infected the culture since NRA coup in the 1970s to the extent many non-fringe people hold the belief that all that is preventing an oppressive government from infringing on their rights is the Clock and their AK. Meanwhile, all sorts of chuckle-heads routinely parade around in all sorts of public places with their guns in a manner that was unimaginable 40 years ago, when Warren Burger was labeling the NRA's arguments a fraud. Millenialist who hold an eschatological theology are a dime a dozen. The anti-government jack-asses are mainstream enough for elected officials to meet with Clive Bundy and his ilk.

As I see it, the extreme fringe you are talking about has a place in the movement I am postulating; after all May 19th, Weather Underground, and the Black Liberation Army grew from the New Left. But not everyone will be on the fringe, I am going for a fairly broad movement mostly populated by middle-class activists and alienated youth.
 
I'm glad you mentioned that. This thread has got me thinking about the current wave of right wing populism in Europe -AfD/Pegida in Germany, the Swedish Democrats, UKIP in the UK, the Front Nationale in France and so on. In particular, I've been thinking about how a lot of these groups deliberately employ the methods of the counterculture, positioning themselves as a 'natural and organic' counterweight to an out-of-touch establishment elite.

Of course, populism and reactionaries are nothing new, but it's striking just how anti-establishment these movements are; their members regard 'The Man' with the same degree of cynicism and scorn as did the hippiest hippie of the 1960s.

They are more representative of the social-economic side of culture, rather than the artistic (heard any good UKIP bands? Me neither) but they do seem to provide a clue to how a conservative movement might arise in opposition to traditional government.

What is even more striking is how much support these groups draw from the same cohort (born 1940s-50s) that were the base of the 1960s-70s counterculture.

It's interesting that you point this out, I had the inspiration for this idea after observing the same trends you have. I wanted to envision what a similar movement would look like in sixties and what sort of environment would enable its existence as well as how pop culture would be affected.

Some of the ideas espoused by these groups are pretty mainstream--far more than the few yahoos in the Weather Underground. For example, pro-gun dogma has infected the culture since NRA coup in the 1970s to the extent many non-fringe people hold the belief that all that is preventing an oppressive government from infringing on their rights is the Clock and their AK. Meanwhile, all sorts of chuckle-heads routinely parade around in all sorts of public places with their guns in a manner that was unimaginable 40 years ago, when Warren Burger was labeling the NRA's arguments a fraud. Millenialist who hold an eschatological theology are a dime a dozen. The anti-government jack-asses are mainstream enough for elected officials to meet with Clive Bundy and his ilk.

Good points.
 
Honestly, there was/is a major one in the Christian homeschooling movement, especially that in the 1980s and 1990s. It's included a potent political wing (HSLDA) and has led to significant educational law changes in every state.
 
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