"popular culture in the 1960's did more harm than good" Use the sources and your own knowledge to explain whether you agree with this view.

Coursework

1960’s

“popular culture in the 1960’s did more harm than good” Use the sources and your own knowledge to explain whether you agree with this view.

The 1960’s has caused many split opinions as to whether it was a bad or good influence on the young people in that era.

There are many people who thought the ‘60’s were a good influence sources A, D and I support this view. The quote ‘it was very heaven to be alive’ sums up the 1960’s for many people. The 1960s also brought a lot of new opportunities that the previous generation had not had such as television programmes in the advert in source D which shows the rising importance of the teenagers. Source I is very good at showing the good influence of the 60’s on the young people. However in source A may not be totally reliable as it was written in the 90’s and was from the opinion of someone who was looking at their childhood with fond memories.

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Some people had argument for both a good influence and bad influence. These sources are sources C, E and H. The writers of these sources had both good and bad things to say about the 1960’s. Source C sys ‘it was never as crazy as they used to say it was.’ Which goes against the perceptions of bad influences of pop music, however this source also suggests that there was some crazy and wild behaviour such as Johnny rays coat. This source is good because it is reliable and from the perspective of a performer rather than a fan. Source E also shows the new opportunities presented to the teenagers in the 1960’s as they now had their own radio station playing pop music. However bad the quality was the teenagers would prefer to listen to this than the radio with their parents this infers a possible loss of parental control.

Source H shows how the teenagers had few financial worries which was a drastic improvement after the hardship of the 1950’s however with lots of money the teenagers were open to exploitation and were in risk of waste their money on unnecessary purchases.

Some sources show the bad influences of the 1960’s. These sources are sources B, F and G. Source B Shows the very bad influence that the popular music had on the teenagers. The source says ‘maniacal, screaming mob’ this suggests that the crowds and the teenagers who heard the music were out of control and this was the effect of the music. It also shows how fearful the bands and performer were of this mob and crowd. This source is most likely to be reliable as the fan who wrote it was actually was at the concert. Source F shows the bad influences on the generation of teenagers from television. Mary Whitehouse says about the bad influences of bad programmes on young people and the lack of censorship in the BBC. However this is published in the Daily Mail which would support her Conservative view. This source is from a very biased person who is older and of a different generation than the teenagers in the 60’s. She is also Christian, which would affect her opinion because she would want to see Christian programmes, and middle class. Source G focuses on much more serious and worse influences than the other sources. Janice Joplin was a rebellious young performer who many fans. She was a bad influence because she took drugs and had a very ‘sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll’ lifestyle. Publicity surrounded Janice Joplin’s lifestyle and her death from drugs overdose and this amount of coverage could influence and persuade young people and particularly her fans to live the same as her. This is a very reliable and good source as it is very factual without bias as it comes from a biography entry.

To conclude, overall I think the 1960’s had more of a good influence than a bad influence. It presented many opportunities that we still have now. The 60’s was the time when companies realised that they had a large market in the teenagers. It also did not sacrifice things like education there was nearly twice as many people in full time education in 1969 than in 1961. Also the sources that displayed bad influences were mainly biased such as source F. The bad influences were also isolated events were as the good influences were continued throughout the period. To add to this opinions of the 60’s have changed drastically with time and many critics have been silenced.

Paul Davies