John Lennon and Mick Jagger were money hungry self-promoters who faked anti-consumerist sentiment and preached revolution simply to tap into the mood of the 1960’s and so make the most dosh says a British academic.
Cambridge University historian David Fowler says the so-called "Swinging London" was a myth beyond most normal people, and in fact was only enjoyed by an already monied social elite.
The academic points to how groups like The Beatles and The Rolling Stones cut themselves off from others, installing themselves in grand country houses so they could enjoy their wealth alone.
"The world of Swinging London may be viewed as an emblem of youth culture now, but it was really for the Michael Caine’s of this world; an elite who could afford it," Fowler told AFP.
"The 1960s are often viewed as the point at which youth culture in this country exploded, but in many ways they were the years in which the idea began to fall apart," said Fowler.
"Groups like The Beatles were basically capitalists interested in enriching themselves through the music industry. They did about as much to represent the interests of the nation's young people as The Spice Girls did in the 1990s."
Fowler, who teaches modern British history in Cambridge, said more authentically revolutionary youth movements can be found in the period between World War I and World War II.
He points to little-known Cambridge student Rolf Gardiner who championed physical labour and rural reconstruction as a way to challenge their elders.
Gardiner’s group organised naked bathing sessions along the Cam river to express their pre-hippie “back to nature” values.
"People forget that real youth movements are about a lot more than spending and consumerism -- they are a way of life," said the scholar from Clare Hall college, Cambridge, author of Youth Culture In Modern Britain, c.1920-c.1970.
"People like Rolf Gardiner were true cultural subversives, pop stars before pop even existed. In terms of the influence he had on giving Britain's young people a sense of identity ... he is just as important as Mick Jagger."
The reason the 1960s is perceived as the dawn of youth culture is due to a "break in chronology" because of World War II, which left a state of "collective amnesia," the academic said.
