The Lemon Squeezer Research Paper Part 2

    Overnight, Kerouac found himself to be national sensation; but, the question that stems from this becomes why did the Beat movement capture the hearts of million of Americans. Primarily, the shift towards the liberal left comes from the rejection of the conservative right. The World War Two generation believed in the institution of marriage, the sanctity of virginity, and also, they rejected the use of hallucinogens like weed, and a result, heavily drank in order to ease the pain of the events that were occurring during the time.
    Through the course of time however, there are often a few people who are able to single handily change the socio political and cultural structure of America. Most of America, in any given generation accept the power that the government has over them. However, sometimes, there are individuals who separate themselves from society and fight for what they believe in.  Soon after, the majority from the original society, want to come to the original sheep’s new world. In this case, the children of the World War Two generation left the conservative right and joined the liberal left which is apparent with the hippies.
    Kerouac represents the few who strayed from societal standards. With him came the hippies who represent the final stepping stone in the process of liberalism. Both the Beats and the Hippies did not like war, but rather peace. Also, they did not believe in the sanctity of marriage and believed premarital sex was a moral, acceptable act. This shift marks the complete transition  to the left which Kerouac was not a fan of.
    When finally printed in 1957 the Beat Movement became widespread and was infecting the social and political fabric of America. Kerouac was disappointed in his newly found fame. He believed that he achieved fame for the wrong reason: “little attention went to the excellence of his writing and more to the novel’s radically different characters and its characterization of hipsters and their nonconformist celebration of sex, jazz, and endless movement.” (Britannica, 2). Between a Dialogue between Kerouac and one of his friends, Kerouac stated  "It's a kind of furtiveness ... Like we were a generation of furtives. You know, with an inner knowledge that there's no use flaunting on that level, the level of the "public," a kind of beatness—I mean, being right down to it, to ourselves, because we all really know where we are—and a weariness with all the forms, all the conventions of the world__ So I guess you might say we're a beat generation."
    Furthermore, Kerouac despised the cliche “doing the wrong things for the wrong reasons.” He believed people shifted to his movement in order to conform with the new standards that Americans were establishing for society. In other words, people wanted there self image to appear similar to the rest of America and as a result, shifted to liberalism to be rebellious, and in essence, selfish.
    Social movements such as the beat generation are used as a tool that allows society to further believe in a false idea of progression and advancement of the human race; but also, even to Kerouac’s dissatisfaction, his movement, and his book On The Road, illustrate to readers that no matter how much humanity ‘progresses’, it will still indulge in a pool of selfish lemon squeezers.