Hipster (from Seen any good movies...)

[LadyShea]

edit: :between: It (movie Juno)totally was(hipster and/or self awaredly arsty), especially with the ridiculous slang. And hamburger phones? Is it the 90s again?

The hamburger phone belonged to Diablo Cody, who grew up in the 90's...she owns the phone, maybe she actually likes it? Maybe she finds it seriously amusing, as opposed to ironically owning it?

The slang may or may not have been ridiculous, depending on where you live. Some kids reported it as "pretty current". People still use a lot of SoCal slang today...and it was mostly spread by popular media in the 80's like the song Valley Girl and the movie Fast Times at Ridgemeont High.

We have seen resurgences or 70's and 80's music, fashion, make-up, and hairstyles over the last decade or so, as such things tend to cycle...in SATC Carrie wore my prom dress from 1988 (exact same dress), and that show was supposed to be the cutting edge of fashion.

Hell I wore nothing but Wayfarers from 1985 until 2002, because they looked good on me and were quality glasses I didn't have to replace often. I took shit for it too in the 90's. I switched to a different design when my last pair broke, and NOW Wayfarers are back in style (and now I won't wear them)! Had I not switched, and still wore them, would that make me hipster or current or nostalgic, or stubborn or what exactly? I have worn All Stars pretty consistently since I fell in love with them watching Sha Na Na....what does that mean?

Is everyone being hipster, or do maybe some people just like what they like? What makes you think you can tell the difference?

[viscousmemories]

I'm not sure but I think 'hipster' is the new 'emo'; i.e. that ambiguously defined group all the cool kids unite around hating today.

[LadyShea]

That actually makes the most sense of all the explanations I've gotten vm, thanks. The Wiki article on it was useless in it's ambiguity and different definitions.

[Ensign Steve]

I think people like what they like, and if they like it genuinely or ironically, what's the difference?

If you choose to wear some outrageous outfit*, the difference between being hip or totally fashionably inept really only depends on whether you are able to pull the outfit off. Which is totally a subjective opinion in itself (*defined as some outfit not directly off the rack at macy's but maybe with some thrift store shit thrown in there? I dunno).

I now give you more examples than you asked for:

Peteykins, the fashion victim:
http://www.peteykins.com/sparklepics5/FashionVictim05.jpg
quoth Peter:
Sometimes I really think about what I'm wearing to work and nobody notices, or I'll get the tried-and-true "That's an... interesting... combination." Today, I was a little rushed and didn't really pay attention. On my way to the Metro, I looked down and thought, Peteykins, what the hell have you got on? Wouldn't you know it? I got, like, a zillion compliments all day long.
moar (http://sparklepony.blogspot.com/search/label/Fashion%20Victim) - the man is a genius with thrift-store finds.

Charles Phoenix:
http://www.charlesphoenix.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/HAPPY-EASTER-FLAG-PORTRAIT-599x399.jpghttp://www.charlesphoenix.com/wordpress/wp-content/themes/cpx10/images/right_upcoming-cpx.png
This guy is not joking. He's not being ironic. He loves Americana, he loves Disney, he loves nostalgia, and he loves thrift-stores.
Charles Phoenix (http://www.godblessamericana.com/)

Both the above guys are total flamers. Does that make a difference? I hope not.

Here's Brittney. She wears crazy glasses and always has. Is she being "ironic" or does she really like the look of these?
http://www.dlisted.com/files/britneyspearsrodeo.jpg
Britney Spears | Dlisted (http://www.dlisted.com/taxonomy/term/50)

Mischa and Jessica both took a lot of flak for wearing their high-wasted jeans. And both their responses were, "So what? I like my jeans." :shrug:

Mischa
http://www.blogcdn.com/www.tmz.com/media/2010/04/0405_mischa_barton.jpg
Mischa Barton -- High & Waisted | TMZ.com (http://www.tmz.com/2010/04/05/mischa-barton-high-waisted-pants-fashion-photo/)

Jessica
http://buzzworthy.mtv.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/jessica_11.jpg

People wear what they like, what they think looks good. Whether they are trying to fit into some mold on the side of trendy or on the side of anti-trendy (which can be their own thing or just another flavor of trendy within some counter-culture) it really just comes down to personal taste.

[Ensign Steve]

Oh, one more. Look at these fucking hipsters:

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/ensignsteve/4495437162/" title="100_0937 by jdrouan, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2686/4495437162_3c43c94b93.jpg" width="500" height="375" alt="100_0937" /></a>

Geddit? They're a bitch and a dick, slathering atheists, and here they are on Easter dressed in their pastelest best, hiding eggs for the kiddies. How ironic. Or, you know, fun. Whatever you want to call it.

[Anastasia Beaverhausen]

You look really cute, ES. That dress is darling, and I adore those sandals.


http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_l0ev8dQuI51qzzhzdo1_500.jpg

[Ensign Steve]

I stand corrected. That guy wins.

[wei yau]

I've no idea about any of these trendy things, I really don't.

I dress now pretty much the same way I have since High School, though I have introduced tropical shirts to my ensemble in the last few years.

My hairstyle hasn't changed, aside from thinning.

My glasses are pretty much in the same style, changing only when something is on sale or recommended by the salesperson.

So, I've never been in tune with trends or fashion. Thus, I can't tell what is a hipster supposed to be, not only because of the fact that hipster is a trend in itself, but it's a trend based on other trends.

So, I'm doubly lost with hipsters.

[Adam]

Not a bad attempt at describing what people mean when they say "hipster":

Under the guise of “irony,” hipsterism fetishizes the authentic and regurgitates it with a winking inauthenticity. Those 18-to-34-year-olds called hipsters have defanged, skinned and consumed the fringe movements of the postwar era—Beat, hippie, punk, even grunge. Hungry for more, and sick with the anxiety of influence, they feed as well from the trough of the uncool, turning white trash chic, and gouging the husks of long-expired subcultures—vaudeville, burlesque, cowboys and pirates.

Of course, hipsterism being originally, and still mostly, the province of whites (the pastiest of whites), its acolytes raid the cultural stores of every unmelted ethnicity in the pot. Similarly, they devour gay style: Witness the cultural burp known as metrosexuality. As the hipster ambles from the thrift store to a $100 haircut at Freemans Sporting Club, these aesthetics are assimilated—cannibalized—into a repertoire of meaninglessness, from which the hipster can construct an identity in the manner of a collage, or a shuffled playlist on an iPod.

Read more: http://newyork.timeout.com/articles/features/4840/why-the-hipster-must-die#ixzz0kWE8E4zI

[LadyShea]

http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_l0ev8dQuI51qzzhzdo1_500.jpg

I would be willing to bet real money that was posed to make fun of hipsters, not a guy really wearing that shit because he likes it- either seriously or ironically- and reading...what a Twilight coffee table book?

Do we know the provenance of the photo?

[LadyShea]

So, hipsters appropriate styles from all different cultures and eras as a way to remove themselves from the mainstream, creating a fad that then has been appropriated into the mainstream...so one can buy trucker hats at the mall, for example.

How is this any different from any other counterculture gone popular culture then abandoned? They seem no more original, nor more worthy of derision, than the Hot Topic goths or pre-torn/pre-bleached/pre-paint splattered jeans wearers or the pre-faded flannel grunge appropriators of the past.

[Ensign Steve]

So, hipsters appropriate styles from all different cultures and eras as a way to remove themselves from the mainstream, creating a fad that then has been appropriated into the mainstream...so one can buy trucker hats at the mall, for example.

How is this any different from any other counterculture gone popular culture then abandoned? They seem no more original, nor more worthy of derision, than the Hot Topic goths or pre-torn/pre-bleached/pre-paint splattered jeans wearers or the pre-faded flannel grunge appropriators of the past.

I was never more depressed* than the day I saw that Urban Outfitters had started selling three-wolf-moon. :sadcheer:

UrbanOutfitters.com > 3 Wolf Moon Tee (http://www.urbanoutfitters.com/urban/catalog/productdetail.jsp?id=17056383&navAction=jump&navCount=21)

*I am being dishonest. I have been more depressed than I was that day.

But I love three-wolf-moon because it is nerdy. Because Dwight wears it on The Office without a hint of irony. Because it imbues the wearer with magical powers. Not because it's ironic. Is that the same or different? I don't even know! And I don't even know what I have against Urban Outfitters. A shirt I like is now available at a store I have no beef with, and this makes me angry for some reason. I blame hipsters. :shakecane:

[LadyShea]

Probably because you can't like what you like without being accused of being a hipster and not really even knowing what it means! I know that's my beef with the whole hipster/haters deal.

[wei yau]

Is this anything like the whole "I like that band before anyone else knew about them, but now that the band is popular and everyone knows them, they suck." kinda thing?

[Ensign Steve]

Is this anything like the whole "I like that band before anyone else knew about them, but now that the band is popular and everyone knows them, they suck." kinda thing?

Maybe it's that combined with the "I don't know if you're wearing that shirt because you genuinely like it, or if you are doing it to make fun of the people who like it, so I don't know if I like you or think you're a jerk" and also what LS said. And since my theory is that people wear what they genuinely like (or, more accurately, that they genuinely like what they wear), my problem becomes and remains my own.

[Adam]

http://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0016/9762/products/elitism801.png?1270728325

I dunno that it has anything to do with hipsterism specifically, though. I think you get a lot of that in any music scene, probably because people do, in fact, enjoy being one of an exclusive group, even when that group is defined by something as arbitrary as fandom.

[Ensign Steve]

Also?


Hell I wore nothing but Wayfarers from 1985 until 2002

Hot!

[Ensign Steve]

http://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0016/9762/products/elitism801.png?1270728325

:alarm: That's not how Venn diagrams work. :alarm:

Unless I still like all the music I used to like, and that just happens to be the only music that we both like. Do you not like contemporary music, is that it?

[Adam]

But I love three-wolf-moon because it is nerdy. Because Dwight wears it on The Office without a hint of irony. Because it imbues the wearer with magical powers. Not because it's ironic. Is that the same or different? I don't even know! And I don't even know what I have against Urban Outfitters. A shirt I like is now available at a store I have no beef with, and this makes me angry for some reason. I blame hipsters. :shakecane:

See, I would say that, unless you like it because you really dig wolves, or think the picture is beautiful, or something like that, you do like it ironically. There's nothing wrong with that. I like it for most of the same reasons you do (I don't watch The Office), but I definitely think it's an ironomical thing.

Or, on the other hand, if we non-ironicaly like it because it's nerdy, or because of Dwight, but it became popular in nerd circles because it's ironic, what does that mean?

[Adam]

:alarm: That's not how Venn diagrams work. :alarm:

Unless I still like all the music I used to like, and that just happens to be the only music that we both like. Do you not like contemporary music, is that it?

I think the idea is supposed to be that I still like that music, but now that you like it I say I used to like it.

Maybe a better way to say it: whenever there is an overlap between music you like and music I like, I have to claim that I only used to like it in order to maintain my cooler than thou cred.

[LadyShea]

Or, on the other hand, if we non-ironicaly like it because it's nerdy, or because of Dwight, but it became popular in nerd circles because it's ironic, what does that mean?

Hyper-meta-anti-ironic!

[Ensign Steve]

See, I would say that, unless you like it because you really dig wolves, or think the picture is beautiful, or something like that, you do like it ironically. There's nothing wrong with that. I like it for most of the same reasons you do (I don't watch The Office), but I definitely think it's an ironomical thing.

Or, on the other hand, if we non-ironicaly like it because it's nerdy, or because of Dwight, but it became popular in nerd circles because it's ironic, what does that mean?

I like it because it reminds me of the beautiful (yes, I think its beautiful) posters and notebook covers that we had in the 80s. So is it just nostalgic for me? How boring! I'm getting old.

Edit: Damn you guys are forcing me to examine why I like shit. Why do I think three-wolf-moon nerdy in the first place? There's no dragons or spaceships on it. Well, I think it's nerdy because it is out-dated, so if you were wearing it, one would assume you were a bit fashionably inept and not up on the current trends. It shows that you care more about enjoying yourself than you do about being cool, so you probably also are willing to talk about D&D and Star Trek in public, so I'm likely to like you. So if they make it trendy, and it stops being nerdy, how do I know when I see you in starbucks if we are going to have anything in common or if you are just a poser douche? Wow, I think this is the first time I have belonged to a subculture (nerds) whose shit was appropriated by the mainstream. Now I know how all the goths and emos feel. Yuck!

[beyelzu]

I'm not sure but I think 'hipster' is the new 'emo'; i.e. that ambiguously defined group all the cool kids unite around hating today.

emo was not ambiguously defined, it involved shitty sad music often with piano or keyboards that claimed to be punk.


and cutting yourself.

[wildernesse]

Hmm. I feel annoyed about the 3 wolf shirt, too, and I don't watch The Office anymore or go to Urban Outfitters.

First of all, I have to say that RA had a shirt suspiciously similar to that with wolves but with purple/red lightning instead of a moon. Pretty much the same genre of shirt, though. I think he finally gave it away.

Part of it is that the people who are buying the shirt from Urban Outfitters would never actually buy the shirt to wear from the truck stop or nerd rally or wherever wolf shirts like that actually come from. They're buying it because they aren't possibly the kind of person who would actually like this sort of thing. It's mean-spirited.

ETA: I think the wolf shirts are nerdy because the only people I have ever known who wore them (back in the 90's) were nerdy people who didn't bother or couldn't make concessions to the mainstream.

[LadyShea]

Part of it is that the people who are buying the shirt from Urban Outfitters would never actually buy the shirt to wear from the truck stop or nerd rally or wherever wolf shirts like that actually come from.

Western states tourist trap souvenir shops (especially along the SW corridor of Route 66) and/or New Agey stores from the early 90's

They're buying it because they aren't possibly the kind of person who would actually like this sort of thing. It's mean-spirited.


But how does that even work? I am going to purchase and wear a shirt I hate to make fun of people who purchase and wear the shirt because they like it? If 2 people are wearing the same shirt, aren't 2 people wearing the same shirt indicating they both like it on some level?

ETA: I think the wolf shirts are nerdy because the only people I have ever known who wore them (back in the 90's) were nerdy people who didn't bother or couldn't make concessions to the mainstream.

I am pretty sure someone in my family has one or more of those that say "Colorado" or some shit on them from our vacations in the 70's and 80's, because we all collect such souvenirs. If the nerds appropriated them for whatever reason in the 90's, were they also being ironic and mean spirited?

[Adam]

They're buying it because they aren't possibly the kind of person who would actually like this sort of thing. It's mean-spirited.


But how does that even work? I am going to purchase and wear a shirt I hate to make fun of people who purchase and wear the shirt because they like it?

While I don't think it's particularly mean, yes, that's more or less how it works. You buy a shirt you think is awful and you become part of the informed audience who get to wink at people who genuinely like the awful shirt.

[beyelzu]

Hmm. I feel annoyed about the 3 wolf shirt, too, and I don't watch The Office anymore or go to Urban Outfitters.

First of all, I have to say that RA had a shirt suspiciously similar to that with wolves but with purple/red lightning instead of a moon. Pretty much the same genre of shirt, though. I think he finally gave it away.

Part of it is that the people who are buying the shirt from Urban Outfitters would never actually buy the shirt to wear from the truck stop or nerd rally or wherever wolf shirts like that actually come from. They're buying it because they aren't possibly the kind of person who would actually like this sort of thing. It's mean-spirited.

ETA: I think the wolf shirts are nerdy because the only people I have ever known who wore them (back in the 90's) were nerdy people who didn't bother or couldn't make concessions to the mainstream.

as recently as the early 2000s we sold them at some convenience stores I worked at. always popular among rednecks, i assure you.

[Ensign Steve]

They're buying it because they aren't possibly the kind of person who would actually like this sort of thing. It's mean-spirited.


But how does that even work? I am going to purchase and wear a shirt I hate to make fun of people who purchase and wear the shirt because they like it?

While I don't think it's particularly mean, yes, that's more or less how it works. You buy a shirt you think is awful and you become part of the informed audience who get to wink at people who genuinely like the awful shirt.

Or are you bucking the system by wearing an awful shirt, even though you are informed of the awfulness thereof? Can you be celebrating its awfulness?

[LadyShea]

While I don't think it's particularly mean, yes, that's more or less how it works. You buy a shirt you think is awful and you become part of the informed audience who get to wink at people who genuinely like the awful shirt.

But doesn't that still indicate you like or enjoy, or are amused by, or have some positive feelings toward the shirt on some level?

My dad once bought the most heinous 70's shirt at a garage sale for a quarter because he liked the bright colors (he wore it for years). My brother collects elaborately decorated (with scrolly stuff and gold leaf and shit) clocks and lamps because they amuse him. I, myself, have my yard filled with dumpster dived crap, because it appeals to my sense of whimsy. We all like this shit because it's awful, ya know? It happens to be ironic I guess, but we still truly like it.

[Ensign Steve]

Whimsy. Great word.

[Adam]

Those are all good points. [Thanks] for the Hipster, guys.

[lisarea]

This BBS sucks. It has NO MARY WORTH SMILEYS, so I'm going to have to ask everyone to please read this post explaining hipsters in my wise but gentle elderly matron voice.

Hipster doesn't really mean anything specific. It's a term that is currently being used to describe a specific genre of everything, but what that genre is isn't well defined. Generally, though, it means what it has meant since the Civil War days, when I was a girl. It means a follower (or leader) of current youth culture, whatever that happens to be at the time.

Current incarnations of hipsters can often be identified by their dress, their behavior, and the various works they produce, which often have commonalities such as an anti-consumerist, DIY ethos, and a self-conscious fondness for cheesy things, which is currently, in youth lingo, referred to as 'irony,' based on a generous interpretation of the term. (That is, to an uninformed audience, an airbrushed kitty shirt is simply twee. To the informed, hipster audience, it is interpreted as the hipster poking some gentle fun at the twee imagery. See? Irony.)

So, right now, right this minute, hipsters tend to dress in unattractively dated clothing such as bootie shorts and tube socks, listen to independent music, watch independent, experimental films, and appropriate elements of cultures that are not normally appropriated. (Like appropriating old, blue collar culture by drinking Pabst beer.)

You know what other subcultures did similar things? Hippy. Punk. Grunge. Probably everything else I can't think of the names of, because these are common themes among disaffected youth and of US subcultures in general.

The one major theme of early, underground youth cultures is almost always a rejection of consumerism. Wearing thrift store clothes or making your own, listening to independent often DIY music, supporting independent filmmakers, and participating in a culture that is outside the domain of corporate entities. This is why it has to move fast. Because as soon as clothing manufacturers and record labels and production companies pick up on your culture, they appropriate it for the benefit of poseurs, so you have to move on. Eventually, someone is going to get the idea to mass market earrings that look like safety pins and necklace charms that look like razor blades, and they'll sell pre-ripped jeans and push up the price of Converse sneakers. Or JC Penney (true story!) will manufacture and sell a shirt in their catalog that has the body of a plaid flannel shirt with a gray sweatshirt hood actually SEWN ONTO IT to give the appearance of a flannel shirt worn over top of a sweatshirt. And Hot Topic and K Mart and Target will start printing t-shirts with pre-worn looking corporate logos for classic junk foods and wacky but dated and inappropriate sayings, like "Foxy Grandma" shirts marketed to young men.

So as a generalized culture, that's what it is. It's a fundamentally exclusive culture. It loses its cool once it becomes appropriated. That's why it's a rapidly moving target, and that's why it's difficult to nail down its specific elements. Because they don't want you to. They don't want people to like them or to imitate them. This is 100% normal, 100% predictable, and IMO, 100% justified.

As far as the arts go, movies and music, there is no such thing as major release hipster stuff. Not Juno, not a post Bottle Rocket Wes Anderson movie, not a post Stranger Than Paradise Jim Jarmusch, etc. If any director is a hipster director, it's going to be someone like Harmony Korine or Vincent Gallo, not someone making movies that are designed to showcase certain cultural semiotics to appeal to a broad audience. Those are something else entirely. (And as I pointed out before, you have to be careful to distinguish between the derivative and the derived.)

Oh, and this shit about Mary Worth? Totally ironic!

[livius drusus]

When I first moved to Atlanta, I found out that an old friend lived here who I hadn't seen since her parents moved to India when we were in 9th grade. We got together and it turned out we liked each other even more as adults.

We had a total blast together doing such things as: moving a monstrous Naugahyde couch we found on the side of the street into her apartment, singing Air Supply songs at the top of our lungs, watching awful movies that wished they were B, and listening to a tape of her 4th grade orchestra performance that was one brilliantly loud cacophony after the other. She would do this orchestra conductor mime along with the music that had me weeping in laughter.

Was it all irony? Yes, in the sense that both she and I have fairly sophisticated tastes developed by being forced to do rarified cultural things by our parents in our formative years, so we were aware that Naugahyde sidewalk couches are tacky (and possibly diseased) as fuck and that that 4th grade orchestra failed utterly at producing anything resembling melodious sound. But also no because we also genuinely, truly, 100% enjoyed every minute of all of that stuff. We weren't sneering in the least. We were wallowing.

[Adam]

That sounds awesoem when you put it like that. It sort makes me of wish I was cool enough to be a hipster.

[lisarea]

We all do, Adam.

[Watser?]

Sublime Frequencies (http://www.sublimefrequencies.com/) is the hipster label of World Music. World Music has become a major industry like all other music, although there have always been small, independent labels plodding on, barely making any money. But Sublime Frequencies is different in the audience it aims at, which is two-fold IMO. Part of it is people who like the old jangly garage guitar sound but think 13th Floor Elevators and the Sonics and stuff like that have become uncool so they move on to obscure bands from Mauritania and Niger that SF signed that give an Arab/Tuareg twist to the old electric guitar with an authentic edge. And on the other hand there is the cheesy stuff from Indonesia, Thailand, Iraq, Syria etcetera which you can like in a totally ironic way or just because it is kinda cool in a cheesy way.

You see both those groups at small scale world music concerts as well these days. I'm guessing this means world music, or at least some subgenres are going to go massive in the next decade. Some already have here, like the Balkan/gypsy music. Which, yeah, is no longer cool...

[LadyShea]

Okay so, since the ironical shit has been corporatized, are all the people currently being called "hipsters" really just poseurs? I am assuming the rebels have moved on to something else now?

[Adam]

Does "World Music" mean anything besides "popular music outside the Euro-American tradition"?

[Watser?]

Does "World Music" mean anything besides "popular music outside the Euro-American tradition"?

No.

Well, Scandinavian, Irish and other European folk and American regional styles like cajun, zydeco, bluegrass tex-mex etc. are usually included too.

[Ari]

It seems like every culture and counter culture has *that* group of people. Often a younger generation that has come to the culture from the top down. Who never got to experience what created that group and so they idolize what pop culture tells them that group is about.

pre-torn/pre-bleached/pre-paint splattered jeans wearers or the pre-faded flannel grunge appropriators of the past.
I've been on a recent 'how things are made' youtube kick and found it amazing how much effort goes into fading and abusing the newly made jeans. Practically half of the jean factory was there to damage the new and crisp product.

[BrotherMan]

Hipster doesn't really mean anything specific. It's a term that is currently being used to describe a specific genre of everything, but what that genre is isn't well defined. Generally, though, it means what it has meant since the Civil War days, when I was a girl. It means a follower (or leader) of current youth culture, whatever that happens to be at the time.

Current incarnations of hipsters can often be identified by their dress, their behavior, and the various works they produce, which often have commonalities such as an anti-consumerist, DIY ethos, and a self-conscious fondness for cheesy things, which is currently, in youth lingo, referred to as 'irony,' based on a generous interpretation of the term. (That is, to an uninformed audience, Hello Kitty shirt is simply twee. To the informed, hipster audience, it is interpreted as the hipster poking some gentle fun at the twee imagery. See? Irony.)

So, right now, right this minute, hipsters tend to dress in unattractively dated clothing such as bootie shorts and tube socks, listen to independent music, watch independent, experimental films, and appropriate elements of cultures that are not normally appropriated. (Like appropriating old, blue collar culture by drinking Pabst beer.)

You know what other subcultures did similar things? Hippy. Punk. Grunge. Probably everything else I can't think of the names of, because these are common themes among disaffected youth and of US subcultures in general.

The one major theme of early, underground youth cultures is almost always a rejection of consumerism. Wearing thrift store clothes or making your own, listening to independent often DIY music, supporting independent filmmakers, and participating in a culture that is outside the domain of corporate entities. This is why it has to move fast. Because as soon as clothing manufacturers and record labels and production companies pick up on your culture, they appropriate it for the benefit of poseurs, so you have to move on. Eventually, someone is going to get the idea to mass market earrings that look like safety pins and necklace charms that look like razor blades, and they'll sell pre-ripped jeans and push up the price of Converse sneakers. Or Sears will manufacture and sell a shirt in their catalog that has the body of a plaid flannel shirt with a gray sweatshirt hood actually SEWN ONTO IT to give the appearance of a flannel shirt worn over top of a sweatshirt. And Hot Topic and WalMart and Target will start printing t-shirts with pre-aged looking corporate logos for classic junk foods and wacky but dated and inappropriate sayings, like "I :heart: Benson" shirts marketed to young men.

So as a generalized culture, that's what it is. It's a fundamentally exclusive culture. It loses its cool once it becomes appropriated. That's why it's a rapidly moving target, and that's why it's difficult to nail down its specific elements. Because they don't want you to. They don't want people to like them or to imitate them. This is 100% normal, 100% predictable, and IMO, 100% justified.

As far as the arts go, movies and music, there is no such thing as major release hipster stuff. Not Juno, not a post Bottle Rocket Wes Anderson movie, not a post Stranger Than Paradise Jim Jarmusch, etc. If any director is a hipster director, it's going to be someone like Harmony Korine or Vincent Gallo, not someone making movies that are designed to showcase certain cultural semiotics to appeal to a broad audience. Those are something else entirely. (And as I pointed out before, you have to be careful to distinguish between the derivative and the derived.)

[Adam]

[Thanks] for the Benson

[livius drusus]

That sounds awesoem when you put it like that. It sort makes me of wish I was cool enough to be a hipster.
You and lisapea are out of luck, sad to say. There's no way you could be as cool as Sarah. When we were in 7th grade, her parents put a pencil drawing she had made on the fridge. It was the head of Placido Domingo on a flamingo's body. Naturally it was entitled "Placido Flamingo".

So yeah, way, way out of y'all's league.

[Adam]

Who is Placebo Dingo? Is that some kind of twee hipster thing? Do I need to punch you in the cock?

[livius drusus]

http://www.freethought-forum.com/livius/cockpunching.jpg

[Adam]

Which one is Placenta Marentes? The guy doing the punching, or the guy with the red crown growing out of his crotch?

[Nullifidian]

Who is Placebo Dingo? Is that some kind of twee hipster thing? Do I need to punch you in the cock?

I'm going to be all hipster and ironimical and answer this question with a 6.5 minute video clip where Domingo only sings for 30 seconds.

Skip ahead to 4:35 for the Domingo.

"Una vela... Esultate!" - Verdi's Otello

Honestly, though, if you're at all into opera, you should watch the whole thing because musically it's one of the strongest openings of any Verdi opera.

[Adam]

HA! My interest in Diego Pteradona was affected and ironomical in the first place, and you fell into my trap or something! Stupid mainstream culture person!

[erimir]

ETA: I think the wolf shirts are nerdy because the only people I have ever known who wore them (back in the 90's) were nerdy people who didn't bother or couldn't make concessions to the mainstream.People who are engaging in a Native American identity project (i.e. constructing a NA identity for themselves) wear them too.

Or at least, in this documentary about the Lumbee Indians, a group in NC which is genetically mixed race (probably more than one NA group, white and black), there was this guy totally wearing one of those shirts, in his store which sells prints of that kind of picture. Totally cheesy, and not even something that would've originated with the Lumbee at all. The Lumbee don't have their own language anymore, but they have a distinct dialect, but anyway, they do some things that aren't really from the area, or that they have no recent connection with as part of asserting their Indian-ness.
If 2 people are wearing the same shirt, aren't 2 people wearing the same shirt indicating they both like it on some level?Well, my friend bought a baseball cap that says "Jesus is my boss" even though he's a total atheist. He's too scared to wear it in public tho lol.

At an actual rural gas station tho. Although the gas station was run by an (India) Indian, who probably wasn't Christian anyway.

But if he wears it, he only likes it on the level of "Ha, I'm a total atheist who dislikes the sort of person who would wear this kind of hat because they do love Jesus and they feel the need to tell everyone about it, so that I'm wearing this hat is funny."

The same friend also has this t-shirt:

http://www.tshirtgalleries.com/wp-content/uploads/laser-cat-tshirt-full.png

Does that make him a hipster?

[Ensign Steve]

Hipster or not, it makes him cool as hell.

bey's gas station is owned by an Indian (Sikh) and he sells all kinds of Jesus stuff, as well as USA and Rebel gear and whatever. You sell what sells, not what the owner is into. Not a big market for turbans and Bollywood DVDs in rural Georgia, believe it or not.

[wildernesse]

The Lumbee don't have their own language anymore, but they have a distinct dialect, but anyway, they do some things that aren't really from the area, or that they have no recent connection with as part of asserting their Indian-ness.

No joke. I talked with a good handful of Lumbee while working at Legal Aid.

[godfry n. glad]

Hipster or not, it makes him cool as hell.

bey's gas station is owned by an Indian (Sikh) and he sells all kinds of Jesus stuff, as well as USA and Rebel gear and whatever. You sell what sells, not what the owner is into. Not a big market for turbans and Bollywood DVDs in rural Georgia, believe it or not.

Yet.

[Stormlight]

Does "World Music" mean anything besides "popular music outside the Euro-American tradition"?

No.

Well, Scandinavian, Irish and other European folk and American regional styles like cajun, zydeco, bluegrass tex-mex etc. are usually included too.

And if you believe iTunes, also German/French pop. :blank:

[Deadlokd]

YouTube- Edith Piaf - Non, je ne regrette rien (1961)

[Adam]

[Thanks] for the [R], Deadlokd.

[Demimonde]

Gah! I will not miss another hipster thread! But I have to go to class, so two quick points before I have to run:


http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_l0ev8dQuI51qzzhzdo1_500.jpg

I would be willing to bet real money that was posed to make fun of hipsters, not a guy really wearing that shit because he likes it- either seriously or ironically- and reading...what a Twilight coffee table book?

Do we know the provenance of the photo?

While I can't vouch for the authenticity of the photo, I can say that it appears that my friend Dave and my friend Toby have had a love child none of us were aware of. Though Toby would be carrying a gold lamé bag with it.


Edit: Damn you guys are forcing me to examine why I like shit. Why do I think three-wolf-moon nerdy in the first place? There's no dragons or spaceships on it. Well, I think it's nerdy because it is out-dated, so if you were wearing it, one would assume you were a bit fashionably inept and not up on the current trends. It shows that you care more about enjoying yourself than you do about being cool, so you probably also are willing to talk about D&D and Star Trek in public, so I'm likely to like you. So if they make it trendy, and it stops being nerdy, how do I know when I see you in starbucks if we are going to have anything in common or if you are just a poser douche? Wow, I think this is the first time I have belonged to a subculture (nerds) whose shit was appropriated by the mainstream. Now I know how all the goths and emos feel. Yuck!

Yeah, I still don't think that will ever be trendy per se. Hipsters are still the counter culture IMO and get the same treatment as nerds. Actually, come to think of it, when our local rag ran a feature in Last Call about the "nerdiest" bars, our Chat Room Pub was listed as the best even though it is also the center of the Hipster / Indy universe around here. So there is great overlap most of the time.

Is this anything like the whole "I like that band before anyone else knew about them, but now that the band is popular and everyone knows them, they suck." kinda thing?

Maybe it's that combined with the "I don't know if you're wearing that shirt because you genuinely like it, or if you are doing it to make fun of the people who like it, so I don't know if I like you or think you're a jerk" and also what LS said. And since my theory is that people wear what they genuinely like (or, more accurately, that they genuinely like what they wear), my problem becomes and remains my own.

To say that hipsters wear that stuff because they hate it I think would be a mistake. You are right on track that people wear what they like. A hipster loves their gear in the same way others love their designer labels. Its a choice that they have made whether they were able to buy it back in the day, in a thrift store, or at UO. If they are wearing 3 wolf moon, it's because they think it is awesome too.

[Sock Puppet]

The same friend also has this t-shirt:

http://www.tshirtgalleries.com/wp-content/uploads/laser-cat-tshirt-full.png

Does that make him a hipster?From what I understand from this thread, a hipster's choice of clothing is based on a subjective context that allows him/her to enjoy it. So your friend is not a hipster, because that T-shirt is objectively awesome.

[lisarea]

I can understand why people might be annoyed if you think someone is slavishly following trends or being way too image conscious, and I am aware that a lot of people seem to take offense at people dressing in ways they think are unattractive; but what I can't even begin to understand is the indie hate.*

What possible objection could anyone have to independent artists, whether they're musicians, designers, or filmmakers?

* In fact, if there's any kind of truly hateworthy category of 'hipster,' I'd think it'd be those who buy stuff from places like Hot Topic and Urban Outfitters, which systematically steal designs from independent artists.

[Ensign Steve]

You mean like those Bansky rip-off graphic tees they sell at UO?

Hooray! I have a legitimate beef with UO!

I would totally wear one of those shirts.

[Adam]

What possible objection could anyone have to independent artists, whether they're musicians, designers, or filmmakers?

I believe the objection is not to the existence of independent artists, but to the conceit that being indie means that some given work is automatically better than any work produced by a major studio/label/whatever.

[lisarea]

I believe the objection is not to the existence of independent artists, but to the conceit that being indie means that some given work is automatically better than any work produced by a major studio/label/whatever.

Well, it's certainly not automatic, but it's a fairly decent rule of thumb. Corporate music, movies, and arts are nearly always watered down and designed to appeal to a broader audience than artist-produced work.

So if you're young and you're really really into the arts, as young people should be, it's understandable that you'd have a preference for art that's independently produced. Maybe it's a little snobby, but snobbery isn't always pretentious.

And there's usually some ethical element to it, too, with more of the profits from sales going to the artists. And that's also a normal, healthy thing for young people to do.

I guess my point is that young people are supposed to be idealistic and angry. If anything, I'm more annoyed by those who aren't, and who just swallow consumer culture whole.

[beyelzu]

I believe the objection is not to the existence of independent artists, but to the conceit that being indie means that some given work is automatically better than any work produced by a major studio/label/whatever.

Well, it's certainly not automatic, but it's a fairly decent rule of thumb. Corporate music, movies, and arts are nearly always watered down and designed to appeal to a broader audience than artist-produced work.

So if you're young and you're really really into the arts, as young people should be, it's understandable that you'd have a preference for art that's independently produced. Maybe it's a little snobby, but snobbery isn't always pretentious.

And there's usually some ethical element to it, too, with more of the profits from sales going to the artists. And that's also a normal, healthy thing for young people to do.

I guess my point is that young people are supposed to be idealistic and angry. If anything, I'm more annoyed by those who aren't, and who just swallow consumer culture whole.

I disagree, I think that one of the defining traits of hipsterism is valuing indie shit for being indie and assuming it is good. By and large, it really isn't that great. Sure some of it is just fucking awesome, but in my experience most of it really isn't very good.

I think it's pretentious as hell often times and experience has taught me that if a hipster suggests that something is good, I will generally pass.

[Ensign Steve]

Yeah, I figure if it's really, truly that good, it will eventually get picked up by the mainstream, and then I won't have to wade through the shit to find it. Maybe I will miss a gem here or there, but that's a risk I'm prepared to take.

Damn, that's horrible, right? I'm totally not joking. I know I'm supposed to say I care about talent and integrity and all that arty shit, but I just want to listen to some good tunes in my car. I'm bucking the indie system!

Reverse meta indie hipster up in heah.

[Watser?]

Almost nothing eventually gets picked up by the mainstream. Some things eventually get taken over by the mainstream, which then starts spitting out bad copies. And some things make it to a cult classic status so they will be sort of floating just below the mainstream.

[lisarea]

How do you determine whether someone is a hipster in the first place? It's almost a nonce word.

Of course there are people who are pretentious and who are just trying to cultivate some kind of image for themselves.

But it's really common for people to dismiss things they don't get as bullshit, and that's just stupid. Of course you don't like a lot of independent art. That's my point. For the most part, mass marketed media is designed for broad appeal, and to be easily categorized and understood. So it lacks a lot of the creativity and nuance that you can often find in art that hasn't been mucked around with by some committee.

I'm just not buying that huge numbers of people are making themselves miserable pretending to like stuff they don't really like and abstaining from the things they really do like just so other people will think they're cool or something. They just like stuff you don't get.

[Ensign Steve]

I'm just not buying that huge numbers of people are making themselves miserable pretending to like stuff they don't really like and abstaining from the things they really do like just so other people will think they're cool or something. They just like stuff you don't get.

It goes both ways, though. The huge numbers of people who like the mass-appeal shit really do like it, not just because it's what the media or corporate america or some committee has told them to like. I mean, that's kind of the nature of mass-appeal.

[Adam]

I believe the objection is not to the existence of independent artists, but to the conceit that being indie means that some given work is automatically better than any work produced by a major studio/label/whatever.

Well, it's certainly not automatic, but it's a fairly decent rule of thumb. Corporate music, movies, and arts are nearly always watered down and designed to appeal to a broader audience than artist-produced work.

So if you're young and you're really really into the arts, as young people should be, it's understandable that you'd have a preference for art that's independently produced. Maybe it's a little snobby, but snobbery isn't always pretentious.

And there's usually some ethical element to it, too, with more of the profits from sales going to the artists. And that's also a normal, healthy thing for young people to do.

I guess my point is that young people are supposed to be idealistic and angry. If anything, I'm more annoyed by those who aren't, and who just swallow consumer culture whole.

I wasn't really defending the objection, I was just trying to articulate the substance of it. Whatever the merits of indie production versus mainstream production, it's irritating to be told that your tastes are somehow wrong and, in my experience, fans, especially young fans, of indie bands/movies/etc have a tendency to take just that position with regards to mainstream works. That leads to backlash anti-indie-rage.

What's sort of interesting to me is the rise, in the last couple years, of vocal indie video game developers, many of whom are in the habit of shooting off their mouths about how mainstream titles are not fun or, even more amusingly, that they are somehow actively preventing players from having fun. Google some of Jonathan Blow's rants some time. Predictably, he gets a lot of flak from people who do not appreciate being told that the fun they thought they had was not real, and they were only imagining that they enjoyed those soul crushing mainstream games.

Now, however, I will defend the objection, sort of. I like a lot of indie stuff. I like a lot of mainstream stuff. The two production modes serve different ends, and produce different sorts of works, but I don't think one is necessarily better or worse then the other, speaking as a consumer of music/movies/games/etc.

I'm always mystified by the stance that appealing to a broad cross section of consumers means that a work is bad. Maybe it appeals to a broad cross section because it addresses themes or emotions that most people can relate to? I'm glad that more experimental stuff is also available, but that doesn't mean that I'm going to turn my nose up at anything with broad appeal. On that same note, the need to appeal to a broad audience does filter out a lot of quality experimental stuff, but it also filters out a lot of shitty experimental stuff. Different is not always good, and experiments can fail.

I dunno about the ethical argument, either. Leaving aside abusive contracts for the moment, it seems that the artists have a choice between a higher portion of lower sales, or signing with a major production company and getting a lower portion of higher sales.

[Ari]

* In fact, if there's any kind of truly hateworthy category of 'hipster,' I'd think it'd be those who buy stuff from places like Hot Topic and Urban Outfitters, which systematically steal designs from independent artists.
That's generally the kind of hipster that bothers me especially when they talk to me. In every subculture there is the group core that dresses/acts/lives a certain way because it fits them and an outside group that does so in a flashy way to show off to others how awesome they are. Goths have this bad. I swear I'm going to smack the next person who says that you can't like Manson and be goth (fuck you kid wearing the oh so Goth Disney's Jack Skellington approved merchandise).

I've noticed this in the kinky world too. The girl in giant boots and tight vinyl at the goth club is possibly vanilla and so is that ren girl with a corset and flogger. But that accountant chick at work is really a freak in her spare time.

[lisarea]

Of course they do. I never said they didn't. Some people are motivated to seek out independent and niche media, some people aren't. There's nothing wrong with that.

There is something wrong with casually assuming that people who don't share your preferences are being pretentious and that things you don't get are bullshit, though.

[Qingdai]

I always thought a hipster was what I called a "wanna-be" they acted instead of lived.
Hipsters generally have more disposible income, where I shop at Goodwill because I'm some percentage from the federal poverty line.

I think it's a class issue at some point.Certainly in the urban, impoverished neighborhood I live in, hipsters are the ones that have money to go out, buy a look and then go home to comfort.
I did find it amusing to go through a Urban Outfitter and look at the prices they were charging on stuff I'd been avoiding at Goodwill for decades.

[Adam]

Almost nothing eventually gets picked up by the mainstream. Some things eventually get taken over by the mainstream, which then starts spitting out bad copies. And some things make it to a cult classic status so they will be sort of floating just below the mainstream.

Define "bad copy", though?

I'm going to keep talking about the nerdy media I am familiar with.

So, in the late 80's there were several creative deconstructions of the superhero genre, most famously Watchmen and The Dark Knight Returns. These got to be extremely popular, and inspired a number of followers, most of whom copied the superficial forms, but not the underlying themes of the works. So, in the 90's, you had a bumper crop of Dark N Gritty superhero books, full of gore and sex and supposedly adult themes and what have you.

In one sense, these followers totally missed the point, which was to demonstrate how ridiculous the conventions of a genre that involves costumed vigilantes saving the world by punching people were. On the other hand, people bought, read, and enjoyed many of those point-missing stories, so who's to say that they were not worthwhile works in their own right?

[Qingdai]

On the comic example, while that stuff was going on, I was reading Love and Rockets, Dirty Plotte and other comics that either barely mentioned or were completely removed from the whole super hero genre. I considered Watchmen and that ilk to be mainstream.

[Ensign Steve]

And another contender has thrown her hat into the "i'm more indie than thou" ring. :cheesywink:

[Adam]

Oh, no doubt. Did those inspire any mainstream followers, though? I was just trying to think of a situation where point-missing followers had fans that genuinely enjoyed their work.

[Qingdai]

Nah, I just liked different stuff. But yes, I am more indie than thou. Also mommier.

Fantagraphics had a sort of upswing in popularity, mostly in Europe, sort of like being big in Japan. I was thinking about how a lot of stuff never hits the main stream.

[Ensign Steve]

Everybody is indier and mommier than I, that's for damn sure.

[Demimonde]

They're buying it because they aren't possibly the kind of person who would actually like this sort of thing. It's mean-spirited.


But how does that even work? I am going to purchase and wear a shirt I hate to make fun of people who purchase and wear the shirt because they like it?

While I don't think it's particularly mean, yes, that's more or less how it works. You buy a shirt you think is awful and you become part of the informed audience who get to wink at people who genuinely like the awful shirt.

Or are you bucking the system by wearing an awful shirt, even though you are informed of the awfulness thereof? Can you be celebrating its awfulness?

I think that is both a celebration of awfulness in the way that liv so eloquently described as well as an act of independence. Also, thrift is freaking cheap, and most artistic types are poor as hell. Buying an awesome designer anything is most often out of their reach. Mainstream generic off the rack walmart is boring and has political overtones when it comes to exploitative production around the world. So they make the most out of what is lying around, undervalued, and try to find the fun and beauty in that.

And lisa is right, it is nothing new. There were second hand clothes stores on Haight Ashbury in the sixties, the Merry Pranksters dressed in anachronistic costumes and bought surplus American flags that they cut up and made into DIY jumpsuits. There is nothing new about it at all.

Okay so, since the ironical shit has been corporatized, are all the people currently being called "hipsters" really just poseurs? I am assuming the rebels have moved on to something else now?

It's a treadmill, and the goal posts are constantly shifting. Ironic for the sake of ironic is done now I think. The bad mustache thing made it jump the shark I think.

But rebels/artists/reactionaries will still do their thing. I will say, if someone pays through the nose for crap like that at the mall they have missed the point. I refer to those types as bobos. (http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=bobo) And there are tons of new permutations and mixes coming up too. Contra and I have identified a new sect that we refer to as "Gothabilly" which is an entirely new and strange animal.

Now that I am caught up, I too can't understand the Indy hate. I understand the hate of pretension. Crap, the music example showed up on page one. I think that the folks who whinge on about loving some band or brand or whatever "before it was cool" are just labeling themselves as followers not innovators. They are the early adopters and the worst trend whores, not the vanguard themselves. The artists themselves just do their own thing, and watch others pick it up and run to insane levels with it.

I am a great lover of Indy. Indy art, film, music (and by music I mean what my local bands are doing, I don't really know much about it, myself, I just like musicians, and like to support my friends.) Indy food is a big thing in my neighborhood. We starve out most of the corporate chains to support the mom and pop's.

[Qingdai]

Gothabilly must be like cowpunk.
Nothing new to see here, people. Move along.

[lisarea]

Gothabilly - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gothabilly)

(And I love most alt-country stuff in general. Way too many micro-genres to keep track of though.)

[Demimonde]

:yup: & :lol:

[Qingdai]

Heh, the Cowpunk entry for Wiki lists the Cramps too.

[lisarea]

They're also in Psychobilly.

[Watser?]

Almost nothing eventually gets picked up by the mainstream. Some things eventually get taken over by the mainstream, which then starts spitting out bad copies. And some things make it to a cult classic status so they will be sort of floating just below the mainstream.

Define "bad copy", though?

I'm going to keep talking about the nerdy media I am familiar with.

Ok, I'm not into comics or not into US comics much, so I will give you some examples from music.

Some of my favourite genres:
reggae: great reggae artists from the golden age (70s) like Lee Perry, Augustus Pablo or King Tubby still did not get any farther than cult status and I doubt they ever will (even though they have influenced mainstream music in many ways). Bad stuff like UB40, Inner Circle and others are way more popular and get more popular the more they dilute the real thing. Even Bob Marley, who was pretty good, was mostly popular because he diluted his reggae with rock, blues and other mainstream stuff so it sounded more like what people were used to.
post-punk: a lot of the good stuff is still pretty much unknown, except by other musicians. Hardly anyone knows the Gang of Four even though without them there would be no Red Hot Chili Peppers. Public Image Limited's guitarist inspired U2's The Edge (or to put it another way, The Edge ripped off Keith Levine). Joy Division is still a cult band, even though every third band in the 1980s tried to imitate them. There are others, but those three bands were so, so much better and more original than the bands that did break big like U2 or the Cure.
The same goes for Algerian raï for instance. The original version was pretty raw and not very easy listening for Western ears (even though they used Western instruments). But the big hits by the only artist to break through to the mainstream, (Cheb) Khaled, were hardly even raï at all anymore and sounded more like Italian pop.
In other words: the real edgy stuff hardly ever makes it out of the subculture and the only real way to reach the mainstream is to dilute. Which IMO almost always (Bob Marley is an exception in my book) makes it inferior.

[Ensign Steve]

When you use a word like "inferior" it gives it weight like you're making a value judgment or objective claim. I can understand if you personally prefer the undiluted stuff, but it's the language and tone that makes it sound, well ... pretentious.

Yes, you said IMO, and I don't actually think you are pretentious. But to claim that one thing is inferior, it makes it sound like you think inferiority (or superiority, for that matter) is an intrinsic property of the music itself, outside of the taste of the listener.

[Adam]

...some examples from music.

How are you using "dilute"?

My best guess is that you mean toning down some of the elements that specifically appeal to genre fans in favor of elements that appeal to broader audiences.

[Watser?]

...some examples from music.

How are you using "dilute"?

My best guess is that you mean toning down some of the elements that specifically appeal to genre fans in favor of elements that appeal to broader audiences.

I'm using dilute as saying that what makes that type of music (or art in general) special and different is emphasised less. Which makes it more like everything else and less unique.

It's like saying you can make more people drink coffee by adding more milk. This is probably true, but will it still be coffee that they are drinking?

[Watser?]

Mind you, I am not opposed to mixing different styles. I am not a purist. Combining different styles can be very interesting. I am not a fan of mixing styles if it is done on purpose to make it more appealing to a mainstream audience.

[Adam]

It's like saying you can make more people drink coffee by adding more milk. This is probably true, but will it still be coffee that they are drinking?

I think that sort of misses the point, though, or at least the point I'm trying to make. To me, the relevant question is not "Will it still be X?" I'm not really concerned with whether or not the work I'm consuming can legitimately be categorized as belonging to some particular genre. To me, the relevant question is whether or not I enjoy consuming that particular work.

So, I'm not really concerned with whether or not the beverage I can buy at Starbucks is "coffee" in some Platonic sense, I'm just concerned with whether or not I like the way it tastes. Genre fans of coffee can still drink the hardcore edgy stuff and it doesn't concern me, just like it shouldn't concern them if I prefer a cup of milk with some coffee flavor in it.

[Adam]

Mind you, I am not opposed to mixing different styles. I am not a purist. Combining different styles can be very interesting. I am not a fan of mixing styles if it is done on purpose to make it more appealing to a mainstream audience.

Why, though? Why is it OK to mix styles, unless you are doing it to make [ETA: more] people enjoy your work?

[Watser?]

I see your point. Makes sense.

But the discussion was on whether things that are good make it to the mainstream. I think they don't. Something makes it to the mainstream and if you like that, that's fine. But it's not the same thing and personally I think it is inferior. And if you look at how it influences other stuff I guess the edgier, original stuff is more influential in the long run too.

[Watser?]

Mind you, I am not opposed to mixing different styles. I am not a purist. Combining different styles can be very interesting. I am not a fan of mixing styles if it is done on purpose to make it more appealing to a mainstream audience.

Why, though? Why is it OK to mix styles, unless you are doing it to make [ETA: more] people enjoy your work?

Because I think music (or art) is usually better if you try to make it sound the way you like it yourself and are not trying to please others/as many people as possible,

[Adam]

I see your point. Makes sense.

But the discussion was on whether things that are good make it to the mainstream. I think they don't. Something makes it to the mainstream and if you like that, that's fine. But it's not the same thing and personally I think it is inferior. And if you look at how it influences other stuff I guess the edgier, original stuff is more influential in the long run too.

I guess it's just the word "good" that I object to. You seem to be implying some universal standard of good, and I disagree that such a thing exists.

[Ensign Steve]

I don't know how many pages back it was, but I had said that "the good stuff makes it to the mainstream" and I don't need to wade through shit to get to it. And he was replying to that.

So, yeah, I made a claim that what makes it to the main stream is "good" and Watser disagrees. I can dig it.

[Watser?]

I see your point. Makes sense.

But the discussion was on whether things that are good make it to the mainstream. I think they don't. Something makes it to the mainstream and if you like that, that's fine. But it's not the same thing and personally I think it is inferior. And if you look at how it influences other stuff I guess the edgier, original stuff is more influential in the long run too.

I guess it's just the word "good" that I object to. You seem to be implying some universal standard of good, and I disagree that such a thing exists.

I guess it is mostly a matter of taste. But I do really feel that something is lost by appealing to mainstream tastes. Though I suppose that can be a good thing in some cases too...
Production values are usually better with mainstream stuff. And there is a lot of crap in independent music/art too, obviously.

[lisarea]

Most niche music (and movies and design) lose some of their original character when they're retooled to appeal to a general audience. In general, subversive elements are toned down or eliminated, nuance is lost, and it's modified to appeal immediately to the largest audience possible. Some of the best art is that that doesn't immediately click, but takes some time to fully appreciate. It grows on you, not just individually, but sometimes as an acquired taste in general. Someone who listens to a whole lot of death metal or whatever is going to notice nuances that a general audience isn't.

I don't see what's so untenable about people who have more discerning tastes being 'snobbish.' Is it snobbish to think that Michaelangelo was a better painter than Thomas Kinkade or that Werner Herzog is a better director than Michael Bay? Maybe so, but if so, then what's wrong with being snobbish?

There's nothing morally wrong with personally preferring the wrong one, but not all preferences have equal merit. Some people actually do have more refined tastes than others, and the opinions of people with more knowledge and experience on the subject carry more weight than casual consumers. It seems like people usually get this when they're talking about something they're discerning about.

[Ensign Steve]

I can dig that. But I think it's possible to like both Michaelangelo and Kincade at the same time. And it's possible to dig some independent music and some mainstream music. I don't like to feel like I have objectively bad taste in music because I happen to like the current pop music.

Full disclosure, I haven't always liked pop music, but I have been getting into it lately (about the last year or two) because I really enjoy the way that the current stuff is so over-the-top manufactured. I have become obsessed with autotuning lately, and I can't get enough Kanye and Kesha. Not ironically! I feel like there's as much or more talent in the engineers' booth as behind the mic, and that's okay, because it's the final product that I enjoy.

[Ensign Steve]

Why do I keep saying "dig"? I :blame: liv. And Prince.

[Adam]

Personally, I'm fine with snobbery, and I'm snobby as hell regarding my specific genre interests, but I still don't think it's valid to make value judgments about other peoples' tastes (although I probably carelessly speak as though I think I can legitimately do that when I talk about my interests). Like, I can explain some specific areas in which Michaelangelo demonstrated more technical skill than Kincaide, or where he was breaking new ground while Kincaid just churns out repetitive works, but I don't think that gives me grounds to tell someone that they should, in an objective sense, prefer the one to the other. What if they don't value technical painting skillz? What if they just like pretty pictures of houses? Or, back to my comicbook example, I think the 90's antihero stuff was complete shit, and I can explain why in excruciating detail (the short version: it layered ostensibly adult subject matter over an inherently juvenile framework without being aware of the contradictions and then congratulated itself for being so mature), but I don't think that gives me grounds to say that no one should prefer it to the books I enjoy.

[wei yau]

Gee, Adam, I bet you also think you're too good for the Cheesecake Factory.

[Adam]

I'm not a genre fan of slightly upscale chain restaurants, so my tastes aren't really refined enough to judge the Cheesecake Factory, wei.

[Ensign Steve]

I actually have an incredibly fond memory involving The Cheesecake Factory and Nickelback, but I think I have already humiliated myself enough in this thread.

[Watser?]

:whoa:

[lisarea]

You guys know I never said anything about what people should enjoy and what they shouldn't, right? I know I didn't say it, but it's kind of been intimated a couple times.

I don't care what people like or don't like for the most part, and pretty much everyone likes something because it's comforting or pleasant or otherwise amusing. There's nothing wrong with that at all, and I never said there was.

I'm just saying that there are not entirely objective but credible arguments that some music, movies, and art is better than others.

And I'm not even lying about what I'm about to tell you. I was going to make a point and back it up by providing a side-by-side comparison of images, but then, just on a whim, I decided to try all of my search terms in one search instead of doing it in two steps, and I discovered that I AM NOT THE FIRST PERSON TO NOTICE THIS SHIT.

They both suck, but Thomas Kinkade is worse than Hitler. (http://www.nineteenthparallel.com/lava/?p=672)

[Watser?]

Oh yeah...

Also to be honest, his moustache is better too.

[Demimonde]

:rofl:

[Adam]

You guys know I never said anything about what people should enjoy and what they shouldn't, right? I know I didn't say it, but it's kind of been intimated a couple times.

I don't care what people like or don't like for the most part, and pretty much everyone likes something because it's comforting or pleasant or otherwise amusing. There's nothing wrong with that at all, and I never said there was.

I'm just saying that there are not entirely objective but credible arguments that some music, movies, and art is better than others.

I'm sorry if I put words in your mouth. I'm not sure what you mean, then. What do you mean by "better"? I'm struggling to find some definition here that isn't either tied to personal preference (in which case saying that A is better than B is either a completely subjective value judgment or else actually does imply that others ought to prefer A to B) or else tied to narrow objectively measurable criteria that aren't really relevant outside their specific context (i.e. show dogs are better than your dog or mine in the sense that they are closer to the semi-arbitrary standards of their breed, but who cares?).

And I'm not even lying about what I'm about to tell you. I was going to make a point and back it up by providing a side-by-side comparison of images, but then, just on a whim, I decided to try all of my search terms in one search instead of doing it in two steps, and I discovered that I AM NOT THE FIRST PERSON TO NOTICE THIS SHIT.

They both suck, but Thomas Kinkade is worse than Hitler. (http://www.nineteenthparallel.com/lava/?p=672)

:lol:

Hitler is totally worse than Kincaide! The perspective is fucked up in both his paintings!

Uh...I mean...Hitler fails to meet a particular arbitrary standard that I am aware of, but neither he nor Kincaide is better than the other.

[Ensign Steve]

You guys know I never said anything about what people should enjoy and what they shouldn't, right? I know I didn't say it, but it's kind of been intimated a couple times.

I don't care what people like or don't like for the most part, and pretty much everyone likes something because it's comforting or pleasant or otherwise amusing. There's nothing wrong with that at all, and I never said there was.

I don't think that you have said it, nor Watser, but I think that there are some people who do, and that's part of the "what is annoying about [some] indies and hipsters" thing that started it.

If I may ramble at length about my mommy issues (I think my touch-feely persona from the other board might be leaking over to here, sorry), she is a stuck-up bitch who is also a giant snob, two independent qualities that are often found together. I see that in her, and I don't like it, so I endeavor to go out of my way to avoid it in myself.

So when I experience something for the first time, I really make an effort to stop and think, what is my actual opinion of this specific thing, removed from what others* will think of it, and what they will think of my liking or disliking it? Doing so has opened up a world of possibilities for me as far as clothing, music, art, food, whatever. It is very liberating.

*others can be the mainstream, or they can be the counter-culture crowd, or indies, or my mom, or you fruit loops on :ff:. Whoever, anybody but me.

So bey has this giant collection of original art, most painted by his grandmother, but there are some other artists in there as well. Some of the pieces are very obviously inspired by Bob Ross and/or Kincade. We have them hung up all over our house and we like them and we get lots of compliments on them. We're not going to not to hang up our heirloom art that we very much enjoy because someone on the internet somewhere says Kincade is worse than Hitler.

I am also aware that I need to be conscious of going the other direction with it. That I need not assume that everybody who avoids chain restaurants or FM radio is stuck-up or judging me personally. Bey has a bad habit of blaming artists for their fans, so whatever shit he said in this thread I can't necessarily stand behind.

[Watser?]

So when I experience something for the first time, I really make an effort to stop and think, what is my actual opinion of this specific thing, removed from what others* will think of it, and what they will think of my liking or disliking it? Doing so has opened up a world of possibilities for me as far as clothing, music, art, food, whatever. It is very liberating

I can dig that as some say :blank:

It's not that I like the kind of music I like because of anybody else's opinion though, just for the record. I just generally rarely find any mainstream music interesting, with a few exceptions. But I don't really have anyone who shares my tastes more than a few bands or types of music. So if I read reviews or listen to someone else's opinion it is only as a shortcut to music I might like to hear. It is a lot of work wading through the stuff I don't or think is meh otherwise.

[Ensign Steve]

So when I experience something for the first time, I really make an effort to stop and think, what is my actual opinion of this specific thing, removed from what others* will think of it, and what they will think of my liking or disliking it? Doing so has opened up a world of possibilities for me as far as clothing, music, art, food, whatever. It is very liberating

I can dig that as some say :blank:

It's not that I like the kind of music I like because of anybody else's opinion though, just for the record. I just generally rarely find any mainstream music interesting, with a few exceptions. But I don't really have anyone who shares my tastes more than a few bands or types of music. So if I read reviews or listen to someone else's opinion it is only as a shortcut to music I might like to hear. It is a lot of work wading through the stuff I don't or think is meh otherwise.

I think you've done a great job of explaining what happens to the music itself when it migrates toward the mainstream, and what you don't like about that. It seems like the opposite of what I do like, which is the engineering and the higher production values. Someone (I won't name drop him a third time) thinks that Tool's EP Opiate is better than the later stuff, because it was so much more raw. I OTOH think they got way better in the later albums with the insane production values, and I find Opiate darn near unlistenable with it's garage-quality sound.

It's been a little confusing and stepping over each other about what makes music good in our respective opinions, but I think I understand where you're coming from a lot better now, and I appreciate the conversation.

[Adam]

It's been a little confusing and stepping over each other about what makes music good in our respective opinions...

:yeahthat:

[Watser?]

I think what I'm looking for and what I mean with more raw is more emotion (any kind, sorrow, anger, happyness, grief or whatever). Reggae and raï artists for instance have a tendency to re-record their old songs with better production. I have this song by Khaled that is on an lp, 80-something, recorded in Algeria which he redid later, produced by Don Was and recorded in the US. I heard the lp version and I was totally in love with the song because you could feel the emotion even if you didn't understand the words. Later I noticed I had the song already, in the new version which I had never really noticed...

The same goes for some Bob Marley songs that he redid with better production and in a more mainstream rocky version, although not as much as the previous example, I still felt the old version was better, more emotional.

[Ymir's blood]

I always thought a hipster was what I called a "wanna-be" they acted instead of lived.
Hipsters generally have more disposible income, where I shop at Goodwill because I'm some percentage from the federal poverty line.

I think it's a class issue at some point.Certainly in the urban, impoverished neighborhood I live in, hipsters are the ones that have money to go out, buy a look and then go home to comfort.
I did find it amusing to go through a Urban Outfitter and look at the prices they were charging on stuff I'd been avoiding at Goodwill for decades.
I shop at Goodwill partly for the variety (not just what's in style, maybe not that at all) and a lot because I'd rather give my money to them than the owners of a sweatshop.

[Ymir's blood]

Contra and I have identified a new sect that we refer to as "Gothabilly" which is an entirely new and strange animal.
That's an actual term and it's not even that new, maybe 5+ years old.

[lisarea]

You guys know I never said anything about what people should enjoy and what they shouldn't, right? I know I didn't say it, but it's kind of been intimated a couple times.

I don't care what people like or don't like for the most part, and pretty much everyone likes something because it's comforting or pleasant or otherwise amusing. There's nothing wrong with that at all, and I never said there was.

I'm just saying that there are not entirely objective but credible arguments that some music, movies, and art is better than others.

I'm sorry if I put words in your mouth. I'm not sure what you mean, then. What do you mean by "better"? I'm struggling to find some definition here that isn't either tied to personal preference (in which case saying that A is better than B is either a completely subjective value judgment or else actually does imply that others ought to prefer A to B) or else tied to narrow objectively measurable criteria that aren't really relevant outside their specific context (i.e. show dogs are better than your dog or mine in the sense that they are closer to the semi-arbitrary standards of their breed, but who cares?).

By better, I mean something that has more artistic merit. That displays a mastery of the craft, creativity, nuance, and that transcends the superficial. You get more out of something 'better' than you do out of something that's only enjoyable at an immediate, superficial level.

As an example, I don't know anything about music at all. I can't tell what's easy or hard to do as far as instruments go. So I don't really get much out of music that's difficult to play and requires advanced skills. But almost everyone I know who does understand this stuff appreciates it. They're getting more out of it than I am. Just like you often get more out of a song if you understand what it's about than someone just bopping around to a catchy little tune while entirely missing the fact that the song is about heroin or disenfranchisement or unspeakable violence or something like that.

I think where you're getting caught up is in assuming I mean better in some kind of moral sense or something like that. I'm not. There's nothing morally wrong with bouncing around to Lust for Life on some cruise boat commercial. I'm saying that, if that's all you're getting from it, you're missing some stuff.

[lisarea]

I just thought of a good analogy.

Assuming that people who like indie music are pretentious is like if some horrible loathsome fishwife you were acquainted with referred to all science fiction as The Star Tracks, and posited science fiction was simply a device to employ cheap, hamhanded deus ex machina shit and prosthetic foreheads to a bunch of boring and overdone storylines; and assumed that everyone who claimed to discern some difference between some really good Star Trek and, say, SeaQuest was just full of shit and faking it to impress other people.

lol Star Tracks

[Ensign Steve]

http://www.freethought-forum.com/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=6550&stc=1&d=1270853499

[Ymir's blood]

There's nothing morally wrong with bouncing around to Lust for Life on some cruise boat commercial.
Dance like hypnotizing chickens!

[Ensign Steve]

I liked Adam's show dog example the best. The dog is "better" according to the standards set up by people who are in that industry, but who cares? I don't want a show dog, I want a sweet little mutt companion. It doesn't mean that I am ignorant of the standards of what makes a winning dog, or that I can't appreciate those elements in the winning dog.

I don't want a house that looks like the Lourve, I want a house that I can sit in with my husband and my cats and watch TV and get wasted. I can still appreciate the paintings when I do go to the Lourve to view them, and I might even understand the technicalities in them that make them what they are.

Finding enjoyment in the lesser-quality products does not correspond to an ignorance of the genre, or a lack of appreciation for the technical merits.

Some days I want filet mignon, some days I want a pop tart.

[Ensign Steve]

None of that is what you said, either. I know.

Where's curses to come in give her example about her friends who like/don't-like Joy Division or whatever for the wrong reasons (like, internally inconsistent reasons). For every Watser? there are a hundred posers who like indie because it's indie and hate mainstream because it's mainstream, but can't articulate it further than that. That shit is annoying, but fine because of to each his own, but when those assholes start rolling their eyes at my taste, that's when I get irked. And in general, I think you find that in much younger crowds, who are still trying to figure out what they like and why. I'm in my thirties and I'm still working on it.

[curses]

Oh hai. You mean the dude that thought "Love Will Tear Us Apart" was the only song Joy Division ever recorded and when I put on another track proceeded to ask "what is this shit?" Yeah, I hate the scenesters/hipsters here. You gain standing amongst your peers for liking certain stuff, even if you can't really stand it. He can namedrop Joy Division now without actually enjoying the music. I should have kicked him in the teeth.

[Ensign Steve]

:lol: Six minutes. That was awesome.

[Ymir's blood]

I summoned her.
:wizard5:

[Ensign Steve]

None of that is what you said, either. I know.


Oh! Now I remember what the hell I was trying to reply to. The part where you said, "I'm saying that, if that's all you're getting from it, you're missing some stuff." I feel like that assumes that enjoying something on a superficial level isn't possible if you actually do understand the ... fiscial aspects of it. I think it's possible to do both, and I feel like it would be a total drag to spend my life able to appreciate something only after taking it apart and examining every brushstroke or chord.

[ITSOZAZ]

i'm a jeepster.

[Ensign Steve]

Isn't that just the Spanish spelling?

[ITSOZAZ]

jes

[lisarea]

None of that is what you said, either. I know.


Oh! Now I remember what the hell I was trying to reply to. The part where you said, "I'm saying that, if that's all you're getting from it, you're missing some stuff." I feel like that assumes that enjoying something on a superficial level isn't possible if you actually do understand the ... fiscial aspects of it. I think it's possible to do both, and I feel like it would be a total drag to spend my life able to appreciate something only after taking it apart and examining every brushstroke or chord.

Nope again. I picked a bad example, but what I was trying to do was think of an easily relatable example of something where nuance enhances your appreciation of something, to illustrate that it's a valuable quality, and to illustrate how mainsteaming lessens or entirely removes many of those qualities. So as a really oversimplified but relatively clear analogy, I am showing how a completely unsubtle nuance is lost in songs used in TV commercials. That's what mainstreaming does. It strips art of its nuance, and of the qualities that fans often value about it, so it's understandable that they can be a little derisive of the mainstream appropriations of their favorite genres, artists, or even songs. And the same thing goes for shitty focus group oriented remakes of movies, or Urban Outfitters outright doing an ugly trace of someone else's design.

I think I've said explicitly that people can and do appreciate things at different levels. If not, I know I at least haven't said they don't. So also stop saying that I'm saying that.

I'm saying two main things:

1. There is such a thing as good art vs. bad art, and there are quantifiable qualities you can use to sort of measure it, with varying degrees of objectivity. People with more expertise about a subject tend to be more discerning about it.

2. It's not accurate to assume that everyone who appreciates something you don't appreciate (or understand) is full of shit, whether it's a matter of them having some heightened discernment you lack, or whether it's a simple matter of personal preference.

[ITSOZAZ]

i think what this thread needs is a super gay picture of me.

[Ensign Steve]

Damnit, you snuck in your reply when I thought of a totally awesome example that doesn't apply anymore. I'm still going to say it though.

It's like, there's nothing morally wrong with enjoying a rotary phone, but if you were actually knowledgeable about phones and understood performance benchmarks, you would understand that a smart phone is objectively better.


Nope again. I picked a bad example, but what I was trying to do was think of an easily relatable example of something where nuance enhances your appreciation of something, to illustrate that it's a valuable quality, and to illustrate how mainsteaming lessens or entirely removes many of those qualities.
Okay, that's cool. I think Watser helped me figure out some technical reasons why the music I like is more likely to make it to FM radio than the stuff he does, and it turns out that some of the what gets lost is something that I actually don't like.


2. It's not accurate to assume that everyone who appreciates something you don't appreciate (or understand) is full of shit, whether it's a matter of them having some heightened discernment you lack, or whether it's a simple matter of personal preference.
Cool. Again, I don't feel that everyone who appreciates what I don't is full of shit. I do feel that some are, and it's not really my business. But when self-same people declare that what I do like to be shit, but are unable to give any objective criteria as to why, I am unlikely to value their opinion.

Again, not referring to anyone in this thread. Just mythical people that I am sure exist somewhere, otherwise how would I know that I'm supposed to feel shame for my love of Nickelback.

Which! BTW! That one song of theirs that I like is actually really technically challenging to sing and play. The lyrics are junk food (which of course I love!) but the vocals and instrumentals are on point, so I really don't get the beef.

[Watser?]

Okay, that's cool. I think Watser helped me figure out some technical reasons why the music I like is more likely to make it to FM radio than the stuff he does, and it turns out that some of the what gets lost is something that I actually don't like.

Wow, ok well some of it is technical like production values not as high, but I think most of the reason is that people don't really want to be confronted with music with real raw emotions.

And to be honest I have the same aversion to art sometimes. You don't always want to be listening to music or watching movies that make you cry. There is definitely something to be said for stuff that is more superfical. I don't want to have paintings in my house that every time I look at them I am wrecked with emotion.

It's just that sometimes I do want that and then I find that mainstream music/films/books etc. rarely convey real emotions.

[Ensign Steve]

Hai! I'm saying some more stuff! After this, I'm going to talk about mustaches.


That's what mainstreaming does. It strips art of its nuance, and of the qualities that fans often value about it, so it's understandable that they can be a little derisive of the mainstream appropriations of their favorite genres, artists, or even songs.
Two questions. What do you mean by nuance, and how does mainstreaming strip it of it?

Did you see the Oscars? They did the five nominated songs in what I heard a critic refer to as "interpretive dance" but it would be more accurate to call it contemporary, except that in the dance field the word "contemporary" describes a different style right now. My point is, it was break dancing. Fucking amazing break dancing going on. This one soloist popped and locked like he was the best popper and locker to audition for the Oscars. All of the dancers were ridiculously talented, and I was so thrilled to see it on network TV. Am I supposed to be upset that I saw it on TV instead of on the corner? That they wore stylized black and white costumes instead of street clothes? That they danced to fucking Oscar music instead of regular hip hop? Why is it bad that something I have liked for years is now being enjoyed and even taken seriously by the masses.

One time the guy on the Pringles can sang a Basement Jaxx song at me. I was like "lol, did the pringles guy just ask me where my head at?" Is this something I am supposed to be outraged by, and if so, why? I truly want to understand.

Actually, maybe I don't, because I'm kind of blissful in my ignorance right now. But, yeah, I do really want to know.

[Ensign Steve]

Okay, that's cool. I think Watser helped me figure out some technical reasons why the music I like is more likely to make it to FM radio than the stuff he does, and it turns out that some of the what gets lost is something that I actually don't like.

Wow, ok well some of it is technical like production values not as high, but I think most of the reason is that people don't really want to be confronted with music with real raw emotions.

Oh yeah, I for sure don't want to downplay all of the ... nuance (fucking lisarea!) and declare that it's only the production values that are making the difference. But yeah that's just part of a broad brush example of one reason you and I have such drastically different opinions of whether something we consider "good" will ever make it to the mainstream.

[lisarea]

Damnit, you snuck in your reply when I thought of a totally awesome example that doesn't apply anymore. I'm still going to say it though.

It's like, there's nothing morally wrong with enjoying a rotary phone, but if you were actually knowledgeable about phones and understood performance benchmarks, you would understand that a smart phone is objectively better.

And you know, hypothetically, one might counter that there's nothing morally wrong with being enamored of closed source, user friendly consumer products that you can't even change your own battery on, but if you'd worked in telco for upwards of a decade, working on predictive models for internal telco capacity provisioning tools, had you singlehandedly built the initial iteration of one of first major mission critical intranet sites as a skunkworks project at the largest telecommunications company in the world, had you directly worked with the internal hardware and software--both production and prototypes--that the major telecommunications providers use to route your calls, you might have a better understanding of and appreciation for the durable technology and the impressive industrial design of vintage telco equipment such as Henry Dreyfus' Model 500 telephone.

So it's good that's not the analogy you're making or anything.

[Ensign Steve]

Okay, talking about mustaches now.


It's a treadmill, and the goal posts are constantly shifting. Ironic for the sake of ironic is done now I think. The bad mustache thing made it jump the shark I think.

Really? That's disappointing. :sadcheer: Not the loss of ironic for its own sake, which got old after about five minutes, but the mustache thing.

I'm going to name-drop Peteykins again. He's the one from my first post in the thread where I talk about how much I love how he dresses. Peter says:
The facial hair pattern shown above is usually called "friendly muttonchops," the "friendly" part referring to the mustache which bridges the sideburns. I, however, like to think of it as the "ventriloquist dummy." I was a little nervous about sporting this old-fashioned style, but so far the reaction has been very positive/amused from my friends and coworkers. Now all I need is a top hat and spats and more velvet in my wardrobe.

Facial hair is one of my security blankets. The very least I've had over the last twenty years is a soul patch. The idea of being completely bare-faced fills me with dread. I'm glad to be living now during the great renaissance/liberation of facial hair, where pretty much all styles are now acceptable anywhere. Think of the reaction my friendly muttonchops would have gotten in the 80s!linkypoo (http://sparklepony.blogspot.com/2009/03/i-got-bored-with-my-facial-hair-so-i.html)

So am I! I can't do much with my own, it only grows the one way, but I have had a really great time seeing what men have tried in the last decade or so. In the Air Force your choices are no-stache or copstache (and I love me some copstache in uniform!), but on civilians, the sky's the limit. I would hate to think the renaissance is over.

[Ensign Steve]

Damnit, you snuck in your reply when I thought of a totally awesome example that doesn't apply anymore. I'm still going to say it though.

It's like, there's nothing morally wrong with enjoying a rotary phone, but if you were actually knowledgeable about phones and understood performance benchmarks, you would understand that a smart phone is objectively better.

And you know, hypothetically, one might counter that there's nothing morally wrong with being enamored of closed source, user friendly consumer products that you can't even change your own battery on, but if you'd worked in telco for upwards of a decade, working on predictive models for internal telco capacity provisioning tools, had you singlehandedly built the initial iteration of one of first major mission critical intranet sites as a skunkworks project at the largest telecommunications company in the world, had you directly worked with the internal hardware and software--both production and prototypes--that the major telecommunications providers use to route your calls, you might have a better understanding of and appreciation for the durable technology and the impressive industrial design of vintage telco equipment such as Henry Dreyfus' Model 500 telephone.

So it's good that's not the analogy you're making or anything.

I'm fairly aware of your expertise in the field. That's the joke.

[livius drusus]

O HAI ENSIGN STEVE
http://www.freethought-forum.com/livius/starburns.jpg

[lisarea]

I'm fairly aware of your expertise in the field. That's the joke.

OH. So what you are saying now is that I'm supposed to interpret some nuance in your post, rather than simply taking it at face value, lest I miss some non-obvious interpretation that is nevertheless essential to your message?

IS THAT WHAT YOU ARE TELLING ME, ENSIGN STEVE? HUH? HUH?

:ohsnap:

[Ensign Steve]

lol starburns

[LadyShea]

Which is better, Disney World or Universal Orlando? Well, it depends on who you talk to and what your goal is.

Unless you go for the coasters, then, not Disney. That's objective.

[curses]

Wow, ok well some of it is technical like production values not as high, but I think most of the reason is that people don't really want to be confronted with music with real raw emotions.

And to be honest I have the same aversion to art sometimes. You don't always want to be listening to music or watching movies that make you cry. There is definitely something to be said for stuff that is more superfical. I don't want to have paintings in my house that every time I look at them I am wrecked with emotion.

It's just that sometimes I do want that and then I find that mainstream music/films/books etc. rarely convey real emotions.I still want your record collection. I always figured that people enjoyed pop/Top 40/whatever's hot because it offers a sound they're familiar with. That's how these classic rock stations have been playing the same handful of songs for 30 freaking years. People like familiarity. That's my take.

[freemonkey]

This discussion is making me want to write an angsty, existential mid-life diatribe on bad art/good art/real art and originality. And also, what a friend calls the state of art literacy in the U.S. But I am a snob and I don't know the answer and it's something I struggle with daily. So, I'll be quiet for now. But I like this thread. Carry on, please.

[Adam]

You guys talked about a lot of stuff while I wasn't around, so I'm just going to reply to random snippets.

2. It's not accurate to assume that everyone who appreciates something you don't appreciate (or understand) is full of shit, whether it's a matter of them having some heightened discernment you lack, or whether it's a simple matter of personal preference.

Just in case it's not clear, I'm not arguing anything like this. Just the opposite, in fact. I think people like the things they like, even if they sometimes have a difficuilt time trying to explain why they like them. I did say, way back at the start of this, that I think a lot of people, especially dag nab young people, who enjoy indie works often condescendingly act as though mainstream works are bad simply by virtue of being mainstream works, that the people who enjoy them are wrong for doing so, and that this quite naturally leads to some backlash, but that isn't the same as saying they are full of shit about the things they like.

lol Star Tracks

:lol: The funny part is that teh hardcorez science fiction fans' opinions of the Star Tracks are pretty similar to Watser?'s opinion of mainstream reggae. I can even explain a little of why that is (short version: sci-fi is inherently about exploring the human consequences of some hypothetical discovery/technology/social change/whatever. The Star Tracks sometimes have episodes about that stuff, but mostly they're a contrived setting for fantasy adventure stories), but I don't think that means the Star Tracks are worse than any other work. The best I can say is that they are not a very good example of what discerning sci-fi enthusiasts like.

By better, I mean something that has more artistic merit. That displays a mastery of the craft, creativity, nuance, and that transcends the superficial. You get more out of something 'better' than you do out of something that's only enjoyable at an immediate, superficial level.

I don't really disagree, I just don't think you can equate craft and nuance with being strictly better. Better examples of some particular genre, or better displays of some particular technical skill, sure, just not better in some definitive way. For that matter, I think it's misguided to claim that there isn't a lot of craft, and even nuance, in adapting a niche genre for mass audiences.

I think where you're getting caught up is in assuming I mean better in some kind of moral sense or something like that. I'm not. There's nothing morally wrong with bouncing around to Lust for Life on some cruise boat commercial. I'm saying that, if that's all you're getting from it, you're missing some stuff.

I don't think I'm using it in a moral sense or, at least, not in a sense I would normally think of as moral. I think perhaps I'm coming at it from the opposite angle as you, though. You're talking a lot about the craft that goes into creating something, and I'm really just talking about the experience of enjoying something.

Or, to put it another way, I think maybe you're assuming that the perspective of the expert in any given field is the preferred perspective, and I'm assuming that there is no preferred perspective. So, you're saying that as long as the expert prefers A to B, then A is better than B, but I'm saying that unless everyone prefers A to B, we can't really say that A is better than B. Is that close?

Or, maybe I do get what you're saying when you suggest I'm looking at it from a moral perspective, because when you say A is better than B that implies to me that an unbiased observer in possession of all the facts would always prefer A to B, and that is very similar to a moral theory that I forget the name of.

Okay, that's cool. I think Watser helped me figure out some technical reasons why the music I like is more likely to make it to FM radio than the stuff he does, and it turns out that some of the what gets lost is something that I actually don't like.

That's a good point.

...I think most of the reason is that people don't really want to be confronted with music with real raw emotions.

True Art Is Angsty - Television Tropes & Idioms (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TrueArtIsAngsty)

...which is kind of a snide response, but it's the first thing I thought of when I read that.

[Watser?]

No. It can be all kinds of emotion. I know that a lot of people are under the impression that music is only worthwhile if it deals with darker emotions or teen weltschmertz, but happy music can be good music too. In fact this 'angsty' music is pretty much unknown outside the West anyway. African music is often party music. Either that or it deals with real problems, not luxury problems.

[ITSOZAZ]

there pretty much isn't any music i don't like. i really love music. there are types of music i wouldn't go out and buy to listen to at home, but when i see music being played live i always feel good and admire what the musicians and singers are doing. i think the only music that truly makes me want to stop listening is pop country, but that's more because of how fake and produced it is. it's more calculated than dance music...but i still have to admire the craftsmanship and production skill.

[Adam]

Do you have an example of what you're talking about, Watser? I'm having trouble with the concept of rawly emotional party music (and why people would not want to be confronted by it).

[Qingdai]

This comes to mind. Angry, resigned.
YouTube- K-naan (whats hardcore)

Happy.
YouTube- Manu Chao - Me gustas tu

[beyelzu]

Bey has a bad habit of blaming artists for their fans, so whatever shit he said in this thread I can't necessarily stand behind.

Yep, its why I hate pink floyd, a band that I think would be ok, and why it took me many years to drink the ccr coolaid.

[Adam]

Thanks, Q. I guess I don't get why those are "raw" or why I wouldn't want to be confronted by them, though. I mean, I get that the K Naan piece addresses uncomfortable subject matter, but I personally wasn't overwhelmed with raw emotion in a way that would make me dislike the piece.

[Watser?]

Do you have an example of what you're talking about, Watser? I'm having trouble with the concept of rawly emotional party music (and why people would not want to be confronted by it).

This stuff is way too happy for most people:

YouTube- Soul Brothers - Isgilamkhuba

YouTube- Orchestre Poly-Rythmo de Cotonou Dahomey - Gbeti Madjro

Also: what Qingdai said.

[Adam]

Do I have to understand the lyrics to get why they're too happy for most people?

I guess what I'm saying is I don't know a lot about music in the first place, and I know next to nothing about these particular genres, so in this case I am the uninformed consumer, I am "most people", but I don't hear an excess of raw emotion that would prevent me from enjoying those works.

Oh! Next question! Are there mainstream works that you think are similar to those but lack the raw emotion?

Oh! And also! I am totally open to the possibility that there is all sorts of nuanced musical wizardry going on in those pieces that I just don't get because I don't know a lot about music, and that's fine. I'm just saying that, as an unrefined listener, I don't hear a lot of super raw emotion, so I don't think it makes sense to say that that music is not mainstream because unrefined listeners don't want to be confronted by all the raw emotion that they can't hear in it.

[Watser?]

Well, the 'most people' I play this stuff to all tell me it's too happy for them :shrug:

So that's my theory and I'm sticking with it!

[Adam]

:lol: You know some weird "most people", Watser? Maybe they're the real True Art is Angstsy contingent.

[Watser?]

That seems likely.

[Ymir's blood]

Sometimes The Cramps are too happy for me to listen to and I start bouncing off the walls.

[roastelk]

The term hipster must be an American thing because I've never heard it until reading about it right here. But of course Ive usually got my head up my ass when it come to things like popular culture.

btw....that photo of the guy in the pink leopard print tights, Id of just assumed he was gay or colour blind, or possibly both.

[Dingfod]

Someone like that is most likely asexual.

[livius drusus]

Side note: I love Manu Chao, and not just because of the copious weed references neither.

[Qingdai]

I've heard Manu Chau referred to as being hard to listen to


I don't know, perhaps it's the messy part of the music, which I like, but seems lacking in the heavily produced stuff.

Produced:

YouTube- The Lion sleeps tonight FULL

Raw, original language.

YouTube- Miriam Makeba- Mbube

[erimir]

I've noticed this in the kinky world too.Oh really? What do you get up to? :eyes:
Most niche music (and movies and design) lose some of their original character when they're retooled to appeal to a general audience. In general, subversive elements are toned down or eliminated, nuance is lost, and it's modified to appeal immediately to the largest audience possible.So as an example, it would be like if they took this song, which Björk said you could interpret about being a woman leaving a bad relationship... (But which she dedicated to Greenland and the Faroe Islands, which are still part of Denmark, like Iceland used to be.)

YouTube- Björk - Declare Independence

And then changed the music to polished produced country-pop music, removed the elements that suggest it's about political oppression, and then gave it to Taylor Swift to sing as a feel-good grrlpower song about how you're gonna leave that no-good man?

[Stormlight]

:lol: The funny part is that teh hardcorez science fiction fans' opinions of the Star Tracks are pretty similar to Watser?'s opinion of mainstream reggae. I can even explain a little of why that is (short version: sci-fi is inherently about exploring the human consequences of some hypothetical discovery/technology/social change/whatever. The Star Tracks sometimes have episodes about that stuff, but mostly they're a contrived setting for fantasy adventure stories), but I don't think that means the Star Tracks are worse than any other work. The best I can say is that they are not a very good example of what discerning sci-fi enthusiasts like.

WAFER THIN ICE, BUDDY! WAFER-THIN ICE! :unstare:

Just sayin'

[Ensign Steve]

He's right, though. Just like my music, art, and food, I like my Star Tracks to be easy to understand and extremely predictable.

[Watser?]

Predictable, yeah. That's the difference. Predictable is a bad thing to me, especially in music.

[Nullifidian]

I'm just not buying that huge numbers of people are making themselves miserable pretending to like stuff they don't really like and abstaining from the things they really do like just so other people will think they're cool or something. They just like stuff you don't get.

That accusation gets thrown around a lot at those of us who like contemporary classical music, and here it is the case that the most popularly performed stuff is watered down (at least in the U.S.). When balancing the demands of the audience, most orchestras and opera companies are too damn scared to go after an audience unlike that one they already have, but they feel some sort of obligation to present modern music in order to make themselves seem relevant. Thus they end up commissioning stuff which is really insipid shit that they hope will not offend an audience with an average age of 68. Then, because the composers of insipid shit are the ones who attract the big commissions, other boards for operas and symphonies look at that when deciding where to bestow their commissions. More experimental composers have either gone abroad or established a parallel music scene to that of the big name symphonies and opera companies. This is really apparent in New York, where there's a downtown music scene that doesn't overlap at all with the uptown music scene out of Lincoln Center.

Here in San Diego, it's the same story. The San Diego Opera has given up any pretense of an interest in modernity, but when they were presenting modern operas, they sent out begging letters that, when you read between the lines, basically said "Please come! It's tonal! You won't be offended! Trust us!" Meanwhile, concerts of contemporary classical have always been pretty well-attended by an almost completely different audience. It would take more work than the SDO is prepared to do in order to bring that audience into the Civic Center.

Those who don't like contemporary classical are constantly berating those of us who do with accusations that we are secretly miserable, and only pretend to like it because it's "esoteric" and because we've all been indoctrinated by those subversive professors of music. In my case, this subversive indoctrination by the tweed-jacketed crowd goes back to when I was ten and listening to Charles Ives and Edgard Varèse.

Here's an example of something I was secretly loathing every time I listened to it. :wink:

Varèse - Arcana, Part 1
Varèse - Arcana, Part 2

[Ymir's blood]

Predictable, yeah. That's the difference. Predictable is a bad thing to me, especially in music.
I knew that you would say that.

[Adam]

Necrothrad!

What Was the Hipster? -- New York Magazine (http://nymag.com/news/features/69129/)

[Janet]

‘big-city hipsters’ are now decorating their apartments with taxidermy.”

I had a roommate who did that in '92. Guess he was ahead of his time.

[Anastasia Beaverhausen]

Hipster and Hot Topic? :lol: Cool article, [thanks].

[LadyShea]

Hipster and Hot Topic? :lol:

Now see, I don't understand what's funny about that. You have ideas regarding Hipster that are still lost on me and I feel all stupid!

Hot Topic's sole purpose is to bring subculture and counter culture fashion right into the mainstream via malls. That's what they do. I remember seeing fake gas station attendant and bowling league shirts at Hot Topic over a decade ago. Was that cashing in on the first wave of Hipster?

Oh also, Hubby bought a whole bunch of clearance T-Shirts at Target that had like Tony the Tiger and King Ding Dong and other old advertising campaigns on them. They were like almost free. I assumed that was totally the death of Hipster, being clearanced at 75% off at Target. But maybe that kind of Nostalgia isn't really Hipster at all?

[Ari]

Hot Topic's sole purpose is to bring subculture and counter culture fashion right into the mainstream via malls. That's what they do. I remember seeing fake gas station attendant and bowling league shirts at Hot Topic over a decade ago. Was that cashing in on the first wave of Hipster?
At the time it was probably cashing in on the Punk and/or Rockabilly subcultures.

I thought Hot Topics sole purpose was to sell over priced items to people who think they can buy their way into a subculture.

[Anastasia Beaverhausen]

Hot Topic caters towards the goth/emo/Rockabilly area, Shea, rather than hipster.

[curses]

Not anymore. They had to abandon those because they were no longer making enough money. Last time they went past them it was big jeans and care bear shirts.

[Ensign Steve]

I think Ari nailed it, Ana.

[Anastasia Beaverhausen]

I do, too. One of the best descriptions of it I've heard was "goth 'n' go."

I will admit I sometimes wandered in to buy music (only place I knew of that had the new KMFDM releases immediately) or talk to my friend, who was the manager.

[Ari]

Yep the last time I was in Hot Topic it was pop music, 80's nostalgia, raver clothes and beanies. It was odd feeling like the most hardcore person there just because my hair color takes more than a single wash to come out, oh and

The only bonus is that I occasionally find some goth stuff that I thought was cool but over priced on the sale rack for over half off, the appropriate amount.

[Anastasia Beaverhausen]

I think Lip Service is one of their suppliers - they have a lot of awesome stuff, but looking at the site now, overpriced.

[Adam]

To be fair to Hot Topic, it's the most convenient place to find t shirts with Transformers on them. And, you know, as a professional in his 30's, I need t shirts with Transformers on them. Right? Right?

[Ensign Steve]

To be fair to Hot Topic, it's

just a retail store that sells stuff that some people like to buy. :unnod:

[LadyShea]

To be fair to Hot Topic, it's

just a retail store that sells stuff that some people like to buy. :unnod:

Well yeah that. I still don't understand why Hot Topic and Hipster was funny though. Hot Topic sells whatever people are buying and changes up as the fads change.

So if gas station attendant shirts aren't Hipster, then I am still way lost.

I know, how about if people go 100% individualistic with their clothes and stuff so I don't have to hear people bitch about their stolen subculture being stolen in turn or be confused?

[lisarea]

Well, Hot Topic and hipster would sort of be anathema, because anticonsumerism was a pretty fundamental aspect of it. That is, much of it hinged on wearing obviously thrifted clothes, DIYing things, and coopting working class stuff. A whole lot like punk rock was.

And just extrapolating from punk, attempts to mass market the culture miss the point completely, appropriating some of the superficial elements while completely not just ignoring but flouting the cultural roots of those elements.

It's pretty much like if BP started selling Lady Shea costumes, all stripper heels, glued on surgery scars, and homeschooling vests or whatever, and then people started showing up where you hang out in those costumes, and heatedly advocating teaching creationism in the schools.

[LadyShea]

Well, Hot Topic and hipster would sort of be anathema, because anticonsumerism was a pretty fundamental aspect of it. That is, much of it hinged on wearing obviously thrifted clothes, DIYing things, and coopting working class stuff. A whole lot like punk rock was.

Well right, except that retailers -as usual- started selling stuff based on the look of the counterculture.

I am not denying that whatever it started out as was co-opted and commercialized, just like punk and Goth and Steam Punk or whatever. I can buy a Trucker Hat at Target- that's why I don't understand the "Hot Topic and Hipster LOL" post as if Hot Topic wouldn't sell Hipster or something. That's what they do!

And just extrapolating from punk, attempts to mass market the culture miss the point completely, appropriating some of the superficial elements while completely not just ignoring but flouting the cultural roots of those elements.

It's pretty much like if BP started selling Lady Shea costumes, all stripper heels, glued on surgery scars, and homeschooling vests or whatever, and then people started showing up where you hang out in those costumes, and heatedly advocating teaching creationism in the schools.

Again, I am not saying it's right or cool or anything like that. I just know that it happens, all the time, and don't get why people are surprised or shocked.

You know, I had bought a real gas station attendant shirt at a thrift store as a gift for a friend when I was in high school, then I saw them for sale at Hot Topic years later, and this was decades ago. I've no idea what subculture spawned that look not realized I was a part of anything. I also don't know what subculture brought back Hello Kitty, but I want them all dead.

I don't understand how other people don't understand that wearing the stuff your group/friends wear, enough that it gets named, lessens the impact of any claim to being a rebel, or non-conformist, or whatever.

In the movie Sid And Nancy, this one guy says "I don't want to be a Punk no more, I am going to be a Rude Boy, like my dad" it's all still a group thing, right? They are all labels. How about going labelless? If people want to try to be LadyShea, go for it, but I don't have a peer group that I mimic, and can be mostly found in Old Navy jeans and T-Shirts from WalMart with my hair in a clip.

[beyelzu]

Thank you ls, in order to get into the shean lifestyle do I need a kid?


I have no problem with the uniform but I am a little less enthusiastic about the accessories.

[LadyShea]

You have a purse dog, right? That's close enough.

[livius drusus]

Time to get Ripley a tutu and a gi.

[beyelzu]

You have a purse dog, right? That's close enough.

Yes, except she has a weight problem, at almost 10 pounds.

:tmgrin:

[Ari]

I Lolz at Hot Topic and Hipster because it adds one more level of appropriation and hypocrisy. Hipsters shallowly appropriate from other styles and counter cultures to the point where appropriation is the main point, where the fact that something is 'vintage' is worth more to someone's hipster reputation than where the item comes from. In the same sense that Hot Topic selling punk outfits strips most of the point out of the punk outfit. In a way hot topic has shallowly appropriated the culture of shallow appropriation to commercialize on its vintage looks and 'buy local and unknown' motto by mass producing faux vintage items and nostalgia.

Any 'alternative' Hot Topic had vanished for me when our local Hot Topic had to cancel a twilight cast appearance because of the screaming mob of teeny boppers that overran the mall. Followed by seeing Justin Beiber

[Adam]

In a way hot topic has shallowly appropriated the culture of shallow appropriation...

This tickles me. I love the notion of shallow appropriation twice removed. I am a total pomo.

[fragment]

I don't understand how other people don't understand that wearing the stuff your group/friends wear, enough that it gets named, lessens the impact of any claim to being a rebel, or non-conformist, or whatever.
Subculture is usually a rebellion or non-conformity against dominant styles (and sometimes even values). It's not an attempt to be like no-one else whatsoever - only a handful of people truly want to do that. For some, visual cues are a useful guide to finding potentially like-minded individuals in a world that they feel somewhat alienated from. Basically, it's a community thing as well as a rebellion thing. Sure, there's some tension between those tendencies, but they're not mutually exclusive.

IMO that's one reason why people get annoyed at commercialisation of subculture. It breaks the community aspects, leaving them feeling at risk of truly becoming merely isolated and alienated weirdos.

Bear in mind that this sort of dynamic usually applies to younger people, who haven't yet developed decade-plus old social connections and senses of identity, or the skills to negotiate uncomfortable social situations without feeling like they're losing integrity.

[lisarea]

I Lolz at Hot Topic and Hipster because it adds one more level of appropriation and hypocrisy. Hipsters shallowly appropriate from other styles and counter cultures to the point where appropriation is the main point, where the fact that something is 'vintage' is worth more to someone's hipster reputation than where the item comes from.

I'm no hipster expert, but it's my impression that 'hipsters' started out with much the same ethos as punk. That is, that they were primarily anti-consumerist and anti-pretty, and that the common superficial markers like trucker hats and vintage T shirts and big glasses are the watered down, corporate interpretation moreso than they were ever the actual point.

And I wouldn't be surprised if, as with punk, the people who appropriated just the clothes themselves, divorced from the underlying cultural aspects, are kind of poseurs. As such, I kind of suspect that the iconic 'hipster' things most people associate with it are probably the equivalent of safety pins and torn black shirts. They're just the stuff that filtered down and became the semiotic markers for people appropriating the look as a fashion statement.

IMO, it's kind of weird how angry hipsters make people. Culturally, they're all about reuse, creative DIY, and supporting small business. There's nothing offensive about that. Is it just that they dress funny? Aren't young people supposed to dress funny?

I dunno, you guys. I guess what I am saying is that you guys are acting like a bunch of frightened old coots.

[Kashmir]

just a retail store that sells stuff that some people like to buy. :unnod:

Like a head shop.

:bonghit:

[Ari]

IMO, it's kind of weird how angry hipsters make people. Culturally, they're all about reuse, creative DIY, and supporting small business. There's nothing offensive about that. Is it just that they dress funny? Aren't young people supposed to dress funny?
Whatever the real authentic modern hipster is, they are being drowned out by the pre-chewed commercial hipster that we see today. Those are the people I'm aiming to make fun of. Whatever the real hipsters are doing they probably aren't calling it hipster.

I personally can't stand most hipster art or style but I do have to admit, if the real 80s came back or the nostalgic vintage 80s, I am certainly enjoying the second one better.

Some of the skinny legged jeans I've seen wandering around SF get close to baggy pants sagging in hilarity. Sure both are specific aesthetics but if you go so far as to possibly end up with injuries thanks to your clothes, you are doing it wrong.

[Qingdai]

Unless bondage and pain are your thing, then you're doing it right.

:whipping:

[LadyShea]

IMO, it's kind of weird how angry hipsters make people. Culturally, they're all about reuse, creative DIY, and supporting small business. There's nothing offensive about that. Is it just that they dress funny? Aren't young people supposed to dress funny?

I dunno, you guys. I guess what I am saying is that you guys are acting like a bunch of frightened old coots.

I don't know about others here, but I am not offended by hipsters. This whole thing started because I didn't understand hating a movie because it's hipster or the anger at them either, mostly because I didn't even understand what they are...then it kinda got melded in my mind to the whole conformingly non conformist problem I have with most subcultures.

I had someone ask me if I was a Goth because I was listening to Concrete Blonde and I was like...can't I even enjoy some music without having to buy into some whole counterculture thing? I liked the movie Juno...does that mean I am Hipster? If I am both Hipster and Goth does that mean I have to have a big rumble with myself?

[lisarea]

It probably helps to understand that calling something hipster is almost always meant as an insult. I don't think people really self-identify as hipsters or anything. It's just a way of describing recent trends in youth culture--usually ones that people find annoying. People use it to describe music, movies, art, dress, and other current trends, but it's a kind of nebulous category. It seems to cover pretty much any independent movies, music, and art, but that stuff's been around forever, as have the people who enjoy it.

So it seems that hipster is just a catchall term for young people and for out of the mainstream media. In other words, it means whippersnapper.

[Ymir's blood]

I too like Concrete Blonde and some people have accused me of being Goth. It's so unfair! No one understands me!

:P

[livius drusus]

Not a bad attempt at describing what people mean when they say "hipster":

Under the guise of “irony,” hipsterism fetishizes the authentic and regurgitates it with a winking inauthenticity. Those 18-to-34-year-olds called hipsters have defanged, skinned and consumed the fringe movements of the postwar era—Beat, hippie, punk, even grunge. Hungry for more, and sick with the anxiety of influence, they feed as well from the trough of the uncool, turning white trash chic, and gouging the husks of long-expired subcultures—vaudeville, burlesque, cowboys and pirates.

Of course, hipsterism being originally, and still mostly, the province of whites (the pastiest of whites), its acolytes raid the cultural stores of every unmelted ethnicity in the pot. Similarly, they devour gay style: Witness the cultural burp known as metrosexuality. As the hipster ambles from the thrift store to a $100 haircut at Freemans Sporting Club, these aesthetics are assimilated—cannibalized—into a repertoire of meaninglessness, from which the hipster can construct an identity in the manner of a collage, or a shuffled playlist on an iPod.

Read more: Search - Time Out New York (http://newyork.timeout.com/articles/features/4840/why-the-hipster-must-die#ixzz0kWE8E4zI)

Necrothrad!

What Was the Hipster? -- New York Magazine (http://nymag.com/news/features/69129/)

Here's a nice rebuttal (http://streetbonersandtvcarnage.com/blog/hey-teacher-leave-those-kids-alone/) by Gavin McInnes, co-founder of Vice magazine, an apparent bastion of hipsterism, that mentions both the above articles. He was at a panel discussion on the pressing issue of kids today. The author of the Time Out article was there. (Spoiler: that guy's a total dick.)

Anyways Gavin sounds way, way awesomer than the rest of the panel. He thinks lisarea is very smart and he agrees with everything she says.

The first question moderator Christian Lorentzen asked the UCLA panel was, “Why do they hate us?” I found this particularly ironic because he was the one who wrote the Time Out feature. I confronted him about this, and he said he did it for the paycheck and didn’t believe what he wrote. I told him the question should be, “Why do YOU hate us?” but went on to explain what’s really going on.

Now that being a teenager is permissible well into one’s 40s, you have old people within the youth-culture scene bitching about “the kids today.” Imagine Clint Eastwood’s character from Gran Torino if he was still at the club. “This goddamned kid calls himself a DJ?” he’d ask with a PBR in his hand and a trucker hat to hide his bald spot. “He doesn’t even know how to beatmix, for chrissakes. It’s just a pile of fucking MP3s.” The old will always see the young as naive and arrogant—they are. The only difference today is the old person is writing about nightlife for a twenty-something zine instead of worrying about his mortgage and winterizing his lawn (which is coming up soon, guys—I’d recommend at least four bags of lime if you’re around evergreens).

[lisarea]

Actually, yeah. I was going to mention before but forgot. Vice's DOs and DON'Ts feature is probably a decent overview of what it is that most people mean when they call someone a hipster. It's a pretty broad range, and the spoiler is that it's just young people out having fun and dressing sort of goofy. (It's sometimes NSFW, tho, so fair warning.)

[lisarea]

This may be of interest to some of the hipster scholars here:

Much-maligned trendies (http://www.bookforum.com/blog/archive/20101108#entry6641)

[Nullifidian]

Speaking of more jokes about hipsters, I present to you... Hipster Shrugged (http://www.juliansanchez.com/2010/08/27/hipster-shrugged/)!

So, I inadvertently started a pretty ridiculous Twitter meme yesterday. I wrote:

Painfully tempted to do a parody rewrite w/John Galt as hipster & Gulch in Williamsburg RT @thecalebbacon: Atlas shrugged and said “meh.”

The 60-page speech to be replaced by a Tom Verlaine solo…

Which inspired:

ziege19
@normative Who is John Galt? Oh, you probably haven’t heard of him, he’s really obscure. #HipsterShrugged

Which was all it took to set folks off. Some of my favorites:

normative I guess it’s fair if Hank always pays the rent / And he doesn’t get all bent / About sleepin’ on the couch #HipsterShrugged

normative So, I stopped the motor of the world, which was fine because I got a great deal on this fixie. #HipsterShrugged

radleybalko I stopped contributing to society way before “going Galt” was cool. #HipsterShrugged

SandyS1 Dagny Taggart: Relationship status: It’s complicated. #HipsterShrugged

normative Yeah, it’s my revolutionary new material. As flexible as tights, but you can totally wear them like jeans. #HipsterShrugged

ziege19 I refuse to accept as guilt the fact of my own face on the T-shirt I am wearing. #HipsterShrugged

jacobgrier I have John Galt’s entire speech… on vinyl #hipstershrugged

sethdmichaels @normative Side A is Side A. #hipstershrugged

normative I swear by my life and my love of it, if I have to hear “Oxford Comma” one more f*ing time… #HipsterShrugged

normative No, it’s *Rearden* Metal. I mean, it looks just like 80s metal, but it’s ironic #HipsterShrugged

laughinghyena13 That hamburger sandwich is fine, but I’ve had much better at a diner in Wyoming. #hipstershrugged

normative Yeah, it’s kinda grungy, but this train tunnel is still a lot cleaner than the bathroom at Northsix that time… #HipsterShrugged

grandmofhelsing Galt’s Speech really isn’t as good as his earlier work. #hipstershrugged

grandmofhelsing But 19th Century Mortors was better. RT @willwilkinson 20th Century Motor Company used to make a sweet hybrid. #HipsterShrugged

normative “We are going back to the 80s.” He raised his hand & over the desolate earth checked his neon Swatch. #HipsterShrugged

normative Yeah, Ragnar was in Sigur Ros for a while, but he bailed when the label got so hardass about piracy. #HipsterShrugged

normative Actually, Francisco’s got this trust fund, but he doesn’t like to talk about it. #HipsterShrugged

willwilkinson Yeah, Francisco’s super-rich, but he’s totally cool politically. #HipsterShrugged

ziege19 I just unlocked the “Helping Is Futile” badge on @foursquare! #HipsterShrugged

petersuderman I used to like the government, but that was before it got big and popular. #HipsterShrugged

conor64 People vilify Dagny Taggart, but I wish more corporate execs always traveled by rail #HipsterShrugged

jacobgrier Camping out for the new iPhone. Rearden Metal finish, Galt motor. Pretty sweet. #hipstershrugged #stilldropscalls

silentbeep3000 Rosa DeLauro is a f**ing moocher #HipsterShrugged

peejaybee Galt’s Gulch used to be pretty cool. Now it’s like, strollers everywhere. #hipstershrugged

[Ensign Steve]

I guess this is as good a thread as any for this.

I love 4chan so much!*

Hot Topic shirt:
http://i.imgur.com/G4Bhn.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/CJpY9.jpg

http://imgur.com/pVVD9.jpg

I especially love that the Hot Topic facebook writer understands almost exactly what's going on, and that there's jack shit he can do about it. :giggles:

*The same way I love Howard Stern - hate the material, but love what they do

[LadyShea]

LOL from the FaceBook comments

Josh Edgar Anyone who shops at Hot Topic and is pissed off by this should probably stop whining and resume their normal day-to-day activities of cutting themselves and sinking into alcoholism.

[Ari]

Hot Topic fails at the first rule of the internetz, Don't fuck with 4chan.
:computermonster:

[beyelzu]

I know what were they thinking?


I was talking to es about this last night, and I am struck by the awesome simplicity of 4chan's plan.

JUst make the meme unusable.

[Ensign Steve]

http://i.imgur.com/jESVG.png