So I've long been an opponent of "hipster" culture, making it loud and plain my disdain for what I derisively refer to as "poor boy chic." I grew up in perpetual poverty as a child in the Bronx, and even now I merely live paycheck to paycheck, so whenever I see one of these student loan munching, couch surfing, parent mooching, thrift store hunting, PBR drinking, Cherokee smoking, postmodern refugees of commercialism and postmodernism slouching in the corner at my bar, five deep (at least), playing Journey on the jukebox because *tee hee* isn't it funny? (No, it's not, Journey sucked when I was a child and they still suck now)... well, it tends to get under my skin a little is all.
But if you hate something enough you might find yourself emulating some of its habits. Perhaps to understand it, perhaps to undermine it, perhaps because you've just been staring at this one thing for so long you know nothing else. Love and hate are linked in ways that most people feel too uncomfortable accepting, but this is why I don't tend to "hate" many things... it's an easy word to throw around but if you "hate" something, ultimately it's because you respect something about it, and my ego just won't allow me to give too many things in this world that much regard, but anyway...
Recently I was informed that my glasses are actually "Buddy Holly" style rims -forgive me but I'm largely unfamiliar with the life and times and style of Buddy Holly (all I knew was that he was a rock and roll guy... and the "La Bamba" and the plane crash thing... but Wikipedia set me straight). But after laughing about this for a few minutes I Googled "Buddy Holly glasses"... and found out that she was telling the truth.
I went to work and sat at the counter (it was a slow day at the "Adult Novelties" store), and I pondered my identity crisis. The "Buddy Holly" glasses were the last straw, the final cut, the revelation that finally lifted the veil from my eyes. I'd joke about it before but I was starting to realize now... I was slowly becoming a hipster!
I had to text message James, my hard drinking, chain smoking (he's perpetually "quitting"), self described nihilist (then how does he have any friends?), sometimes painter, amateur philosopher and confidante; a phone call would have been too intrusive, and anyway we both hate the sounds of our own respective voices.
This is, verbatim, what we typed/discussed (reprinted here without permission, but he's a nice guy I'm sure he won't mind):
ME: So I think I'm a hipster James. What's more I think you might be one too...
JAMES: ernie... you are about to cross a line between us... and i'm not sure that there is any going back.
ME: I'm scared James...
JAMES: lol i'm scared too. why are we hipsters? and more importantly, how do we stop it?
ME: A gun and two bullets? But, look, I shamelessy borrow styles and musical tastes from three or more other social scenes. I hate all things rural. I wear Buddy Holly glasses. I smoke like a chimney but no brand you would recognize (cigarillos even!). I'm unapologetic about my nostalgic tastes but trash everyone elses. I blog and I read blogs. I'll go to a used bookstore before a real one. I alternate between bummy and flashy clothing at will (often on the same outfit). And I think hipster girls are the hottest thing ever yet I hate them more than they hate themselves. Oh, and I'm texting all this when a call would have been more pragmatic.
JAMES: well... those are all good points. um... does the fact that u r self aware count for anything?
ME: Actually I think that's another hipster thing too. It's a cunning trap. I feel like... blogging about it. As if anyone should give a shit!
JAMES: surely there is a way out of this douche loop!
ME: I don't see it! What's more I... may not want to. I like who I am, mostly.
JAMES: dear god, a self accepting hipster! transcendental and yet empty of all cultural value. evolution could not have anticipated such a heresy
ME: And Kirk Cameron won't have me either. Who will accept me? Surely not other hipsters?
JAMES: oh no, they will hate u most of all. the knowledge of your emptiness will reflect their own!
ME: "and so staring into the abyss, he saw the abyss staring back at him..."
JAMES: you have become that abyss, ernie. you are the black hole from which all culture enters, but none escapes
ME: But only to be digested and shat out of me via my irreverent vanity-fueling fiction. I am the omega of liberal social progress. Through me all that is sacred is rendered profane and dejected.
JAMES: it worries me that our discussion of hipsters almost immediately turned to nietzsche
ME: He was the beginning of this. Damned coked up bastard.
At this point I had customers and James (probably) had drinking to do. I caught up with him later and we discussed this briefly but really there was alcohol around and it was someone's birthday celebration so we got distracted and eventually I passed out at 6 in the morning which brings me back to here, now, on a Sunday afternoon, blogging about something that only five people in the world will bother reading, if I'm lucky.
I'm not big on apologies, or apologists, but I feel as if this might have become my new path: Ernie the Hipster Apologist. I'm not about to gleefully accept the "hipster" tag and all the douchebaggery in entails (Journey still sucks, and it's not funny), but I've gotten to a point now, I think, where I might have to accept that that's how other people will see me.
Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go clean myself up... I still have the taste of PBR in my mouth.
But if you hate something enough you might find yourself emulating some of its habits. Perhaps to understand it, perhaps to undermine it, perhaps because you've just been staring at this one thing for so long you know nothing else. Love and hate are linked in ways that most people feel too uncomfortable accepting, but this is why I don't tend to "hate" many things... it's an easy word to throw around but if you "hate" something, ultimately it's because you respect something about it, and my ego just won't allow me to give too many things in this world that much regard, but anyway...
Recently I was informed that my glasses are actually "Buddy Holly" style rims -forgive me but I'm largely unfamiliar with the life and times and style of Buddy Holly (all I knew was that he was a rock and roll guy... and the "La Bamba" and the plane crash thing... but Wikipedia set me straight). But after laughing about this for a few minutes I Googled "Buddy Holly glasses"... and found out that she was telling the truth.
I went to work and sat at the counter (it was a slow day at the "Adult Novelties" store), and I pondered my identity crisis. The "Buddy Holly" glasses were the last straw, the final cut, the revelation that finally lifted the veil from my eyes. I'd joke about it before but I was starting to realize now... I was slowly becoming a hipster!
I had to text message James, my hard drinking, chain smoking (he's perpetually "quitting"), self described nihilist (then how does he have any friends?), sometimes painter, amateur philosopher and confidante; a phone call would have been too intrusive, and anyway we both hate the sounds of our own respective voices.
This is, verbatim, what we typed/discussed (reprinted here without permission, but he's a nice guy I'm sure he won't mind):
ME: So I think I'm a hipster James. What's more I think you might be one too...
JAMES: ernie... you are about to cross a line between us... and i'm not sure that there is any going back.
ME: I'm scared James...
JAMES: lol i'm scared too. why are we hipsters? and more importantly, how do we stop it?
ME: A gun and two bullets? But, look, I shamelessy borrow styles and musical tastes from three or more other social scenes. I hate all things rural. I wear Buddy Holly glasses. I smoke like a chimney but no brand you would recognize (cigarillos even!). I'm unapologetic about my nostalgic tastes but trash everyone elses. I blog and I read blogs. I'll go to a used bookstore before a real one. I alternate between bummy and flashy clothing at will (often on the same outfit). And I think hipster girls are the hottest thing ever yet I hate them more than they hate themselves. Oh, and I'm texting all this when a call would have been more pragmatic.
JAMES: well... those are all good points. um... does the fact that u r self aware count for anything?
ME: Actually I think that's another hipster thing too. It's a cunning trap. I feel like... blogging about it. As if anyone should give a shit!
JAMES: surely there is a way out of this douche loop!
ME: I don't see it! What's more I... may not want to. I like who I am, mostly.
JAMES: dear god, a self accepting hipster! transcendental and yet empty of all cultural value. evolution could not have anticipated such a heresy
ME: And Kirk Cameron won't have me either. Who will accept me? Surely not other hipsters?
JAMES: oh no, they will hate u most of all. the knowledge of your emptiness will reflect their own!
ME: "and so staring into the abyss, he saw the abyss staring back at him..."
JAMES: you have become that abyss, ernie. you are the black hole from which all culture enters, but none escapes
ME: But only to be digested and shat out of me via my irreverent vanity-fueling fiction. I am the omega of liberal social progress. Through me all that is sacred is rendered profane and dejected.
JAMES: it worries me that our discussion of hipsters almost immediately turned to nietzsche
ME: He was the beginning of this. Damned coked up bastard.
At this point I had customers and James (probably) had drinking to do. I caught up with him later and we discussed this briefly but really there was alcohol around and it was someone's birthday celebration so we got distracted and eventually I passed out at 6 in the morning which brings me back to here, now, on a Sunday afternoon, blogging about something that only five people in the world will bother reading, if I'm lucky.
I'm not big on apologies, or apologists, but I feel as if this might have become my new path: Ernie the Hipster Apologist. I'm not about to gleefully accept the "hipster" tag and all the douchebaggery in entails (Journey still sucks, and it's not funny), but I've gotten to a point now, I think, where I might have to accept that that's how other people will see me.
Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go clean myself up... I still have the taste of PBR in my mouth.