In one of my classes today we were discussing the purpose of college and this generation’s communication and thought processes, when the topic of hipsters came up. Hipster hating has been very prominent lately, with sites like the
hipster handbook and
latfh gaining popularity. One classmate voiced her opinion of hipsters. This classmate said that hipsters upset her because unlike counterculture groups of previous generations, hipsters don’t stand for anything.
In every generation the counterculture movement had an objective. Unlike the hippies, who stood for peace and freedom, and the punks, who stood against the government, hipsters seem just to stand. In an increasingly conformist culture, the hipsters stand apart from the crowd. Is that enough?
Do the hipsters even stand away in the crowd? Many argue that the hipster movement is really just another way to conform, for people who want to appear to be a step above. They all seem to dress the same, anyway. However, the same could be said of the other counterculture groups. Kids dress up as hippies every halloween, and some still imitate them every day with “boho” styles of dress. Plenty of kids buy leather jackets and wear their hair in mohawks, wanting to channel the early punks. Each of these movements had very distinctive styles, just like the hipsters do. Maybe this is a way to identify like minded people, a shortcut to finding kindred souls.
As any movement gains attention, it will draw both admirers and haters. Since the media is a much stronger force now that it was during previous counterculture movements, it has drawn attention to hipsters very quickly, and the resulting opinions by society were drawn very fast. Many people, especially young people, saw what the hipsters were doing and liked it.
In my opinion, because of the quick judgement nature of media and thinking in this age, people eager to not be left behind by the bandwagon jumped into the hipster boat before the understood what the hipsters stood for. This created two distinct groups of hipsters, in my mind: the visual hipster, who imitates what he sees, and the intellectual hipster, who actually thinks about the world.
It is the intellectual hipsters that actually read the books that many label as “hipster books”, books by Sartre and Camus and Kerouac, not to fit the hipster mould but to learn. Intellectual hipsters care enough about the big ideas that in the age of instant information and spark notes will take the time to read a book and think about what it means. Imitation is flattery, so if visual hipsters are dressing like the intellectual hipsters and maybe occasionally picking up one of the hipster books, maybe it means that they too want to think. Many may not know how, as our generation’s attention span has been decreased by the likes of wikipedia and twitter, but they at least approve of thinking. Maybe someday they’ll give that thinking thing a try, even. I’m not trying to say that all hipsters who only dress the part are dumb, only that they are slowly identifying what it is that they stand for. The media moved faster than the movement, and now that counterculture is struggling to regroup and decide on what they stand for. Given enough time, I’m sure that enough people will get through the books and have the discussions that will allow their truths to come out.
Or, to quote a coworker, maybe we’re all just blithering idiots.
