Tragically hipster
c the ’Stache
Our annual issue dedicated to everything mustache
ď …
January 2009
January 2009 // Volume 5 // no. 3
: d o g r ipste
h r a e d 10// o g u h , e m s 14//ironic: ’ It Th e Mustache : e r u t l u 38//C
Hipster Lullaby 28//quiz:Are you
hipster enough? he St ache: Journ a Decad ey ent 34//T
PLUS SOME OTHER STUFF 06
12
16
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Editor’s letter
by guest editor Moby
Scene
coolest kids on the block
The hipster express
how to get from cool to hip
Fashionably square
burlap
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Music to ridicule
Moby
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50
55
69
72
Where hipsters go to die
record stores
Hipster of the month
Julius Leahy from Sacramento
Letters we get from people
lame
Square pegs, square holes
how hipsters are creating the mold
Back ‘er up
last thoughts
Scene
Our favorite scenesters from across the country.
Jon Gilbert Stefan Breckinridge Nicole Fountainblea u in NYC.
nd in e Sta i r r a C n. Bosto
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Jessica
Rabbit i n L.A.
er and Peter Pott on Bonnie Babs 6. at Studio 5
Jacob Gl ass in Miami. Jorg Reinhardt at his Chicago pad.
Check out more Scene photos on our website: www.winkmag.com/scene 13
Ironic
THE IRONIC MUSTACHE
by SARAH HASKINS
1. IRONIC MUSTACHE
(generally adorned by a HIPSTER) an ugly mustache grown initially as a JOKE and to impress one’s friends with the level of commitment necessary to maintain it. These mustaches often remain with the wearer FAR LONGER than they are funny and become a part of the person’s “LOOK.”
F
IRST OFF — I WANT TO BE clear that my mustache is not ironic and certainly not po-mo. (This mo needs mo’ mo and less po for it to be pomo.) I am not ironic. People think I am. Minister Faust even coined a term - “Iryany” - to describe it. I’m not even trying to shock anyone. What, then, are my real reasons? I don’t like to give my real reasons for anything. You’d all laugh at me. Fact is, I’m just trying to get in touch with my inner Hitler. We all have one. I want to meet mine and kill him. I think the mustache will help. It’s Hitler bait. Just hope he doesn’t bite my lip off. Having established that, the reason mustaches are grown for purposefully ironic ugliness instead of good old fashioned fashion, is quite simple: Women
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photos by ZAC WOLF
are allowed to vote. The ironic mustache is a product of a post-feminist western world. The mustache is a uniquely male accoutrement, though hormones and spirit gum are making inroads. It has long been a potent symbol of male virility and in many parts of the world, still is. The ironic version only exists in a certain stage of post feminist cultures and, within these, across a very narrow, demographic band: Straight, twenty something white boys. Those masters of irony. Those wearers of ironic hats and ironic shirts — those twits who think repeating something in a sarcastic tone is a form of rebellion. What some people call hipsters and what I call twits. You see, irony is a way of doing what you want to do, while pretending that you don’t really want to do it. You wear a Big League Chew shirt because you love that shit, but you wear it ironically because it’s embarrassing to love that shit and you want to send the message that you’re too cool to really love Big League Chew. It’s just cowardice. Love what you love, I say, hate what you hate. Do it openly. Life is short.
So why do these young men wear ironic mustaches? It’s simple: They have no idea how to be men. The baby-boomer fathers, the ones who actually stuck around to raise their kids, gave no usable example of grown-up male behavior. Mom might have been working full-time but you can be damn sure she was still performing the household chores. Her daughters are uninterested in that bad deal and who can blame them? I think it’s bullshit. Feminism was a necessary upheaval but, make no mistake, it was a major one. And it left the fellows a bit confused about how to act. They don’t know if they should open doors for ladies or offer their seats on the train or even if it’s all right to call ladies ladies. They really have no idea of what’s expected of them and, unlike me, they care. Years of tradition were pulled out from under them. This left them totally baffled. I hate confused people. It makes them feel weak. That’s when they’re dangerous. So these frightened, baffled children did what all frightened, baffled people do — They did the exact wrong thing.
A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE NON-IRONIC MUSTACHE
and now, a poem Stache Scratch Fever (Kristi Berg)
1800 BC Pharaoh Teqikencola outlawed mustaches among the elite of Egyptian society; hence the inevitable decline of his nation’s empire. The countryside became overrun by mustachioed bandits and foreigners who gathered popular support among the population who could not afford the expense (and bother) of shaving to please the Pharaoh.
336 BC Greeks and Romans were also antimustache. And, as is well known, their empires are no longer with us. Both empires collapsed, as hordes of hairy-upper-lipped barbarians trashed these centers of so-called civilization.
400 AD
1800ish AD In the United States, mustaches have been prevalent in politics and history. Lincoln grew a mustache while he wrote the Gettysburg Address and General Grant had one as he kicked Confederate butt at Vicksburg. In fact, anything in American history with “burg” in it usually involved a mustache.
The Middle Ages were replete with mustaches. Charlamagne championed them. His great victory over the Moors celebrated in the “Song of Roland” was widely believed to be a battle over whose mustache style would prevail in Europe. Charlamagne’s supporters preferred the more free-form style, while the Muslim-inspired mustaches of the Moors were highly stylized and beyond the European barbers’ capabilities of the time. This caused the Moors to lobby Charlamagne to “fight to the death to defend our freedom of lips.” The pope (who preferred a shaggy handlebar mustache) later crowned Charlamagne the first Holy Roman Emperor as a result.
Well I don’t know where he came from, but he sure is the one His sassy ‘stache is for me And I don’t know how he does it, but he sure does it good I can’t believe he’s doin’ it for free He gave me stache scratch fever Stache scratch fever The first time he kissed me, I was 27 years old We made out on the floor I knew from that day on that I was hooked for sure I wanted to get some more He gave me stache scratch fever Stache scratch fever I’ve got stache scratch fever Stache scratch fever It’s nothing dangerous I feel no pain I’m not gonna cha-cha change I know I’ve got it and I’m going insane It makes a woman so high, high! Can I take that mustache to bed? I get that loving feeling when I stroke his freaky stache It feels so soft, yet strong And he knows just what to do, that sweet mustache man I could love him all night long! He gave me stache scratch fever Stache scratch fever
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Quiz
Are you Hipster enough to be reading Wink? The following quizzes will determine your fate as a hipster. Choose youR answers wisely. by ANDREA DRYGAS
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word quiz Check off each correct statement. You have paid more than $100 for used shoes. You are 28 years old and still embarrassed to be seen out at dinner with your parents. You stopped listening to your favorite band because your Abercrombie-wearing cousin told you he likes their new single. You have on occasion said you never watch TV, but you know exactly how many times and under what circumstances Rachel and Ross broke up and got back together. You also know where this season’s Real World was shot. You throw the devil sign in photos—even at weddings… especially at weddings. You started a band last week— actually three bands. Two broke up because you couldn’t agree on a name and the third disbanded because you couldn’t find anyone to be in it, and because you couldn’t agree on a name. You will start three new bands next week. One will someday have a song used for incidental music on Road Rules. You, however, will already have quit them by then. You have very precisely removed a GAP tag from a pair of jeans. You wore a pair of GAP jeans to a party, and when no one noticed they were from the GAP you made sure to work the point into conversation.
Within two weeks you go through goth, country, and preppie phases, each involving a completely new record collection, wardrobe, and haircut. For none of the following reasons: —for job/work —to attend school —to be with a serious boy/girlfriend you moved to one of the following cities: —New York —Los Angeles —Chicago —Austin —San Francisco —Portland, Ore. You had a tattoo removed based on what you read in a “WHAT’S HOT/WHAT’S NOT” column in Vanity Fair, which you don’t read, except when you do. You broke up with someone because your styles were diverging. You pay your rent with a platinum card. You made friends with a homeless guy, then got upset when he puked on your boyfriend. You stage-dove during karaoke. You “hated” the song anyway. You wore a trucker cap into a truck stop and felt scared. You dated someone because they knew Kim Gordon.
You dumped someone because they knew Steve Shelley, but no one else in the band. You seriously considered leaving a party, going home, changing clothes, and coming back because your pants flared too much. Or not enough. You ended a friendship because a friend who you told about a new band told another friend about that same band, but didn’t tell that friend that they originally heard about them from you. You talk bad about the city when you’re in the country and bad about the country when you’re in the city. For three weeks you told anyone who would listen that Blonde Redhead is a “poor man’s Unwound.” Then you went to their show and said it there too. You’re too cool to smoke pot with your parents. You dry-clean your jeans. Or you don’t wash them at all. You could, if really drunk, explain when it is and when it is not appropriate to dance at a concert. You hid a Jimmy Eat World CD under your bed before your friends came over. And then brought up the band and trashed it. You started a conversation with a friend talking about how glad you are to see them and ended it talking only about yourself.
You dated someone because they knew Thurston Moore.
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SCORING
Count how many boxes you checked and score yourself >10 = F
11-15 = C-
16-20 = B
<21 = A
What kind of hipster are you?
{
Find out here. Did you get a C- or lower on the first Quiz? If yes, find a real hipster and gift this awesome magazine to them immediately and never touch it again. You’re not worthy of Wink. If you passed, move on to the next portion of the test.
{
Which of these images best depicts you? Ex-Frats
Alternagirls
Homoeroticum Misogynystica Ex-Frats are unique among our Hipsters in that they are unable to reproduce sexually. Instead, the species must recruit new members at the collegiate level. New recruits are branded to distinguish amongst tribes, or “Houses.”
Urbanoutfitterum Ornimentia AlternaGirls are unrelenting in their pursuit of so-called “cute boys.” They employ as their modus operandi a savvy reinterpretation of the classic little-girl-lost routine, in which they feign traditionally held assumptions concerning the “weaker” sex.
Butch/Femmes Maculina Approximum Technically two separate species, Butch/ Femmes’ proclivity for cohabitation, coupled with their practically identical philosophies and politics, warrants the traditional act of grouping for purposes of description, as well as identification.
Corporate Hipster/Hip by Night Trendidia Nocturnum Corporate Hipsters are noted for their mysterious ability to reside on the cutting edge of countercultural trendiness despite staunch pro-corporate and anti-creative leanings.
Bike Messengers Condescendum Quicksilverus Bike Messengers, though menial in function, exhibit an instinctual snobbery not normally observed outside of record stores or comics shops.
Elizabeth Street Shop Girls Fashionistica Auteurux Though indigenous to a relatively miniscule and esoteric habitat, Elizabeth Street Shop Girls are so highly regarded by certain Hipsterati that their pursuit is not only recommended, but may regard the seasoned observer with particularly satisfying results.
Performance Poets Bloviatum Dramatica Performance Poets not only journal their rage but read it aloud, disseminating the details of their personal lives through a plangent, staccato, sometimes musically-accompanied howling referred to as "Spoken Word."
Men Who Lunch Gildedum Superfluosa Engineered by their fabulously wealthy fathers, Men Who Lunch prove that human beings can exist who undermine the very fabric of what makes us civilized. Every Dunhill cigarette they smoke is a fabulous affirmation of their self-worth and humanity. continued on next page
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Functioning Junkies Addictiva Rationalizum Functioning Junkies are often held rapt by decidedly mundane objects and events. Such objects become the center of their universe and will proceed to be featured, quite heavily, in all future conversations regardless of time, place, or pertinence.
Academics Shabbylium Erudita Whether or not Academics do indeed possess some intrinsic brilliance, their shocking inability to realize tangible, real-world achievement hinders their movement when outside of academic terrain.
Glam Rockers Androgynum Fantastica Noted for their flamboyant, tarted up appearance, Glam Rockers are perhaps the friendliest and least judgmental of all Hipsters.
Models Physicallum Perfecta Models suffer from an insatiable desire to be photographed. It has been postulated that the species' need for photographic representation functions as the direct inverse to some primitive peoples' beliefs that picture-taking steals one's soul.
Hippies Peacenika Trippyum This hirsute species is among our most slovenly. Hippies regard their lack of cleanliness as a sophisticated piece of anti-establishment, noncorporate commentary.
Laptop Rock Artists Precocioum Roboto The most esoteric and intellectually forbidding of all Hipsters, Laptop Rock Artists are consumed both by audio and their own intelligentsia.
Eurotrash Infiltrata Materialum Existing in a near constant state of Bacchanalia, EuroTrash are our most hedonistic Hipsters, eclipsing other similarly debauched yet less well funded species in terms of sheer drunken revelry.
Mods Anglophilia Dandyum Mods have been known to exhibit a demeanor which some experts regard as "a bit snooty."
Alternaboys Nervanum Slackerius AlternaBoys provide a cultural link to our collective Hipster heritage, having stubbornly resisted temptation to abandon the ideals or fashions of the general Grunge aesthetic popularized during the early 1990s.
Did You Pass? Acceptable kinds of hipsters who can continue reading Wink! Functioning Junkies, Academics, Glam Rockers, Hippies, Laptop Rock Artists, Alternaboys, Performance Artists, Bike Messengers, Elizabeth Street Shop Girls, Butch-Femmes, Alternagirls, Corporate Hipster/Hip by Night.
Unacceptable kinds of hipsters who must burn this copy immediately: Eurotrash, Mods, Models, Men Who Lunch, Ex-Frat Boys.
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Do You know the Lingo? Write The definition under each question. 1. bronson
5. cronkite
9. frado
_____________________
_____________________
_____________________
2. bust a moby
6. deck
10. jug
_____________________
_____________________
7. fin
11. kale
"I drank a sixer of bronsons last night while watching the game."
"Did you see her moves at the party last night? She really knows how to bust a moby."
_____________________
3. chipper
"Have you seen Anne's new cronkite? He is such a frado."
"That girl we met at the opening sure looked deck in cowboy boots."
"She's a real chipper and will sleep with anyone after one bronson."
"How can you like that Vin Diesel movie? Every film he's ever starred in has been fin."
_____________________
_____________________
4. clothesline
8. the frigidaire
"Yo, I heard on the clothesline that she is sleeping with Billy. She is such a chipper."
_____________________
"I don't know what her problem is, but she gives me the frigidaire every time I see her."
"Bill thinks all the girls love him, but they all know he's a frado."
"Tassels respect me. I can drink a whole jug and still bust a mean moby."
"Yo, can you slide me some kale? I'm waiting for my mom to send rent."
_____________________
12. midtown
"He's never heard of Spike Jonze. He's so midtown."
_____________________
_____________________
BONUS: identify this gesture >>> 1. beer // 2. to dance // 3. a woman who's easy // 4. the gossip that is on the scene // 5. boy // 6. to the antiquated fresh, to be up on the latest trends, cutting edge, and/or hip // 7. similar to outdated terms like "wack" and "lame," something that is fin is bad or undes irable. // 8. the cold shoulder // 9. an ugly guy who thinks he's good-looking. // 10. a 40 oz. bottle of domestic beer // 11. money // 12. uncultured or unhip // Bonus: Awkward Turtle
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The Stache:
he The Hef Stac
ache The Daring St
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tache The scared S
a decadent journey
e The ass Stach
ache The rebel St
che The Clean Sta
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ache The hoodie St
he The safe Stac
ache The Selleck St
ache The retro St ache The Model St
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ache The party St
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Culture
s â&#x20AC;&#x2122; r e t
s p i h a y b a l lulby James Franco
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I‘m sipping a scummy pint of cloudy beer
in the back of a trendy dive bar turned nightclub in the heart of the city’s heroin district. In front of me stand a gang of hippiesh grunge-punk types, who crowd around each other and collectively scoff at the smoking laws by sneaking puffs of “fuck-you,” reveling in their perceived rebellion as the haggard, staggering staff look on without the slightest concern.
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T
he “DJ” is keybikes, vintage flannel, fake stroking a selection of eyeglasses and a keffiyeh – iniMP3s off his MacBook, tially sported by Jewish stumaking a mix that sounds like dents and Western protesthe took a hatchet to a collecers to express solidarity with tion of yesteryear billboard Palestinians, the keffiyeh has hits, from DMX to Dolly Parbecome a completely mean“Yeah, just look around you, ton, but mashed up with a jitingless hipster cliché fashion 99 percent of the people tery techno backbeat. accessory. here are total hipsters!” “So… this is a hipster party?” I The American Apparel V-neck “Are you a hipster?” ask the girl sitting next to me. She’s shirt, Pabst Blue Ribbon beer and “Fuck no,” she says. wearing big dangling earrings, an Parliament cigarettes are symbols and American Apparel V-neck tee, non-preicons of working or revolutionary classes scription eyeglasses and an inappropriately that have been appropriated by hipsterdom warm wool coat. and drained of meaning. Ten years ago, a man wear“Yeah, just look around you, 99 percent of the people here are ing a plain V-neck tee and drinking a Pabst would never be actotal hipsters!” cused of being a trend-follower. But in 2008, such things have “Are you a hipster?” become shameless clichés of a class of individuals that seek to “Fuck no,” she says, laughing back the last of her glass before she escape their own wealth and privilege by immersing themselves hops off to the dance floor. in the aesthetic of the working class. Ever since the Allies bombed the Axis into submission, WestThis obsession with “street-cred” reaches its apex of absurdity ern civilization has had a succession of counter-culture move- as hipsters have recently and wholeheartedly adopted the fixedments that have energetically challenged the status quo. Each gear bike as the only acceptable form of transportation – only successive decade of the post-war era has seen it smash social to have brakes installed on a piece of machinery that is defined standards, riot and fight to revolutionize every aspect of music, by its lack thereof. art, government and civil society. Lovers of apathy and irony, hipsters are connected through a But after punk was plasticized and hip hop lost its impetus for global network of blogs and shops that push forth a global visocial change, all of the formerly dominant streams of “counter- sion of fashion-informed aesthetics. Loosely associated with culture” have merged together. Now, one mutating, trans-Atlan- some form of creative output, they attend art parties, take lo-fi tic melting pot of styles, tastes and behavior has come to define pictures with analog cameras, ride their bikes to night clubs and the generally indefinable idea of the “Hipster.” sweat it up at nouveau disco-coke parties. The hipster tends to An artificial appropriation of different styles from different religiously blog about their daily exploits, usually while leafing eras, the hipster represents the end of Western civilization – a through generation-defining magazines like Vice, Another Magaculture lost in the superficiality of its past and unable to create zine and Wallpaper. This cursory and stylized lifestyle has made any new meaning. Not only is it unsustainable, it is suicidal. While the hipster almost universally loathed. previous youth movements have challenged the dysfunction “These hipster zombies… are the idols of the style pages, the and decadence of their elders, today we have the “hipster” – a darlings of viral marketers and the marks of predatory real-esyouth subculture that mirrors the doomed shallowness of main- tate agents,” wrote Christian Lorentzen in a Time Out New York stream society. article entitled ‘Why the Hipster Must Die.’ “And they must be buried for cool to be reborn.” c With nothing to defend, uphold or even embrace, the idea of ake a stroll down the street in any “hipsterdom” is left wide open for attack. And yet, it is this ironic major North American or European city and you’ll be sure lack of authenticity that has allowed hipsterdom to grow into to see a speckle of fashion-conscious twentysomethings a global phenomenon that is set to consume the very core of hanging about and sporting a number of predictable stylistic Western counterculture. Most critics make a point of attacking trademarks: skinny jeans, cotton spandex leggings, fixed-gear the hipster’s lack of individuality, but it is this stubborn obfus-
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cation that distinguishes them from their predecessors, while allowing hipsterdom to easily blend in and mutate other social movements, sub-cultures and lifestyles. Standing outside an art-party next to a neat row of locked-up fixed-gear bikes, I come across a couple girls who exemplify hipster homogeneity. I ask one of the girls if her being at an art party and wearing fake eyeglasses, leggings and a flannel shirt makes her a hipster. “I’m not comfortable with that term,” she replies. Her friend adds, with just a flicker of menace in her eyes, “Yeah, I don’t know, you shouldn’t use that word, it’s just…” “Offensive?” “No… it’s just, well… if you don’t know why then you just shouldn’t even use it.” “Ok, so what are you girls doing tonight after this party?” “Ummm… We’re going to the after-party.”
G
c
clearly defined defined symbols symbolsthat thatproclaims proclaimsit.it for the world to see. ”He’s 17 and he lives for the scene!” a girl whispers in my ear as I sneak a photo of a young kid dancing up against a wall in a dimly lit corner of the after-party. He’s got a flipped-out, do-it-yourself haircut, skin-tight jeans, leather jacket, a vintage punk tee and some popping high tops. “Shoot me,” he demands, walking up, cigarette in mouth, striking a pose and exhaling. He hits a few different angles with a firmly unimpressed expression and then gets a bit giddy when I show him the results. “Rad, thanks,” he says, re-focusing on the music and submerging himself back into the sweaty funk of the crowd where he resumes a jittery head bobble with a little bit of a twitch. The dance floor at a hipster party looks like it should be surrounded by quotation marks. While punk, disco and hip hop all had immersive, intimate and energetic dance styles that liberated the dancer from his/her mental states – be it the head-spinning b-boy or violent thrashings of a live punk show – the hipster has more of a joke dance. A faux shrug shuffle that mocks the very idea of dancing or, at its best, illustrates a non-committal fear of expression typified in a weird twitch/ironic twist. The dancers are too self-aware to let themselves feel any form of liberation; they shuffle along, shrugging themselves into oblivion.
avin McInnes, one of the founders of Vice, who recently left the magazine, is considered to be one of hipsterdom’s primary architects. But, in contrast to the majority of concerned media-types, McInnes, whose “Dos and Don’ts” commentary defined the rules of hipster fashion for over a decade, is more critical of those doing the criticizing. c “I’ve always found that word [“hipster”] is used with such disdain, like it’s always used by chubby bloggers who aren’t getting erhaps the true motivation behind laid anymore and are bored, and they’re just so mad at these this deliberate nonchalance is an attempt to attract young kids for going out and getting wasted and having fun and the attention of the ever-present party photograbeing fashionable,” he says. “I’m dubious of these phers, who swim through the crowd like neon hypotheses because they always smell of an sharks, flashing little blasts of phosphoagenda.” rescent ecstasy whenever they spot Two girls and Punks wear their tattered threads someone worth momentarily ima guy are taking and studded leather jackets with mortalizing. off their clothes and honor, priding themselves on Noticing a few flickers of striking poses for a set their innovative and cheap light splash out from the club methods of self-expression bathroom, I peep in only to of grimy glamour shots. and rebellion. B-boys and bfind one such photographer girls announce themselves to taking part in an imprompanyone within earshot with tu soft-core porno shoot. baggy gear and boomboxes. Two girls and a guy are takBut it is rare, if not imposing off their clothes and sible, to find an individual striking poses for a set of who will proclaim themself a grimy glamour shots. It’s all proud hipster. It’s an odd dance grins and smirks until another of self-identity – adamantly degirl pokes her head inside and nying your existence while wearing screeches, “You’re not some club
P
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“I
f you don’t give a damn, we don’t kid in New York in the nineties. This shit is so hipster!” – which give a fuck!” chants an emcee before his incitements are sparks a bit of a catfight, causing me to beat a hasty retreat. abruptly cut short when the power plug is pulled and In many ways, the lifestyle promoted by hipsterdom is highly the lights snapped on. ritualized. Many of the party-goers who are subject to the Dawn breaks and the last of the after-after-parties begin to photoblogger’s snapshots no doubt crawl out of bed the next spill into the streets. The hipsters are falling out, rubbing their afternoon and immediately re-experience the previous night’s eyes and scanning the surrounding landscape for the way back debauchery. Red-eyed and bleary, they sit hunched over their from which they came. Some hop on their fixed-gear bikes, some laptops, wading through a sea of similarity to find their own call for cabs, while a few of us hop a fence and cut through the (momentarily) thrilling instant of perfected hipster-ness. industrial wasteland of a nearby condo development. What they may or may not know is that “cool-hunters” will The half-built condos tower above us like foreboding monoliths also be skulking the same sites, taking note of how they dress of our yuppie futures. I take a look at one of the girls wearing a and what they consume. These marketers and party-promoters bright pink keffiyah and carrying a Polaroid camera get paid to co-opt youth culture and then re-sell and think, “If only we carried rocks instead of it back at a profit. In the end, hipsters are cameras, we’d look like revolutionaries.” sold what they think they invent and But instead we ignore the weapons are spoon-fed their pre-packaged that lie at our feet – oblivious to our cultural livelihood. own impending demise. Hipsterdom is the first “counWe are a lost generation, desterculture” to be born under perately clinging to anything the advertising industry’s mithat feels real, but too afraid croscope, leaving it open to to become it ourselves. We constant manipulation but are a defeated generation, also forcing its participants resigned to the hypocrisy of to continually shift their inthose before us. terests and affiliations. Less I take a look at one of the girls We are a lost generation, a subculture, the hipster is a wearing a keffiyah and carrying a desperately clinging to anyconsumer group – using their Polaroid camera and think, “If thing that feels real, but too capital to purchase empty only we carried rocks instead afraid to become it ourselves. authenticity and rebellion. But of cameras, we’d look like We are a defeated generation, rethe moment a trend, band, sound, signed to the hypocrisy of those berevolutionaries.” style or feeling gains too much exfore us, who once sang songs of rebellion posure, it is suddenly looked upon with and now sell them back to us. We are the disdain. Hipsters cannot afford to maintain last generation, a culmination of all previous things, any cultural loyalties or affiliations for fear they will destroyed by the vapidity that surrounds us. The hipster replose relevance. resents the end of Western civilization – a culture so detached An amalgamation of its own history, the youth of the West and disconnected that it has stopped giving birth to anything are left with consuming cool rather that creating it. The cultural zeitgeists of the past have always been sparked by furious in- new. We are a lost generation, desperately clinging to anything dignation and are reactionary movements. But the hipster’s self- that feels real, but too afraid to become it ourselves. We are a defeated generation, resigned to the hypocrisy of those beinvolved and isolated maintenance does nothing to feed cultural fore us, who once sang songs of rebellion and now sell them evolution. Western civilization’s well has run dry. The only way back to us. We are the last generation, a culmination of all preto avoid hitting the colossus of societal failure that looms over vious things, destroyed by the vapidity that surrounds us. The the horizon is for the kids to abandon this vain existence and hipster represents the end of Western civilization – a culture start over. so detached and disconnected that it has stopped giving birth to anything new. c
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