222’s democratic vision for skateboard culture
PHOTO BY MAX RUIBAL, COURTESY OF 222
PHOTO BY MAX RUIBAL, COURTESY OF 222
PHOTO BY ANGUS GILL, COURTESY OF 222
PHOTO BY TAKASHI SOEHL, COURTESY OF 222
By JP Pak FILM AND TV EDITOR
When asked by high school friends and relatives to describe the average NYU student, I am forced to answer with the word “poser.” Poser: A young person enamored by a wide variety of hobbies and identities who lives in a city that offers the chance to pursue them, but lacks the focus or commitment to make them a genuine part of their identity. Putting 20,000 young — often financially well-off — people without much life experience or self-knowledge in a cultural hub like New York City inevitably results in a culture of shallowness. The poser middle-parts their hair after watching Timothée Chalamet have relations with a peach in “Call Me by Your Name.” The poser watches an episode of Kaia Gerber’s Supermodel Book Club on Instagram Live, pays $30 for the 400-page novel that Gerber discusses, and flips through its first five pages while sitting on a bench in Washington Square Park — cross-legged and in the open, for everybody to see — only to never touch the book again. The poser buys a Celine bag and declares themself fashionable; the poser goes to Metrograph once and declares themself a cinephile. The poser pays $11 for a single shot and christens themself with the cheap liquid of pseudo-adulthood every Friday night.
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The poser is a deeply unfortunate product of the digital world. Ours is the first generation to grow up on social media, exposed from a young age to a wider variety of lifestyles and cultures than ever before. This abundance of niche interests, each more vulnerable to appropriation and hijacking than the next, breeds affectation. The dreadful softboy shows his barber a picture of 2017 Chalamet and suddenly deems himself sensitive and sophisticated. The dark academic shows off their bookshelf of unread poetry on TikTok. The pseudo-Marxist hears the term social chauvinism mentioned in a lecture and develops the habit of blaming any minor inconvenience on social chauvinism. And the skate poser, a storied term that has only risen in use since its inception in the 20th century, feeds off of skateboarding culture for social status. Draped in clothing from skateboarding-influenced fashion brands, they hang out at skateparks but don’t actually skate, instead posting their outfits online to boost their perceived persona — an egoist among purists. Until my recent conversation with roommates Cannon Michael and Yoshi Nakada, NYU juniors and founders of the New York-based skateboarding collective 222, it was my impression that disdain for posers is a shared and universal feeling — especially among those who take the time and commitment to truly master the craft that the poser hijacks. You can imagine my surprise when they expressed the opposite
