"Hipster" as pejorative.

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MUMMY: I wish there was somebody somewhere who wasn't afraid of me. Oh,
well. Watch what happens when I walk up to somebody.
<dit-dit-dit-dit-dit> I'm a mummy.
BEATNIK: That's cool.
MUMMY: I'm a mummy.
BEATNIK: You mean you're a mother.
MUMMY: No, I'm a mummy.
BEATNIK: I'm a beatnik.
MUMMY: People are afraid of me.
BEATNIK: Yeah, I'll bet.
MUMMY: I was born one thousand nine hundred and fifty-nine years ago.
BEATNIK: Oh, yeah, like, that's a long gig.
MUMMY: Where can I buy a copy of "Kookie, Kookie, Lend Me Your Comb"?
BEATNIK: Oooh, man, I don't dig that trash. You know like Brubeck,
Sherwin, Modern Jazz Quartet?
MUMMY: I'm a mummy.
BEATNIK: Man, you got a warped groove.
MUMMY: Aren't you afraid of me? Aren't you gonna scream?
BEATNIK: Oh, yeah, like, "help."

― Tracer Hand, Friday, 16 March 2007 17:17 (seventeen years ago) link

I judge people more harshly if they use "hipster" derogatorily. They obviously have some inadequacy issues I don't want to deal with.

― Yerac, Friday, 16 March 2007 17:19 (seventeen years ago) link

otm.

― lauren, Friday, 16 March 2007 17:26 (seventeen years ago) link

otm otm.

― s1ocki, Friday, 16 March 2007 17:31 (seventeen years ago) link

also lauren's "moving in on their territory" comment is very very true.

― s1ocki, Friday, 16 March 2007 17:32 (seventeen years ago) link

I say this all while sitting in Williamsburg not working, eating my trader joe's beef jerky and having a drink before going to my guitar lesson.

― Yerac, Friday, 16 March 2007 17:34 (seventeen years ago) link

Del Close to thread!

― kenan, Friday, 16 March 2007 17:35 (seventeen years ago) link

How to Speak Hip

endless fun

― kenan, Friday, 16 March 2007 17:35 (seventeen years ago) link

love that old nichols & may routine where they parody hepcat poetry. "Kools! Kools! Smoke Kools!" riffing on advertising and hipsterism in 1959! if i hadn't been such a fan of The Mechanical Bride (which came out in 1951) before i came upon the Baffler i probably would have been more impressed by thomas frank. he can be good in a you have been lied to preaching to the converted kinda way.

― scott seward, Friday, 16 March 2007 17:44 (seventeen years ago) link

i'm just glad that the pressure to find at least one black guy willing to join yer ska revival band is off

hahahahahahahahahahahaha

hahahahhaha

Did I mention hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.

</former ska revival band member>

― nickalicious, Friday, 16 March 2007 17:57 (seventeen years ago) link

'hepcat' was really good at finding those guys. uncanny.

― tremendoid, Friday, 16 March 2007 18:21 (seventeen years ago) link

We should draw a distinction between 50s beat/Mailerian hipsterism and the postmodern Letterman-esque version, which is a kind of channel-flipping detachment from all surrounding events and people. I'm not sure that the two share a direct line of evolution.

― fife, Friday, 16 March 2007 18:43 (seventeen years ago) link

Somebody said that Mailer's hipster is more a figment of his imagination, or something he tried to will into being: a kind of violent but sly crook lurking in urban environments which he contrasted with beatniks, who are fairly mild middle-class dropouts. If Freud had replaced Marx in the 50s intelligentsia, hipsters were his bolsheviks, the murderous revolutionaries of the psyche as opposed to the menshevik bohemian-liberals.

― fife, Friday, 16 March 2007 18:53 (seventeen years ago) link

i haven't read this thread but "hipsters", to me, are kids who are trying too hard. there's a difference between being hip and being a hipster.

― chicago kevin, Friday, 16 March 2007 18:54 (seventeen years ago) link

They try 'too hard' because they care what they look like

ie:::Fashion

― maricopa john, Friday, 16 March 2007 19:38 (seventeen years ago) link

Nah. You can care what you look like without caring how young/trendy it is. You can wear nice, pressed shirts and keep your shoes shined. That's not a hipster.

― kenan, Friday, 16 March 2007 19:39 (seventeen years ago) link

My friend was born with a white eyebrow...everyone accuses her of trying too hard. With a genetic eyebrow deal.

― Abbott, Friday, 16 March 2007 20:18 (seventeen years ago) link

i know someone who has eyebrows that curl up at the ends giving him a look similar to a demon or pixie or sprite or something with pointy curly eyebrows.

― chicago kevin, Friday, 16 March 2007 20:20 (seventeen years ago) link

I guess there's a subtle line between dressing young and trendy and feeling the need to put on a costume before you leave the house. And you can sense the latter. Maybe it's a personality issue more than a fashion issue? You can look cool as hell and still look unpretentious.

― kenan, Friday, 16 March 2007 20:39 (seventeen years ago) link

can people just not use the phrase "trying too hard" anymore

― s1ocki, Friday, 16 March 2007 20:41 (seventeen years ago) link

You're pushin' too hard, uh-pushin' on me
You're pushin' too hard, uh-what you want me to be
You're pushin' too hard about the things you say
You're pushin' too hard every night and day

― kenan, Friday, 16 March 2007 20:44 (seventeen years ago) link

ya! people should just sing that instead.

― s1ocki, Friday, 16 March 2007 20:44 (seventeen years ago) link

― chaki, Friday, 16 March 2007 20:44 (seventeen years ago) link

I hate that phrase too, slocki.

― Abbott, Friday, 16 March 2007 20:45 (seventeen years ago) link

No i think theres a sense here that people are looking down on people who care about fashion, rather than wearing some good clothes. In a way that others care about music, rather than just having some good cds

― maricopa john, Friday, 16 March 2007 21:12 (seventeen years ago) link

ie: subtext:people shouldn't spend too much time thinking about their outfits

― maricopa john, Friday, 16 March 2007 21:13 (seventeen years ago) link

What hipster didn't start out overdoing it and then mellowing out? You should see pics of me in HS. Like sitting in giant piles of peers in a puppy pal evolved into sitting alone on a barstool w/a gimlet.

http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f86/igotabeefpastry/papes.jpg

Actually this is the closest I ever got to 'trying too hard' (and it should actually go on the secret goth shame thredd):

http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f86/igotabeefpastry/BIGHEAD.jpg

Vainglorious me.

― Abbott, Friday, 16 March 2007 21:14 (seventeen years ago) link

subtext: people should stop dressing funny

― milo z, Friday, 16 March 2007 21:17 (seventeen years ago) link

"You can care what you look like without caring how young/trendy it is. You can wear nice, pressed shirts and keep your shoes shined. That's not a hipster."

it's not really fashion either, is it? i mean i'm sure you look good but you're missing the point.

― jed_, Friday, 16 March 2007 21:20 (seventeen years ago) link

"can people just not use the phrase "trying too hard" anymore"

http://www.ilxor.com:8080/ILX/ThreadSelectedControllerServlet?boardid=40&threadid=30843

― scott seward, Friday, 16 March 2007 21:22 (seventeen years ago) link

I like when people dress funny, like the old woman I saw dressed like an anthropology prof. w/the flowy dress & billion turquoise necklaces...paired w/neon orange chuck taylors. i like the kids who dress too much, they add some levity to my world.

― Abbott, Friday, 16 March 2007 21:23 (seventeen years ago) link

I like the sartorialist a ton but it everyone dressed like that what a dry world it would be. I'd rather eat ice than look at Vice, tho.

― Abbott, Friday, 16 March 2007 21:24 (seventeen years ago) link

can people just not use the phrase "trying too hard" anymore

i'll stop saying it when i stop seeing it. restraint is key, rarely is anything any good when it's over the top.

― chicago kevin, Friday, 16 March 2007 21:26 (seventeen years ago) link

But what attitude does it imply beyond dress sense and musical taste?

― fife, Friday, 16 March 2007 21:36 (seventeen years ago) link

Slocky OTM. In my experience, the phrase "trying too hard" is generally employed by self-conscious killjoys.

― Fluffy Bear Hearts Rainbows, Friday, 16 March 2007 21:38 (seventeen years ago) link

to me it screams "i want to belong accept me accept accept me" and i don't dig that.

― chicago kevin, Friday, 16 March 2007 21:39 (seventeen years ago) link

"I'm cooler than you"

not saying that's the INTENDED projection of attitude - sometimes yes sometimes no

― dmr, Friday, 16 March 2007 21:40 (seventeen years ago) link

xpost to fife

― dmr, Friday, 16 March 2007 21:41 (seventeen years ago) link

kevin mostly OTM

― milo z, Friday, 16 March 2007 21:46 (seventeen years ago) link

oh man high school... that's where it's ok to try too hard, i guess, but man. I was like the girl in... what's that movie?... who keeps coming in wearing totally different "looks" (i.e. beehive)? Anyway, I was like that. I went from band geek in polo shirt to wannabe surfer to metal guy with boots.

Today I am dressed not unlike Kumar.

― kenan, Friday, 16 March 2007 21:46 (seventeen years ago) link

I do look down on people who care about fashion. As a midwesterner, it's my birthright to do so.

― Granny Dainger, Friday, 16 March 2007 21:50 (seventeen years ago) link

well, there's no shame in being a provincial boob, I don't guess, but there's no pride in it either.

― kenan, Friday, 16 March 2007 21:56 (seventeen years ago) link

I like hipsters. hooray people who make an effort - however misguided, self-conscious, or obnoxious it may be - to make their lives strange or unusual or interesting.

― Shakey Mo Collier, Friday, 16 March 2007 22:03 (seventeen years ago) link

*flees from shower of stones, rotten garbage*

― Shakey Mo Collier, Friday, 16 March 2007 22:04 (seventeen years ago) link

I do look down on people who care about fashion. As a midwesterner, it's my birthright to do so.

This might explain why midwestern thrift stores beat the shit out of anything on the coasts-- y'all throw away all of your cool articles of clothing! I mean, clothing designers from Japan fly into Cleveland all the time just to buy tons of shit at the thrift stores and then re-sell them to young hip types in Tokyo.

― the table is the table, Friday, 16 March 2007 22:11 (seventeen years ago) link

That's where definitions begin to differ, I guess. 'Hipster' as I hear it used (and the people I see) really doesn't refer to someone who is making their life strange, unusual or interesting.

Hipster means they're taking their cues (fashion, music, etc.) from a certain pool of resources that just happens to be a different pool than Stripey-Shirt Frat Bro or Redneck Woman use.

― milo z, Friday, 16 March 2007 22:12 (seventeen years ago) link

key word is "different", methinks

― Shakey Mo Collier, Friday, 16 March 2007 22:17 (seventeen years ago) link

if caring about fashion is wrong, i don't wanna be right.

― lauren, Friday, 16 March 2007 22:17 (seventeen years ago) link

Redneck Women can also be quite entertaining/idiosyncratic in their own ways.

Fratboys I have an inherent aversion too, however.

― Shakey Mo Collier, Friday, 16 March 2007 22:18 (seventeen years ago) link

chicago kevin otm upthread.

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Friday, 16 March 2007 22:22 (seventeen years ago) link

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