Hipster Nation

(η ιστορία που ακολουθεί είναι φανταστική κάθε ομοιότητα με πρόσωπα και καταστάσεις είναι καθαρά συμπτωματική)

A hipster is a subcultural identification, usually applied to middle-class, and upper-class younger people of North America and Europe. It refers directly to the way one is dressed, and may have connotations involving one's worldview. Traditional usage of the term "hipster" generally has no derogatory connotations, and in 2002 was the sole subject of the book The Hipster Handbook.^[1] Later use of the word into the present day has developed negative connotations in some circles, identifying that a person may be overly concerned with their image, may disingenuously pretend to act significantly poorer or more liberal than they are, or may be an elitist. In this negative connotation, the term "hipster" or "scenester" is typically a term applied by other people, although use of it can be used as a self-identifier, many times with ironic overtones. This is in contrast to the more simple form of the word "hip," which generally still has positive connotations of the same ideas and fashion sense. Today the term hipster usually refers to people who are young, such as college students, who may have an appreciation for independent rock, a campy or ironic fashion sense, or an otherwise "bohemian" style.

There are many associations made to hipsters that can be considered stereotypes. Hipsters are often seen as having a predilection towards vintage items, such as vintage clothing and vinyl records. They may be considered artistic or otherwise concerned with matters of taste. While tight jeans and ironic t-shirts became the de-facto uniform of the hipster male, the hipster female uniform evolved into a combination of 1960's, 1970's and 1980's dress. Both hipster males and females were also influenced by the DIY aesthetic, and handmade screen prints, specifically placed off-center on shirts and dresses, also became a major hipster fashion identifier. This look of screen-printing images off-center on shirts and dresses quickly translated to and permeated the mainstream...screen-printed images of pseudo-punk icons such as skulls, guns, daggers, guitars, drums, and trees became nearly ubiquitous throughout popular culture from 2002 to the present day.

While perhaps a majority of the young people potentially labeled hipsters are so categorized strictly due to their appearance, the overall aesthetic is occasionally representative of a specific liberal ethos. The vintage clothing and thrift store appearance of hipsters in a modern liberal context reveals a wish to consume ethically; to not buy new clothes from large corporations accused of harsh, unfair, and cruel working conditions or even slave labor, such as The Gap and Nike. The choice to consume ethically reveals what some would call realism, and others the cynicism, of a youth culture that agrees with the sentiment that most people will not "make a difference." Thus, the most important way such a person can influence the political and societal world around them is to admit that one's only true voice in a capitalist society is as a consumer, and thus one should consume ethically.

The conlficts and paradoxes of irony enter the popular perception of the hipster in how that term is related to social and economic class, particularly in the United States where colleges rarely provide full scholarships to liberal arts majors. Since liberal thought, intellectualism, a college education, and a deep knowledge of independent music and film as well as popular culture, are all defining aspects of being a hipster, and these very rarely result from a working class or lower class background, the fact that hipsters are seen to espouse such working class aspects of culture appears either ironic or disingenuous. The common perception of a hipster who recieves minimum wage working as a barrista, copy shop employee, music store employee, "hip" restaurant worker, or other job which provides low pay (yet lives in a gentrified "hip" part of town) does exist, but if said hipster indeed has a college education and a likely upper-class or middle-class upbringing, there arises a paradox of identity. From this conflict of class background vs. percieved current economic class, a stereotype exists of a hipster who receives rent and other financial assistance from their upper-class parents, sometimes referred to as a "trust fund hipster."

- wikipedia -