schizophrenic ranting

Reflecting upon my blog posts I can’t help but notice how pessimistic and sarcastic I am. Sarcastic I am fine with; it’s by no means an adjective I would use to describe myself, but it comes as no surprise. I would choose witty over sarcastic. And humble. Pessimistic, however, is far from correct. I’m one of the most nauseatingly optimistic people I know. It can sometimes be a problem, especially when my significant other’s pessimism clashes with my sunny view of the world.  Writing is more fun when you’re bashing something, so I’ll forgive myself.

And pessimism, I believe, represents the basis of the problems society (or humankind) faces. In the same way the complaint/praise ratio of any business will be invariably skewed toward the negative, humans are far more interested in the bad than the good. How many of the essays in Discovering Popular Culture are centered on a negative aspect of our culture? I would venture the vast majority if not all of them. Why can’t we have essays praising some aspect of American culture? Are we really that hateful? Is there no one thing everybody can agree on?

Is there nothing in this world that is purely good?

Hip to be square

Mever in history has it been more socially acceptable to be different. There are a plethora of different subcultures and at this point in time just about any person with enough effort will find like-minded people through the miracle that is the internet. Never in history have there been as many separate subcultures as there are right now. One particular contemporary subculture that has really blown up in the past few years is that of the “hipsters”.  Hipsters can be labeled as “recently settled urban middle class adults and older teenagers with interests in non-mainstream fashion and culture, particularly indie rock, independent film, magazines such as Vice and Clash, and websites like Pitchfork Media.”.¹ Prescott in particular has a large collaboration of these people, surprisingly so for a such a quaint city not immediate to a major metropolitan area, where they tend to congregate.

                Society’s view on the hipster subculture is often very conflicting: there are those who hold a deep and perhaps unwarranted hatred, those who love them, and in the center those who are hipsters but will never, ever admit to it no matter how obvious it is to those around them.  The staple of the hipster is the embrace, or rather clawing onto, ironic or passé fashion and fads. Cheesy, non-prescription eyeglasses, vintage fashion, superficial interest and pretension for art, and having a Tumblr.com account are a few of the many signs you may be dealing with one of these hipsters. The complete lack of individuality is the main problem those outside of the scene have. Hipsters borrow elements from what is  around them, a common example being ugly clothing procured from thrift stores worn ironically. One publication referred to Hipsters as “the end product of all prior countercultures … stripped of its subversion and originality.” ¹

1.     1.  http://www.adbusters.org/magazine/79/hipster.html