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Life with ONE great Leather Jacket vs. Life with MANY Leather Jackets

Bunyip

Call Me a Cab
Messages
2,069
Location
Australia
That's so imprecise. Here hipsters refers to thrift-shop dressed, boutique beer drinking, pseudo-anti-capitalist, long beardy types with a penchant for looking down on the middle classes because they think their choices and innate good taste are superior. Of course, some of them are quite nice.
Well said Seb. i was going to put this sign out the front of the pub....
image.jpg
 

Edward

Bartender
Messages
25,078
Location
London, UK
I guess its just that as we get older we have the funds to pursue our passions - whether its Aero jackets or Swiss watches……


Age is a huge part of it. Whether it's the traditional "mid-life crisis" or someting far more benign, the reality is that most of us will hit a point at some point in middle age (more significantly so for the growing number of us who choose not to have children) where we simply are more financially solvent than we might have been when younger. The mortgage is down to the end being in sight, we've nested and gotten most of what we need for the home, day to day expenses are managed, and we discover we have a little bit more disposable cash than we'd have had at one time. I'm sure it helps that by that age we don't spend as much time out, often socialising in friends' houses, or whatever... Then, Because We Can, we Want All The Things that we'd have loved to have had when younger but couldn't afford. Watches, leather jackets, guitars.... 99.9% of the luxury electric guitar market is not professional players, but middle-aged men living out their [insert guitar hero here[/i] fantasy. A significant proportion of the most expensive guitars on the market will never be played in front of anyone other than the owner's cat /dog/ mirror. Nature of consumer power.


Nice watches.... I'd like some nice wrist hardware but I try not to wear anything that might tempt others to turn to crime. I doubt anyone's going to take the jacket off my back but I'm pretty sure they'd take the watch off'n my wrist.

Worf

I've got a fake Rolex somewhere I picked up years ago. Always thought it would be amusing to have that demanded of me - I'd hand it ovder and go home smiling to myself about what would happen when they tried to fence it.

That's so imprecise. Here hipsters refers to thrift-shop dressed, boutique beer drinking, pseudo-anti-capitalist, long beardy types with a penchant for looking down on the middle classes because they think their choices and innate good taste are superior. Of course, some of them are quite nice.

More or less how it's used here in London (which probably has the highest density of hipsters anywhere in the UK). Eseentially, it's a catch-all for people who fall into a specific tribal grouping which coalesces around a prima facie desire to be different alongside a seeming fetishisation of mainstream culture. Of course, when you scratch the surface, you find that the real philosophy is one of mocking the mainstream by celebrating it - or, at least, selected bits of the mainstream which were once the epitome of now, but prsently seem rather passe. The 1980s revivival seems to provide the most fertile grounds for this, though hipster fashion seems to have evolved into a skewed take on it that doesn't really reflect the time period as it truly was. Always seemed rather an empty tribe to me. I remember being a punk or grunge or goth or whatever as being about identifying with something positively, being passionate about its art, music, literature, politics... Not this "let's eat/listen to/drink / watch/ wear this, it's really rubbish! That's hilarious!" Seems kinda empty and shallow, but obviously it works for some. The one thing it has in common with goth, of course, is that its very most hardcore lifestylers refuse to be identified as "hipsters", and have no label for themselves. Presumably it's because they seke to be a mainstream of sorts, as distinct from the goths who I think were mostly rejecting the mainstream habit of "othering". The thing that bothers me about hipsters taking over an area is that it does seem to lead to a rise in the temporary and disposable. I don't have the patience for "pop-up" shops and restaurants. By the time I'm too old to go to the effort to seek out a new spot only to have it close after I've been there once.

'Life with ONE great Leather Jacket vs. any thing else you can come up with'


Hat's too small with a tie that wide.
 

breezer

Practically Family
Messages
806
Location
Scotland
My mother has in the past bemoaned how the word gay changed from one meaning to another. For her generation gay meant colourful and happy. ( I must stress she is not homophobic ). I feel the same way about the H word. Hipster to me refers to pot smoking, jazz loving hep cats from the 50's, in other words, beatniks, or the beat generation. That I can identify with. I sound like my mother now, but when did the Hipster word become an insult and a means for people to look down there noses at other people. And in fact many of the things I like fall into that category - analogue photography, typewriters & other retro/vintage objects, selvedge denim, vintage clothes. These things I like. Coffee, craft beer, tattoos, I am not so keen on, but I don't spend my time or energy berating those that do love those things. To sum up - unfortunately the H word has become a short hand insult for people you don't like the look of. I just wish it was a compliment for people you do like the look of.
 
Messages
15,563
Location
East Central Indiana
Yep..I still think only a brown leather jacket..and then a black one of different style and possibly hide could work as my complete 'collection'. ..because I'm certainly not twoaphobic....lol
HD
 

tonypaj

Practically Family
Messages
659
Location
Divonne les Bains, France
I like it when people look like what they want to look like and dress and do what they feel like. Hipsters, goths, I do not mind. From the appearances you can only guess. Like watching all these kids pushing a fixie at Brick Lane, well you make a guess. But they may ride that fixie every day everywhere, come rain or shine, you'll never know until you talk with them.

The beards and too small clothes, well, they look highly conformist to me, but that's just looks. It counts for very little, but then again thinking about is one way of passing one's idle hours.
 

Don Tomaso

A-List Customer
Messages
402
Location
Germany
That's so imprecise. Here hipsters refers to thrift-shop dressed, boutique beer drinking, pseudo-anti-capitalist, long beardy types with a penchant for looking down on the middle classes because they think their choices and innate good taste are superior. Of course, some of them are quite nice.

EXACTLY what I thought when I was twenty-something. But with socks.:D
 

Mark Ricketts

One of the Regulars
Messages
113
Location
ontario
If hipsters really are "types with a penchant for looking down at the middle classes because they think their choices and innate good taste are superior. Of course, some of them are quite nice." Then they should fit in well here.
 

Don Tomaso

A-List Customer
Messages
402
Location
Germany
Nice watches.... I'd like some nice wrist hardware but I try not to wear anything that might tempt others to turn to crime. I doubt anyone's going to take the jacket off my back but I'm pretty sure they'd take the watch off'n my wrist.

Worf

Such a bad part of town where you live in? I traveled south-east Asia and India mostly with my Omega GMT strapped to my wrist and I never had the feeling anybody would be lusting after it, even when it represented an annual workers-income in some places. And you're by no means a whimpy guy, are you?
Most Rolexes on the steets are fakes anyway, no thief with a bit of self-respect would go through the uncertainty to steal a watch. Wallets are better -> fake-proof money inside. ;)
 

tnjyoung

A-List Customer
Messages
435
Location
Tennessee
I used to think (4 days ago) that it would be life with ONE leather jacket for me. Now I'm thinking of what my next selection will be. Oh brother...
 

tonypaj

Practically Family
Messages
659
Location
Divonne les Bains, France
Man, you're OLD. :D A "fixie" is a bicycle with fixed gear. ;) Must-have for hipsters!

I have a fixie. My 19-year-old son has an old 10 gear that he swears by. I'm a coffee snob, as well, must have my beans roasted the way I want and have my grinder set up right, let alone the coffee maker. He just drinks tea. And we both buy old clothes. Hipsters? Let others judge. TBH I'm too old and bald and he's just grunge impersonated, so I guess I'll leave these generalisations to others.
 

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