Stuff Hipsters Hate Read Online Free PDF Page B

tattooed dreamboat in a mechanic’s jumpsuit who barbacks on Wednesday nights at the Wreck Room. You can give me a tune-up anytime, Buster.”
     
     
    Then, right around the time a sizable hole appeared in the vicinity of “Ted”’s left elbow, jumpsuits began showing up at every flea market and vintage store this side of the East River. Girls wore modified versions known as “jumpers,” and everyone was totally loving the ease with which a single article of clothing could be removed before a poorly planned act of drunken copulation. Lionel, however, felt a queer anger growing in the pit of his stomach, so comfortably concealed behind the panel of fabric. As he read Missed Connections every evening, Lionel found it increasingly difficult to discern to which “tattooed dreamboat” they were written. Consequently, Lionel began wearing his beloved “Ted” once a month. By the time Urban Outfitters stocked its first jumper, Lionel had donated “Ted” to the Goodwill from whence it came, and, in its stead, had brought home a particularly gaudy Christmas vest festooned with genuine blinking lights.
     
 
    While most of America turns to fashion magazines to ascertain the next season’s trends, hipsters would sooner die (a wholly unconventional death) than pick up an issue of Vogue or GQ for stylistic guidance. You’re not going to catch a hipster making inspirational collages depicting his or her ideal “power outfit” or “go-to date getup,” and hell will pretty much turn into one big-ass skating rink before a hipster takes one of those Cosmo quizzes that determines her “personal style.” (If someone needs to take a fucking test to determine whether they’re “sporty” or “flirty,” she’ll reason , she should probably just go ahead and lobotomize herself now.)
     
    Why the reluctance to turn to Anna Wintour and Tim Gunn for fashion advice? It’s not that hipsters aren’t into style—on the contrary, they dust off long-forgotten accoutrements and set the trends that magazines report on (several months before those fallow fashionistas jump on the bandwagon) and you eventually adopt. You see, the Converse and skinny jeans that most Americans are currently sporting recently adorned the malnourished bod of your average Williamsburg dweller. Take, for example, the hipster uniform du jour: the plaid shirt. This particular fashion has been kicking around since before there was an America to loathe, but hipsters were the latest set to make tartan a must-have for the masses. [See Figure 5 .]
     

    Figure 5 : The Plaid Cycle
     
    a. 1600s-1700s: Scottish Highlanders (who saw it as a symbol of self-identification and rebellion)
    b. 1800s-1900s: British Upper Crust (who wanted to make like Victoria and Albert and the Duke of Windsor)
    c. 1970s-1980s: Punks (who appropriated and bastardized the fabric as a big “fuck you” to the British Upper Crust)
    d. 1980s: Preppies (who enjoyed being Anglophiles and feeling refined in their Ralph Lauren)
    e. 1990s: Grunge kids (who enjoyed its androgynous nature)
    f. 2000s: Copious designers (who got it from musicians/grunge kids)
    g. 2000s-2010s: Hipsters (who enjoyed the working man, mountaineer aspect of the look and saw it as a “fuck you” to traditional American society)
    h. 2010-?: Tweens (who bought it at Forever 21)
    Although hipsters would never admit to willingly setting trends (let alone interacting with the drooling masses on any level), it’s almost a game for them: How far will Joe America follow them down the whimsy pit? How wildly can hipsters deviate from the cultural norm before cool hunters and trend archaeologists throw up their hands in bewildered disgust and relegate the entire subculture to the realm of the clinically insane? The answer: pretty fucking far (see: Indian headbands and Harem pants). Like a magic wand, calculated irony transforms ugliness into wearable fashion for hipsters everywhere.
     
    It would be a fallacy to say that a hipster