I think it applies to me in some measure, although when I think in negative terms about “hipsters” I really only mean that I dislike people who too-frequently use phrases such as “omg, you haven’t heard of x?” or “I can’t believe you haven’t seen y”. I don’t define “hipsters” merely by dress code or set of interests…

iow, I mean people whose understandable and otherwise likable zest for the new and/or numinous is bastardized into a personality which treats (implicitly and sometimes explicitly) simple ignorance as intrinsically wrong and/or shameful. There are certainly some ignorances that one might rightly be ashamed of, but I’ve met many people who thought being unfamiliar with their pet interests signified a lack of intelligence or refinement. I think that’s a dangerous (ntm simply rude) personality quirk…

Curiously enough I find that this egocentric mentality is prominent among my peers (20-30 in age) about as evenly in the progressive types as in the screwy Randian libertarians. There’s an irony in there somewhere. ofc that’s merely an off-the-cuff anecdote, but I’m just musing.

Someone who claims not to be a hipster, mocks others for being hipsters, but is in fact themselves a hipster.

Being “too” fashionable isn’t a problem in a lot of other countries (for men or women) and the idea would sound ridiculous, of being offended by someone else’s style.  

I think it’s our longstanding weird American hangup about appearance, about clothes needing to be strictly utilitarian (sweatpants), so that for decades when we see another person’s style, it amplifies our own self-consciousness and makes us uncomfortable.  We lash out to escape the feeling.  Hence the name-calling, and those with “a little too much” style feeling obligated to be self-depreciating.  

I’m always aware of this when I go back to the states, how everyone is watching everyone else for flaws with little compassion and some people actually vocalizing their thoughts in public about a total stranger’s appearance.  It’s high school all over again and again.

It’s the whole “seeing yourself as others see you” existential dread feeling that I think women face daily in this amplified way, with some women (for instance, Lucy in the comment above) fueling the fire because of the cul-de-sac of identity our society has forced on women in terms of appearances.

It’s not uncommon that people who might be labeled a hipster try to dissociate themselves from the term by labeling others with the same term.  In my small college town people used the term “scenesters,” and it was the same thing.  

I think women have had to deal with that kind of bullshit their whole lives for generations, so it’s good that the hipster thing is turning now towards men so they can experience this weird, alienating self-consciousness promoted by a group mentality that is attacking itself like an autoimmune disease.

Here’s this eloquent, funny, smart girl explaining EXACTLY why you should take her seriously – because she’s got ideas, and publishes them, and is confident in her feminism, and understands, as I wish I had as a teenager, that not having all the answers is actually a really cool place to be – and all some people can do is get all pearl-clutchy at the fact that she’s wearing makeup like a girly, girlish girl. 

And what is the prescribed correct amount of makeup for a girl to wear these days?  I mean, obviously it’s not something one should be allowed to decide for oneself … wear makeup that covers your percieved faults, without looking like you actually choose to enhance your features or play with your image, I s’pose.  Screw that – I like Tavi’s version better.

And maybe I am reading too much into this but it seems that she is still unaware of the role pop culture, which is basically all culture nowadays, has in perpetuating gender roles, but this is besides the point I was trying to make earlier.

I look forward to hearing from her in the future.

You have no idea what it means, do you?

Combined with your earlier removed comments calling her a street walker … you really are a sexist assbag.

How messed up is it that a 15 year old teenage girl can be covered from head to toe, showing absolutely no skin, and still get called a fucking “street walker”?

You are proving her point, so blatantly, and you either don’t notice or you don’t care.

You know, this morning, I was pleasantly surprised at the reactions from commenters in the thread about the Steubenville rape case.

I take it all back.

http://bechdeltest.com/

Nope. Doesn’t make it ok. Sorry. Every woman operates in an industry that does exactly what I just described, for one. Secondly, that’s nothing but an excuse for being a sexist douche.

If it wasn’t, every “serious” feminist would have to dress in a potato sack before being taken seriously, and if she were beautiful “even without make up” (Ugh!), then she should not bathe for a week or brush her hair and she should have puffy eyes. Smoking! that’s the key, smoking 3 packs a day would make her ugly enough to talk seriously about feminism!
The point here is she should not admit to any blatantly “girly” endeavors otherwise she will not be serious about feminism, since we probably suspect that all feminists secretly want to be men.

You get a lot of the same thing from the prreachers and the like who are anti-gay who end up at a lot of rest stops on the highway with wide stances.  If it weren’t so harmful the cliches would be funny.

I think if there is a problem with the fashion industry, it is in part because FOR YEARS, it was dominated by men, much like nearly every other profession on the planet.

But really, we should blame women for being such dumb airheads, amirite.. /S

Overall, this stuff worries me, as I have an about to be teenaged daughter… I remember how tough that age can be….

in my experience, I’ve found the more make-up a woman wears, the less seriously she’s going to be taken

This is entirely their own fault, of course