The Hipster Gene

The Hipster Gene
The Three Stooges’ asshole grandkids.

Ladies and gentlemen, why do we hate hipsters? Why should we hate hipsters, when hipsters areso inherently a part of who we are? It is in human nature to aspire to the mission statement ofthose counter-culture crusaders. We are creatures of intricate design, and the need to feel moreimportant, bigger, self-satisfied, and superior in general is rooted deep within us. After all, we are the superior animal of planet Earth.

Don’t listen to any green movement, hemp t-shirt-wearing, guerilla-composting, razor virgin,tree-humping, bicycle enthusiastic, self-righteous, free-lovin’ pseudo-hippie who drinks greentea out of a salsa jar and dances in tone deaf rhythms to third rate reggae music, when they tellyou how human beings are the lesser animals, and that we should listen to wild animals once in a while. Screw you. No matter how hard you believe it, there is no underlying ghost-whispering
relationship between us. We can co-exist in copacetic spades, or cannot. And if it comes to it, we can exercise our superiority in worst-case-scenario (end of digression).

Yes, of course humans are the superior being on planet Earth. We can read, go to space, reason, do Sudoku, open doors, invent iPods, and we have enough brain power to process all that needs to be processed in order to hate someone who wears a t-shirt that we just can’t stand. Humanity is pretty great. But humanity is pretty self-interested. What do you expect from a species that can self-actualize and ask itself advanced philosophical questions such as: how did existence come to exist? Did that top fall, and if so, did Leo dream it all up? And did that Asian guy really have to be in limbo for like…50 dream years? That sucks.

The point is that humans are advanced and superior. We are so vastly better than other animals. When was the last time you met an interesting pelican? Has your attention ever been held by an anteater? No, those things are insufferable. Basically, since we rank #1 on Earth’s top species list, we need more things to be better than (i.e. each other). We do this in various ways. Some people try to set themselves apart physically, with their silly sporting challenges and muscle pills. Other people use their intellectual capabilities to sell themselves, with ridiculous inventions and life changing ideas. Everyone is constantly trying to one-up everyone else, all the time.

This is why we love reality shows. We watch these shows because we feel infinitely superior to everyone on them. We have a lust for superiority. It is Americans’ modern addiction. So as we call out hipsters on their excessive hipster posturing, we are really committing the moral sin that we have projected onto our fedora-toting prey. We are partaking in the business of self-promotion: as in, “hey you see that hipster over there? I am better than he is.” Hipsters are just like everybody else, they are lost souls trying to find their place in the world; the only difference is that they probably just wrote a sprawling O’Hara-inspired poem about it.

It isn’t even worth calling out a hipster anymore. People speak of hipsters like they are so easy to define, and live based on a certain list of rules. That would be conforming, and hipsters don’t do that. Basically, there are too many trends, and too many different “styles” going on at once in today’s world to catch anybody in a hipster trap.

At this point, I have a belief that I am absolutely convinced is truth. We are all hipsters.
Everybody actively participating in contemporary society is a hipster. We all have at least one trait of a so-called hipster. You’re lazy, you like beer, you ride a bicycle, and you wear a fedora, a scarf, a sports coat. You like Morrissey, Wes Anderson, and Ira Glass. Even some of the more complex traits: You are derisive, ironic, snarky, a slang patron, a child of pop culture. The problem with calling out hipsters on these counts is that these traits define all of us. This is the way society is now. It’s not our faults, it is just this way.

And an another unfortunate circumstance is how things that even try to be innovative in an unoriginal world, are often labeled as hipster staples. We are really caught in a cyclical witch hunt in which nobody is really caught, but everybody is convicted. We are a hipster world.

And yes, there are many people who seem to be obvious, Toms’s shoe-in hipsters. Those people aren’t hipsters, they’re just annoying. But by no means are they the only annoying people in the world. That’s where an injustice lies. There is no doubt that there are annoying scientists, teachers, preachers, politicians, doctors, gangsters, and the works. These bohemian boobs just take the biggest hit.

There is a solution that I will propose, that I think will change everything. Everyone is constantly calling everyone else hipsters. This term “hipster” is being used in a negative connotation, obviously. However, nobody ever owns up to the title. This used to be the case with the “emo” crowd. Everybody would deem everyone else “emo” and there was usually just a lot of misplaced hate. Anything “emo” is simply passé at this point, and anybody picking up the emo armor to further propel the movement is about on par with someone’s grandmother just discovering the Macarena (by the way: emo = hair metal. Trust me).

Anyway, what we really need to do is the one thing that a lot of supposed hipsters would never do: admit to our absolute status as a board-certified irony for irony’s irony hipster. We are all hipsters, and we are all one. All we need to do is hold hands and confess to our sins together. And of course the only way to solidify this is to go to TheDropp.com and buy your “I’m a Hipster” t-shirt for $29.95. It is only available in extra small, and it is completely organic.
- Cody Mattox