From “Charting the rise of Generation Yawn: 20 is the new 40”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/womens-life/11061434/Charting-the-rise-of-Generation-Yawn-20-is-the-new-40.html

PS I loved disco (and even at the time I didn’t understand why we had to take sides on musical styles, rock vs. disco. What is this, Wimbledon?). Donna Summer, Giorgio Moroder! It was only the 70s equivalent of bros who hated disco, and we always knew that was because of its blackness and its gayness.

Generally I agree that sorting through the contradictions of any decade is enlightening and fun. And thanks for engaging with this.

Roy,

You say “I’m interested in fashion as history and what it tells us about ideologies, psychology etc…” Clearly, so am I. The difference is that I’m saying I believe style does have a meaning, including in this case, which I think you’re downplaying (ie. “it’s just the convenient style men had for the first half of the 20th C). I think these styles may not only have historic baggage that is very difficult to dislodge, but also that people seeking these styles may not even want to dislodge it; they may find great comfort in the status or identity it confers. For you, what do these styles tell us about ideologies, psychology etc? I still can’t tell. So far it seems only that the argument is that there are too few other available styles for men.

Lots to respond to here. I fundamentally disagree about the 80s – we can agree on the existence of that disagreement – though I agree every decade had its internal contradictions and true counterculture and clearly it wasn’t all Duran Duran and Thatcher. But why do you assume that I am promoting hippies? Is there only a new wave-to-hippie polarity? I don’t believe I have promoted any particular alternative beyond saying I find a certain amount of androgyny preferable to highly divergent gender norms & super old school masculinity. I never defended hippie as a style, nor argued that the whole hippie free love thing wasn’t profoundly in favour of the male half of the population. Nor did I argue that any style can’t be worn by any creep, stalker or pedo. What I will say again is that I believe aesthetic choices aren’t generally all that random, that fashion is like a language, and I think the pioneer styles in heritage hipster culture are no accident. Forget the hair and look at the whole constellation, and you get what seems to be a very specific …nostalgia if you will. If people wanted to un-moor styles from their historical referent as you say they are, why are they cleaving so closely to very specific historical moment(s)? It must be far more than the mere convenience of an undercut. For me this argument just doesn’t hold water. There may be only a few ways to cut hair (which I’d argue is not really true) but this style seems to reference a very specific combination of conventional pre-war eras and identities. The shoes, the clothes, the hair, the haberdasheries, the hatteries, the typefaces, the ampersanded shopfronts, the whole deal. I really don’t think this can be reduced to “there are only so many haircuts available to men.” Further, whether or not these styles are connected to a past fascism, we’re now seeing a resurgence of fascism worldwide including in Canada – so why ape that style now? I think this is a more than fair question.

I do agree with your last point about tribalism in place of any sort of a politics of class and economics and I agree with your point that “I just see people fixated on equality without questioning economic difference.” What I worry about with some of these “new” aesthetics is precisely that they are not linked to any politics but instead seem to be reassertions of specific identities that I don’t find helpful right now. If we’re all going to come together, can we start with not all dressing like 19thC white males? I mean, throw the rest of us a bone.

I asked a friend of mine what she thought of all these styles and she said “it feels like obedience.”

As for hipster culture and feminism, I don’t know. I’ve been through a wave of feminism and while I think we’re at the beginning of another one, I certainly haven’t noticed the heritage hipster world as any wellspring of it. I would be curious to hear more.

As for activism, really I’m neither trying to gain allies from this group nor scare people away. Frankly I think it’s pretty irrelevant what I say. I’m just doing a bit of off-the-cuff cultural criticism just to start a discussion. I fully recognize things are increasingly very difficult for people under 40, and I don’t want to be on any bandwagon bashing anyone in particular. I’m just interested in wider trends and I am perturbed by a widespread blithe semi-indifference to politics in favour of a fixation on styles and enterprises that happen to make me nervous. I know, I know, people have decided it’s “pointless” to resist, what with the whole system being sewn up and everything. Did you read/watch Deresiewicz’s Generation Sell series? He observes a widespread belief among hipsters (I had really wanted to avoid that word) that artisanal small business will save the world which is, as know, hardly a substitute for dissent, organization, voting, whatever. I never ask anyone to jump into activism – how pointless would that be? – but I do resent the implication that others have no time and we do. None of us have the time for it but on the other hand… well, you know yourself what it’s like. But it doesn’t take a lot of time to get over one’s political purity and briefly sully oneself by, say, voting. What part of “lesser of evils” don’t people understand? There are other things I didn’t mention, but now that we’re getting into it… here’s one fact. The hipster kids who came up with Shit Harper Did, an excellent anti-Stephen Harper campaign, are also heavily involved in helping Vision Vancouver, our runaway developer-controlled faux-green civic party, seek reelection every 3 years. I’m not asking people to become activists; If I’m asking them to do one thing it would be to stay out of the way of projects promoting social justice and govt transparency etc. It’s just frustrating to find yourself doing battle not just against a corporate-controlled City council but also against people in suspenders and waxed moustaches who are not only supporting a neoliberal status quo but pompously lecturing you about the rightness of their cause. Furthermore this has been going on for, what, 8 years now? I’d just like to see some actual proof this thing isn’t as predominantly conservative as I think it is. Or some sign it will morph into something else.

So far the 21st C is about rehashing the previous one, but that’s a topic for another time.

And to think this discussion started with hair… sorry for length.

I really disagree with your characterization of the 80’s. I don’t see it as conservative at all. I thought oppositional culture in the eighties was more intelligent and political than before. Punk was about politics and was a reaction to how the hippies turned into yacht rock consuming Kitsilano millionaires. Sure, there was the mainstream conservatism of Reagan and Mulroney but there was loads of countercultural opposition to that. It’s always too complicated to say one decade was progressive and another reactionary. I think there has been a conservative mass all through those decades and a progressive reaction happening at the same time, Beatniks, Hippies, Glam, Punks, New Wave, Hipsters, it’s a continuum of opposition. Of course, because people are people, there were fake versions of all these movements, which adds confusion. Parsing out that confusion is enlightening and fun. Contradiction is normal, for example; Disco is so maligned today but I remember it bringing people together and breaking down boundaries more successfully than anything before, it brought straight people into gay clubs and blacks and whites together . It lacked a politic agenda but it brought us together to party, and isn’t that political? Reality is always contradictory.

I am surprised that you want to take the artisanal food and craft movement to task as you do. I remember the fluorescent nightmare of the pre-hippy times, with Swanson frozen TV dinners being touted as real food and the rise of McDonalds etc.. The hippy movement was full of all kinds of BS, from Jesus hippies to pseudo-mystical drug victims etc.. And even much of the culture around food was ridiculous, but it was experimenting and questioning, and out of that there was some enlightenment about food and definite improvement in people’s health and pleasure and the environment. So the hipsters might have silly aspects to their culture, but the general direction of caring about the quality of food seems beyond criticism to me. So, they have haircuts you find dorky or even offensive, but they are being very constructive in creating decent jobs and decent products. They are a new shopkeeper class and they are inventing their own style so they can work with dignity, I think thats admirable. We need shopkeepers or it will all be Costco and Walmart.

Artisanal food is entrepreneurial, but what else can one do in a capitalist system? If you want to say it’s libertarian or conservative then we are all libertarian or conservative in that we all are engaged in business. Yes, the bigger issue is the ALR, which is a catastrophe in the making, but that kind of change is slow and one needs to make a living, so in the meanwhile, what is wrong with opening a bakery? I don’t think these kids are the enemy and they are clearly potential allies if they can be politicized. Activism is an uphill battle when most people vote against their own interests. The really big issue then is who to vote for. If you want to prioritize, then getting people to vote NDP or Green is the most important thing. That is slow and seemingly sisyphean labour. I know you are a hard working activist and I really appreciated your work on the Casino and other things. But you have to be careful not to expect everybody to work as hard at change as you do. Most people have enough trouble making ends meet. You can characterize them as complacent or lazy but not wrong or evil. Super critical, self righteousness has turned more people away from activism than it has attracted. And it is bloody hard to get enthusiastic about even left politicians for the most part. People can be activist in their daily life just by expressing their opinions to those around them, they don’t have to actually carry a protest sign or start a petition.

It sounds like you think that hipsters are all secretly misogynist conservatives. I don’t know where you get that because I find it’s generally the total opposite. I don’t see how hipsters are trying to “recoup” White male privilege. Maybe I am missing it? Please tell me how they are doing this?

You keep saying there is no female counterpart to their fashion but I see it very clearly, you just have to look at the women in these businesses in their vintage and local designer/artisanal clothes. I seriously doubt these hipster women feel oppressed by their boyfriend’s moustaches. I think they are happy in finding economic and cultural agency in their life. Anyways, what is your textile business if not artisanal entrepreneurism?

I think a real problem has been that a broad left position based on class and economics has given way to a tribalism of identity politics and cultural sectarianism. This is part of a civil rights movement that has been very important in winning rights and freedoms for marginalized people. But all I see in the media and on the internet these days is people trying to one-up each other in victimhood status or hating on identity differences. The Straight recently ran a story about how white people were supposedly keeping Asians out of the eco movement – I can’t believe anyone would take that seriously. The only unifying issues are economics and ecology, certainly not culture or Identity. The left is floundering because it is fracturing. Many victories are being made for equality, but the larger war is being lost to global Capitalism. There is no good reason that equality and economic change can’t be found together. But I just see people fixated on equality without questioning economic difference. Politics has been largely about special interests, in that they are played to and manipulated by politicians, and the special interest that gets the most from politicians is the wealthy. We need, somehow, to get back to a broad movement for economic change, it never had to come at the expense of equality – I don’t think social democracy was intended to oppress or exclude anyone. What is equality without economic equality? I could care less what cultural style or even religion anyone identifies with, I only care if they want social democracy and an unpolluted planet.

Noel Fielding and Richard Ayoade would never shave the sides and pomade the top. Never. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZ6EeA-srio

First of all, you’re right, “backlash” may be an exaggeration and as you say pre-emptive, though having floated this argument elsewhere before, I have already seen how extremely defensive people get about these styles (not you but others) and isn’t that level of defensiveness usually indicative of something? Secondly, both you and I obviously have aesthetic investments in this area (my aversion, your attraction) but aren’t aesthetics always the thin end of the wedge of a politics or cosmology? Is it really random? Does anything go? Further, I agree that styles can shift but I am not convinced meanings ever get totally removed from their origin. And I’m not talking lice. If lice were the determining issue, why didn’t women in poor neighbourhoods have that same haircut in 1916? I agree that short or long don’t have a monopoly on manliness, but what I’m interested in are those moments when gender differentiation increases. Sure, any cut that gets designated as a male cut can be deemed a manly cut by virtue of the fact that it’s on a man. In the end, though, to me, this short back and sides and long on top thing is a throwback to times I don’t think of as appealing either politically or erotically. But then I’m not the sort of straight woman who likes a man in uniform, Don Draper or cleancut guys out of The Preppy Handbook. Manly is one thing – manly in a conservative way is another. Also, I think that just because something can be read as gay doesn’t mean it’s not male or even manly, and it doesn’t automatically read as progressive.

Forgive me for jumping around here but there are so many topics to cover:

My approach to the micro-brewing/Portlandia hipster/urban farm thing is different than yours. I really don’t buy that scene. For me it’s nostalgic and not in a good way. For one thing I think an old school masculinity – an attempt to recoup it and its past privileges, mostly white – is tied up in it very strongly. That would be a whole essay to go into but one sign of what I’m talking about is that its aesthetics, which seem to involve facial hair and a harking back to haberdashery, are completely lacking any viable female counterpart. That’s always a sign. But more importantly evidence keeps mounting that urban farms are a failed project and that the real answer is in things hipsters give no time or support to, such as any political effort to support things like the Agricultural Land Reserve; instead they mistakenly think they are going to save the world with urban artisanal small businesses, as Bill Deresiewicz has I think correctly pointed out (I linked to his article “Generation Sell” in my post above). So I find it less alternative/progressive and more libertarian/conservative. While meanings do shift, I just don’t think certain styles are as divorced from ideology as you do. I find the linkages more enduring. Anyway as a woman, the shift between straight and gay male in style is for me a less pressing distinction as it’s one from which women are largely excluded (even if homophobia is rooted in misogyny)

… I will end by confirming that you are totally right. I’m invested in 60s and 70s aesthetics in more than one way, and I feel the need to point out how absent the styles of those decades have been for the last 30 years while every other decade, especially all the conservative ones (30s, 50s, 80s), make incessant comebacks. We’ve had 80s nostalgia almost without stopping since.. well, the 80s? I think that’s no accident and I think it merits a lot more discussion than it gets. The 80s were a reaction to the 60s and 70s and they did it by echoing and remaking the 50s, which were themselves a post-war return to earlier pre-war conservatisms, putting women back in the kitchen…

Big difference between the Hitler Youth haircut and Ziggy Stardust, or the kind of “unisex” hair that is not “boyish” but actually traditionally feminine or truly gender-bended. I don’t know… it’s just interesting how seldom the latter options appear.

I’m not a fan of most female fashion either when it looks back prior to the 60s. I’d also say that I’m not a fan of following most fashion trends, period. The only thing I really understand is the impulse to buck a trend. And I find androgyny pretty interesting.

Given your artistic works I know you don’t dismiss the 60s and 70s either, or given what you said, the more gender-bent options. You’re just more tolerant than I am of other decades and I wish I could feel the same.

Thanks for engaging with this. Few ever comment here and I’m always glad when someone does, particularly when it’s this well considered.

I don’t think short or long hair has a monopoly on manliness or perceived manliness. I can show you adverts from Playboy or Esquire in the 70’s where long hair is presented as the height of a burly macho. in contrast the short sides look is boyish and so can be seen as weaker, more feminine. On women the cut is referred to often as a “boy cut”. Less hair is seen as less manly, etc…

Most ideologies with future looking agendas have been fascist or totalitarian.
I precisely said that reviving an earlier style need not be nostalgic, it can be a recognition that something from the past is better (i.e.: organic farming) and so readopting it can be the most progressive thing. People really get this with food and I am just tickled by young people opening micro breweries and making incredible organic food. I also see a surge in reviving cobbling, BARBERING, and other crafts that seemed to be heading towards obsolescence. In this town, the shorter cuts seem to have a direct relationship to the emergence of hipster barbers like the Belmont.

Women’s fashion also looks back constantly. What about the flapper? Much of that style was inspirational in the 60’s and 70’s and seemed to symbolize the new rights and freedoms women felt or demanded. Also the 40’s “Rosie the Riveter” look or big shouldered suits have been later mined as images of women as independent and capable of doing “mens work”. Lesbian culture seems to really like Rosie.

I don’t think this cut is “masculinity in crisis” at all, I think it is the opposite. I would guess that one could be in the wrong place and get beat for being a “fag” for having that cut. I think if you did a study you would find that the cut is most popular with gay, bi, and gay friendly men. Besides that it looks better on young men and I have a fat head, I wouldn’t have that cut for precisely that reason, because it stands out as too fashion conscious – and that attracts the attentions of truly fucked-up homophobes.

I am really interested in the intersection of fashion, sexuality and ideology. I think it might have something to do with being beaten for having a Bowie cut at age 14 and then seeing the same mullet become the official hairstyle of hockey hooligans and toothless “fag bashers’ for decades after.

As I said, haircuts don’t have ideologies, they can just be adopted by people practising ideologies. It’s like the whole problem with the swastika, many people would like to reclaim this basic symbol from its Nazi associations. I don’t think its time for that, but I am sure the time will come.

It sounds like you just prefer the fashion codes of the seventies. By the way, this isn’t a “backlash”, if you start a conversation, you can’t protect yourself from argument by prophesying a “backlash”. This is just an argument that you invited by your argument. I think the idea of the “backlash” is a kind of dirty trick, it preemptively tries to discount a response. But anyways, it is an interesting topic, thanks for initiating the discussion.