Etymology of 'Hipster'

“Hipster” is a term co-opted for use as a meaningless pejorative in order to vaguely call someone else’s authenticity into question and, by extension, claim authenticity for yourself.

It serves no conversational function and imparts no information, save for indicating the opinions and preferences of the speaker.

Meanwhile, a market myth has sprung up around the term, as well as a cultural bogeyman consisting of elusive white 20-somethings who wear certain clothes (but no one will agree on what), listen to certain music (no one can agree on this either), and act a certain way (you’ve probably sensed the pattern on your own). One may be quick to coin such interests and garb as "black-rimmed glasses, flannel, and indie music," however said mainstream-avoiding "hipsters" will logically turn down abiding to such a popular consensus, voiding the interpretation null.

You can’t define what “that kind of behavior or fashion or lifestyle” actually is, nor will you ever be able to. That’s because you don’t use “hipster” to describe an actual group of people, but to describe a fictional stereotype that is an outlet for literally anything that annoys you.

The twist, of course, is that if it weren’t for your own insecurities, nothing that a “hipster” could do or wear would ever affect you emotionally. But you are insecure about your own authenticity - “Do I wear what I wear because I want to? Do I listen to my music because I truly like it? I’m certainly not like those filthy hipsters!” - so you project those feelings.

Suffice it to say, no one self-identifies as a hipster; the term is always applied to an Other, to separate the authentic Us from the inauthentic, “ironic” Them.

tl;dr: if you believe hipsters exist, you are a plebeian.

they're called cucks now

>>2900680
>>2900664
Why exactly do terms need to be perfect representations of a construct in order to be useful? We have certain monikers (Hippie, Hipster, redneck, Hillbilly) which can represent a wide range of behaviors that all have commonalities.

>>2900697
Add geek and nerd to my list of monikers.

>>2900664
OP here, I thought that was really well written and coherent. I agree that is used as a defensive mechanism by ignorant normies more often than not. to label people who differ from social norms in whatever direction these days. but I also agree with what >>2900697
has to say that it could objectively be used as a blanket term for those said people

"Hipster", along with terms like "Hep Cat", referred to chill, sexually liberal folks who also puffed the Devil's Lettuce in the 30s/ 40s. Bing Crosby is usually identified as the leader of this movement

>>2900751
I always figured it was just a way of referring to people who do things specifically because other people don't do them, and they are too proud to like things that other people like. Basically a synonym for contrarian.

>>2900680
This was true some years ago but now Hipster is forming as a sub-culture. There are plenty of products marketed toward hipsters and the ad men know this.

It was like Hippie. Bunch of edgy teenagers who didn't respect his parents. Some were pro-ecology, some were leftist, some were just plain edgy and the rest just dressed wiht long skirts to look cool. Some years passed and they formed a sub-culture, with Free Love, muh ecology and peace as their main tenets.

Pretty sure Hipster is going this way.

>>2902583
>now Hipster is forming as a sub-culture
>now

Hipster-dom has been dead and co-opted for advertising purposes for the better part of this decade. It's in the position now where Emo was in the late 00's/early 10's, as a borderline non-existant boogeyman that exists more as a dying stereotype than as a cultural force like in the mid/late 00's. For example, most indie bands lumped in with hipsters are now occupying the same irrelevant space as grunge did after the mid-90's. Pitchfork and other publications largely associated with hipsters has largely abandoned most of the initial culture of the group in favor of something else. Any major ideas associated with them, such as overt liberalism, consciousness consumerism (ie: Fair-Trade,Organic, and various eclectic fad diets.), and an over-riding sense of ironic detachment have either been integrated into mainstream cultural at large, or died or are dying an ignoble death in the market of ideas.

Of course, there's always the copypasta >>2900680 which is a nice retort, and semantic historians like >>2902502