Adbusters thinks so. Their argument is that the current generation of hipster trash is trying to be rebellious without really rebelling against anything: not against war or capitalism or government or anything else. The sole motivation seems to be whether something is Cool or not.
But Alex Payne sees things differently. His thesis is basically that the hipsters are no different (philosophically) from previous generations of youngsters who didn’t believe in what their parents believed in. The hipsters are the current incarnation of alienated youth, nothing more, nothing less.
Payne also writes that the hipsters don’t believe in anything, but that this isn’t nihilism, because it isn’t an informed position. They believe in nothing because our culture has given them nothing to believe in. (I can’t resist: the Chicken (Western Culture) came before the egg (the 21st Century Hipster.)
This all reminds me of the great slacker epic, The Big Lebowski. ‘We’re nihilists, Lebowski. We believe in nothing.’
Via Andrew Sullivan.
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