Archive photo
So, for anyone unaware of the creature known as the “Hipster” the Urban Dictionary defines them as people who “Use a great deal of sarcasm, claim to be ironic… Listen to Indie Rock, rely heavily on Pitchfork Media to tell them what’s cool. Don’t dance at concerts.”
Well, clearly that all seems harmless albeit slightly annoying, right? I mean, who would be crazy enough to accuse them of eradicating so much poor people and think they can back it up? The man in my head would.
The thing about hipsters is, they like cheap stuff. Of course, they like to pay a lot of money for cheap stuff ($5.00 for PBR: that stuff happens, man), but the point is that they like cheap stuff. You can always find a number of hipsters hanging out at the local thrift store or some second-hand, free market joint down on Milwaukee Avenue (or anywhere in Milwaukee). This is where it all begins. You see, once the hipster occupies a thrift store he starts telling all his chums about it and they start going there. Then they look around the neighborhood and say, “man, this is the place to be, look at all the real life, not like the plastic burbs, man, this is where it has to happen.” What the “it” that’s about to happen is, no one really knows or cares about, because what’s important is that the hipsters start looking around the lower income neighborhood for real estate.
Could you imagine being a realtor dealing with a Hipster? The hip don’t move into a run-down place because they need a place to sleep and live, that’s what poor folks do. They move in for the great “idea” behind that place. That mystical (and false) idea that this is simply “the place to be.” So, yeah, that realtor’s gonna hike up the prices, oversell the area and convince the hipster that this is indeed the place to be. Then it gets bigger once again. More hipsters move into the area and suddenly the local economy starts to grow.
Now, everyone’s happy at first. The local businesses are happy because they’re making a profit off the Hipster mentality that cheap stuff is supposed to cost a lot of money and the Hipsters are happy because they get to be a part of this cool scene. Who gets the bite? The local poor folks get the bite.
Once the local economy gets to a certain point, more high-income folks are gonna start moving in, but unlike the Hipsters, they won’t be too moved by the totally awesome housing project that reminds them of what the world’s really about and is such a cool inspiration for their poems, because these new folks don’t write poetry, they work downtown and live in condos. So condos have to be built. Unfortunately, there’s nowhere to put these condos because there’s all these poor people hogging up the land. Selfish poor people. If you don’t see where this is going, the cops start sprouting up more and more, making life harder for the poor folks and the projects get worse and worse until the poor folks are in a squeeze and left with no other choice but to get pushed out Anatevka style.
It’s called “gentrification” and it happens. Remember how much everyone loved Greenwich Village and Joan Baez and all that crap? Well the poor folks loved it first, until the hippies pushed them out. It’s happening now in Chicago to Pilsen and, well, the North Side. I’m not calling for a stop to this hipster nonsense because I’m skeptical anyone can fully realize the long-term problems associated with being a Hipster (especially since it’s such a funny argument). What I want, however, is for all the Hipsters to simply know what their trendiness works for, which is: displacing poor people.
