All White Panda

There comes a certain point in many people’s lives when they realize their limitations. Sometimes it’s a 31-year-old that realizes they probably won’t make it as a pro athlete because they didn’t even play a sport in college. Sometimes its cutting back on your max weight at the gym because you’re 78. Other times it’s realizing that you need to quit your heavy drinking for a while because you always black out and make decisions that get you into bad, life situations. Woah there, sorry. Didn’t mean for that to get heavy. I’m just saying, there comes a time when you need to step back and look at the actions you take in your life and understand what needs to stop and what can go on. It’s not a signal of weakness to realize that you’re screwing things up for yourself and change them because of it. It’s about the will power it takes to tell yourself that you are screwing up. It’s not someone else’s fault or an out of body experience (unless that’s what actually happened of course) that you can’t control; it’s you. An old friend once told me, “It’s not me, it’s you.” Wait, other way around- I think? What? I don’t know. Either way, you need to be willing to tell yourself that you are in fact accountable for what you’ve done. It might be time to dry out.

Most people have a lot of fun when they drink. Even though bad decisions of varying degrees occur, usually they are not severe enough to make one question whether or not they should be drinking at all. Sometimes words slip out that shouldn’t; maybe you hit on a girl at a bar in a manner that is far too blunt; maybe you spill a drink in the process. Either way, a lot of stuff we do when we’re drunk isn’t too big a deal, and you usually get a pass because hey, you were drunk. A lot of times getting a pass for something stupid really depends on your drinking company. If you’re just drinking at a house with all of your friends, pretty much everything is passable because all your friends understand who you are, understand who the drunk you is, and what they difference between them is. But in public settings you are exposed to lots of people that you do not know well enough to behave freely around, especially when you’ve had too much to drink. Normally you can call your drinking buddy an asshole for some reason and then he might do the same and you just laugh at each other. I’m sure you can guess where I’m going with this. It’s much different at the bar. You can’t get away with shit like that at bars. If you call some guy you just met an asshole, he’s going to look at you like, “Would you like me to hit you about the face and neck?” Because he definitely would like to. You just have to be able to differentiate between your buds and all the strange out there. If you can’t, it’s probably time to dry out.

So now you’re blacking out on the weekends. Sometimes Thursdays. What I’m referring to are not spotty memories of conversations you had with that one blonde chick by the pool table. More along the lines of you woke up on a couch in an unknown apartment and you don’t have any recollection of how you got there. Then you go back later that day to say thanks for letting you crash there and they don’t know who you are or what you’re talking about. That kind of black out. It’s something to avoid in my experience. It’s also important as a friend of someone who keep blacking out, to not laugh at their stories or the lack there of. You don’t have to be an ass about it, but make sure you’re not encouraging their behavior. Because that’s officially too much drinking for one night. Maybe even over two. Anyway, it should be clear to you that you have an issue with the rate at which you consume alcoholic beverages. Not to mention that blacking out for lengthy periods of time basically means that you consumed so much that your brain basically said, “Nope. Not doing this anymore, I’ll catch you later.” Not a good sign. Also remember how alcohol can like, kill you? A lot of people don’t really think about it because death by alcohol poisoning doesn’t happen too often in our immediate proximity. But its real. Alcohol has become such an integral part of American culture that a lot of people fail to realize that it is literally a poison that we choose to consume at levels we as a society deem acceptable. So those blackouts that you’re now having at an alarming rate? Not a good sign my friend. It’s definitely time to dry out.

I remember the stereotype developing when I was just a little kid. I would walk into Starbucks after a long day at Briarwood Country Club’s caddy shack where I spent a solid 3 hours sitting in a rubber string backed chair normally used for enjoying a poolside margarita. What would I see? Laptops everywhere, over which were huddled men and women with square glasses and untrimmed beards (usually just the men on that last one), likely with dreams of a screenwriting career or maybe just finishing a presentation. Back then I suppose I didn’t think to much of it; I was only there to spend $6.50 on the largest mocha frappuccino available and probably finish half of it before discarding it into a driveway trash can on my bike ride home. Twas quite a time to be alive. It’s funny how my opinions of the coffee shop writer developed with age, and even funnier to think that I could begin to develop an impression about someone based on a cup of coffee and a laptop running google chrome thanks to free wifi. But as we get older, we develop our cynicism because of all the bullshit we begin to experience in our lives. Old friends that screwed you over, girlfriends that cheated; all of that and more make us associate certain negative impressions based on something as simple as a pair of glasses and eye contact that you perceive as a dirty look. Unfortunately, it’s quite natural to develop a thought process of judging people before we actually know them. In fact it is an instinct. It’s how squirrels decide whether or not to eat those nuts out of your hand; they judge you based on a series of instinctive guidelines and decide whether or not you seem safe or whether they should get the hell out of there. It’s usually the latter. Believe me, I’ve tried.

Now I am not going to begin to equate the human brain to that of a squirrel, but if you are going to sit there and tell me that humans are too evolved socially and biologically to avoid primitive thoughts, I’m also going to sit here and tell you that you’re wrong. A primitive thought is not a thought that literally comes to you in the form of, “Dave no like dog, dog bark loud.” That’s just having to vocabulary of a caveman. But if you’ve ever thought twice about petting that dog with it’s head sticking out a car window in a Target parking lot because when you got close it broke to richter scale with its bark, you’re thinking primitively; instinctively. I am also not making the words, “Thinking primitively” synonymous with a low intelligence level, because these instinctive thoughts are what keep us alive everyday and are very important to our decision making. It’s easy to think that we no longer think instinctively and primitively because of how developed our society is, but our instinctive thoughts always apply. Ever thrown out bad milk because of how it smells? Instinct. Ever crossed a street in a big city to avoid a group of people you deem unfavorable? Instinct. Ever said no to a date with a person you find unattractive? Instinct. So how does this relate to those god damn coffee shop writers?

The coffee shop writer is just one example of how we can begin to judge people. The reality is that when we walk by on our way to work or anything else, and see that person in square glasses, chugging coffee, we have no idea about anything they do with their life, what they’re doing on their laptop; we know nothing. But yet we immediately make a judgement about them the second we see them. We internally process the look of the coffee shop, the shape of their face and associate it with others like it, the computer they’re typing on and where else we’ve seen it, the color of their pants and who else wears them; the color of their shoes. It all gets processed in our brain, I don’t care who you are. But whether we determine or categorize someone as judgmental or not, is about how deeply we root these instinctive associations; it’s about whether we keep them internalized to simply our thoughts, or whether we actively project them outwardly and let these immediate judgments affect our lives and our decisions. So we are all judgmental; we are all animals of instinctive processing. But it is about how we use these instincts that define us. I will continue to think twice about petting a dog that comes off as aggressive, though I do not really know that is the case. I will continue to change the side of the street I walk on late at night in Chicago if something in my brain says to avoid the group, or even person ahead of me. But we should all make an effort to understand how to categorize and use our instincts in the right way. Wearing glasses and using a coffee shops free wifi is not a crime, and the person I see doing said activities, wearing said apparel does not deserve to be categorized negatively for doing so. But I am far from a perfect man, and I will continue to unfortunately develop irrational and more than likely untrue personas for people I know nothing about. Still, in an effort to keep my judgmental thoughts internalized and under control, I will try to understand what is a fair and reasonable judgment, and what is not. It’s all up to you; how you separate the two. Travel on, people of instinctive processing. Judge wisely.

Last night I once again found myself at a bar with some friends. We came to see a band called Bumpus; kind of a funky Motown group. This bar I speak of is called the Ore Dock and is actually a brewery I guess, so all they have is beer. Now this place was pretty fuckin packed to the gills with all sorts of different varieties of people, and everyone was dancing. I’m not talking grind trains or anything like that, just people moving to the music, jah feel? So I’m twistin and shakin and bumpin around with a pint of beer in my hand, and the totally expected happened. I got bumped a little bit, and some of by beer spilled onto the girl next to me. She didn’t get drenched or anything bad, just got a little spot on her shoulder. But she gave me this look and made this whining sound fit for a fucking 3 year old that just fell over while walking to the park with their mom. You know, like the kid falls over and doesn’t even react for a second but then he realizes oh hey wait I just fell therefore it must have hurt so I’m gonna start to cry because I can. Just super overly dramatic, and a reaction like that is unwarranted when everyone’s dancing around with beer. Did you really think you would escape unscathed? I didnt. I got spilled on. I got over it. Its a fuckin liquid it will come out after you wash it. I just don’t know why you put yourself in that situation if you’re going to get so upset when something totally expected happens. Everyone is dancing in a large crowd with beer to a FUNK BAND and you’re going to get that upset over some minor spillage. At no point did I engage in conversation with her, but if I had been casually talking to her at the bar and there was no said funkadelic twistin and shakin and bumpin, you can get upset when I spill my rum and coke on you. Because that means I’m pretty much a sloppy mess at that point and also an idiot; drunk or not drunk it’s pretty easy to hold a drink perpendicular to the floor. Not saying I’ve never spilled a drink when I shouldn’t have, because its definitely happened, but there is certain protocol to follow when determining how much of an ass you’re being. Wasn’t even really drunk when it happened I was probably on beer number 3. Just something to bounce around the ole noggin; keep your expectations reasonable at the bar, and understand where you are putting yourself.

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Let’s talk for a second about something I know very little about; fashion. Not really a fashionable person in general, but I do personally enjoy my clothes and do care what clothes I wear. I think we all project a certain image when we dress, even if that image is that of a 70 year old man. But something I do know a bit about is socks. Seems like a useless thing to have knowledge on I suppose, but my sock career has been long and filled with much fluctuation and change. Anyway, saw this guy at the same bar wearing jeans, black shoes, and you guessed it, white fuckin socks. Now the surprising part is, this guy seemed to be using his white socks and black shoes combo as a part of his style. Kind of looked like he was dressed for a 50s swing dance party in high school where people think things are getting serious when hugging happens. I guess he kind of pulled it off but that’s something I personally can never put my stamp of approval on. And trust me everyone totally cares about my stamp of approval, holds a lot of fuckin weight around town.

Up until I was maybe in 7th grade, I wore plain white socks like everyone else in the world. But the time came for me to change things up, and make the switch to black socks. Why? Because you don’t look like and idiot when you wear them with black shoes. I don’t know what happened in my brain, but I received a new pair of black Nike’s when I was 12 or so, and one day I just looked down and my feet and realized how much of an idiot I looked like. I was walking around with white socks, and black shoes. Oh my god, hot mess. So I made the change. Fucking Revolutionary decision. Started wearing black socks and began to realize that they’re just an overall more useful sock compared to those of the white variety. The only time white socks seem to be useful is when you’re walking around your house and no one will ever see you wearing those white fuckin socks. I’m sorry, they just have no practicality to me. What are they good for? I guess wearing them white playing sports is functional, but once again, black socks function the same and I still maintain that you look way more legitimate as an overall human being. Not trying to hate on those of you that choose to wear white socks, but I personally will never understand it. I think I only own one pair of white socks which are STRICTLY reserved for when I don’t have any clean black ones, and they only come out when I’m playing sports. Sports Sports Sports. So for me, there is no debate on which socks look better at any point in time. It’s a pretty black and white discussion.

Pretty much everybody has one; a favorite animal. For most of people, their favorite animal is a, maybe not exotic, but wild animal that we see photos of or hear stories about and somehow get attached. I’m one of them. It’s probably not hard to guess what the favorite animal of a guy with a blog called, “All White Panda” is. PANDAS; Love em. But what’s my motivation? I’ve never met a panda, and I’ve definitely never touched one because odds are if I tried, I would cease to have a face. I’d be like Harvey Dent but way less vindictive and unable to flip a coin effectively because I would have no eyes after my favorite animal was done fucking me up. Anyway, getting off the topic. It’s kinda curious to me how we develop these seemingly intimate relationships with wild animals we’ve never met, and that likely do not give a flying fuck about us. Now if you’re favorite animal is a dog or a house cat, and maybe an exotic bird small enough to keep in a cage, then you’re probably clear. You will experience a mutual love between you and you’re absolute favorite animal and it’s probably the shit. But to me that seems like a waste of a favorite animal. Maybe that’s why we consider these animals our favorite; because we will never likely get to own one or develop an actual relationship. It’s the forbidden fruit element. Here’s why your favorite animal probably does not love you back.

1. Nobody likes humans, except other humans of course. It definitely wouldn’t surprise me if every other animal in existence talks a ton of shit about humans because of how much we manage to fuck up every ecosystem in ways that proceed to then fuck up every animals life. Take every animal that resides in the gulf coast. They are ONE HUNDRED PERCENT talking shit about humans every chance they get. I mean, we literally took a giant shit consisting of oil in their house and BP was like hey sorry about those millions of gallons of shit only humans get to benefit from. But yeah now it’s gonna get in your eyes, nose, mouth and every other known orifice, and really there’s not much we can do. But what we will do is try a little bit to clean up so we’re gonna go around  but little oil nets and try and scoop some of it out. Yeah I’d be talking tons of shit about humans if I was a fish in the Gulf. People go around cutting off rhinoceros’ horns to sell for mad cash. People boat around the ocean catching sharks, then cut off their fins and dump their carcass back in the water. People kill elephants and then cut off their ivory tusks and once again just leave their bodies to rot. The list goes on and on. Wild animals just have no reason to fuck with humans because it probably feels like every time they do, they well, get fucked.
2. You’re probably not invited. This is sort of an extension of #1, because that animal knows you’re bad news, and it’s not taking any chances with your human ass. Because of all the bullshit humans do to other animals, we’re pretty much blacklisted. Remember the, “Red Scare?” Well I guess I don’t remember it because I wasn’t even in existence during that time, but I do remember learning about it in history class. The, “Red Scare” was period of time during which the cold war intensified, and everyone got freaked out that there were communist, Russian agents infiltrating the United States, so a TON of people got put on a giant list which basically signaled that the US government had some reason to believe that you were a threat/a communist. My point is that basically all humans are on the animal version of this list, which is probably titled something along the lines of, “Do Not Fuck With” list. That list for most animals probably consists of humans, and then probably sharks. Sharks are on that list because they obviously do not care what that thing on the floating board is, their gonna fuck it up. But either way, humans are still on every animals list, including sharks. Totally warranted though because, hey dude surfing on top of that super deep, dark, extremely unknown and undiscovered ecosystem for which we basically nothing about about, you’re asking for it. That’s like walking into an unlit house Texas or Alabama, uninvited, while clearly inhabited by people and expecting that everyone will behave with decorum and that reasonable heads will prevail. Won’t apologize if you’re from Texas or Alabama, those places are backwards; very Twilight Zone-esque. Point being you can’t just walk into someone else’s house and expect them to not be like hey get the fuck out or I’m gonna really hurt you.
3. You’re wearing clothes. Now this one here might be a bit of stretch but hear me out for a second. Every other animal to ever exist walks around naked. And no just because you put a little pink fucking vest on your Shih Tzu (barely even a dog imo) in the winter does not mean it likes to wear it and feels okay with it. But every other animal likes to walk around naked, and at some point humans did too. I bet that when we did walk around naked, we were way cooler with other animals. I just feel like when you’re walking around the woods of Canada (or wherever else has lots of woods) in your long sleeve Columbia under your Patagonia vest, and you see bear munching on some berries having a kick ass time, its gonna see all that shit you’re wearing and probably think, “This thing looks ready for fucking battle. Engage super territorial, overly aggressive, insanely dangerous mode.” Now you are screwed. Bears climb trees better than you, run faster than you, and are better at pretty much everything else related to being in the woods. You. Are. Fucked. But think about it. All these clothes we wear probably look like some kind of armor to other animals, because that’s essentially what they are for. We use clothes to protect us from the elements, and those fucking big ass flies that seem to be everywhere in the woods; mosquitoes too. I definitely will give credit to animals for being smart enough to understand why we wear clothes, at least the concept at its core.

So what’s my advice to you? Find a favorite animal that won’t eat your face if you try to get a little hang time in. That or just come to terms with the fact that if you’re favorite animal is something with lots of sharp teeth or claws or anything else they can use as a weapon, and keep your infatuation at the zoo, preferably behind the railing. I guess if you get any closer, you should ideally be willing to get naked, and be equally willing to deal with the consequences. Look at what happened to Grizzly Man. He spent most of that movie hanging out with Sergeant Brown and thing were totally cool for a while there. And then he ran into some other bear that he wasn’t exactly on good terms with, and the man got eaten. Tread carefully my friends. You’re favorite animal probably does not love you back, take it from this panda.

So a few days ago I wrote a little piece about the skate and snowboard crew that resides in Marquette, Michigan. Most of my article was focused on isolating the perceived undesirable traits of the crew towards the rest of the social scene, and how they seem to be exclusive to those with XXL sweatshirts and mad steez. But I come to you a humbled, and revitalized man thanks to the words of a couple friends who made me think about my personal perspective versus the perspective of those who I wrote about. One friend told me my words were just plain mean, and that I only have a certain perception because I’m not part of that crew. Last night he said to me, “Why don’t you try writing something nice, you’re being kind of a dick lately.” The other said, “It’s just very offensive when you clearly don’t know about that group of people.” So this is something nice(r). Something not focused on how shitty some people are. When you’re wrong, it’s fuckin annoying but you have to admit it.

One of the main points I focused on was how such a historically degraded group such as skaters could be so discriminatory towards others after such had been done to them. But that thought process really has no validity. If anything, a  group that has been degraded would be more likely to keep to their own, and not choose to include others because those are the people that have labeled them as degenerates or rejected them in the past. I didn’t really look at things from the right perspective. It completely makes sense that people accept those of the same cloth and reject those of a different one, especially if you think others might see you as bum or a loser. I would probably do the same. I think most of my resentment of that group came from a couple of friends during my sophomore year. I remember meeting both of them and seeming to think they were good kids; relationships began to develop. But once they began to meet those who liked to skate and hit the mountain like them, I noticed a lacking inclusion. I think that’s when I began to resent the exclusiveness of the group. All of a sudden I wasn’t cool enough to hang. But that’s an overly emotional response, and far too sensitive of me. Being emotional and sensitive at the same time never leads to rational perspectives.

“….meanwhile standing around with that quizzical look of having no idea whats going on beyond the thought process of, “Bros, hit that pole, hand me that brew, bro.”

HIGHLY EMOTIONAL. EQUALLY SENSITIVE. Looking back at this particular sentence, I kind of can’t believe I wrote it. Very dick move to assume that somebody who dresses a certain way can only possess the capacity for such a thought process. And the fucked up part of it is, I wrote about how these guys had been degraded for years because of people creating a perception that was unwarranted, meanwhile I did the same within a paragraph. I ain’t perfect, but that don’t mean I gotta be a dick. A sincere apology to all those I likely offended in the article I wrote called, “Skaters Got Haters.” I was an asshole. I’m not going to delete the article because I wrote it, and that would be far to much of an image conservation move. But I will admit that the words I wrote were far to hateful and judgmental for what is warranted. Read with caution, and don’t take it too seriously. Now this panda is going to retreat into the forest and eat a shit ton of bamboo until I forget about being a dick. And in the spirit of being nice and all that shit, here’s a link to the World Wildlife Fund’s Panda conservation project.

http://wwf.panda.org/how_you_can_help/support_wwf/donate/donate_panda.cfm

You don’t have to donate, but if you feel like helping pandas a little bit on this Thursday morning, go right ahead. Here’s to the pandas, and not being a pretentious and unnecessarily judgmental asshole. Cheers.

Honestly had this entire blog typed out and the somehow managed to FUCKING delete the entire thing with a simple swipe of my mouse. Filing complaint with Toshiba tomorrow. So I’m going to do my best to create the greatest piece of literature behind the one I previously created,  which was definitely achieved by my initial post (which will never be seen by the world, ever). Like, it would’ve won some kind of fucking blog award from the academy of fucking blogs. Anyway, here goes.

So I had a few drinks earlier tonight, and decided to go over to friends house for a few more and some time to hang out and do nothing. So we talked a bit with his room mates, had little bit of whiskey, smoked some cigarettes, and talked a little bit about the existentialism noted by Ernest Hemingway. Needless to say it was pretty goddamn hipster. Almost too much to handle but I was surrounded, what else could I do but spew a bunch of meaningless shit from my mouth consisting of what I know of Ernest Hemingway. Let’s be clear the only thing I know about Ernest Hemingway is that his name is Ernest Hemingway. So we step outside for another cigarette with one of my buddy’s room mates. I pull out my usual special blend reds (thank you Abigail, sincerely), while my buddy pulls out one of his hand rolled cigarettes. Now you understand the fog of hipster-osity I am surrounded by. His room mate pulls out his own. Quizzically, I asked, “What are you smoking?” He says, “American Spirits, black box.” Let’s take this step by step. First of all, the kid smokes American Spirits. Immediate hipster flag. Now I’m not saying that just because you smoke American Spirits you’re a hipster. But I am saying that you’re looking at around a 70-80% chance. Moving on. Now I do know that the American Spirit brand offers a diverse variety of cigarettes ranging from full flavor, to light menthol, to organic grown. So I asked, “What kind is that?” His response might be the most hipster response ever recorded by the human race. The greatest treasure known to those who seek to find out what it means to be the original hipster. It is like searching the deserts of Egypt for your entire childhood, adulthood and old age, only to find King Tut’s treasure waiting hundreds of fathoms below ground. Also not sure if King Tut even has hidden treasure somewhere below ground but you can guess how historic that would be. Also fathoms might be a measurement of depth in water. Both are irrelevant. The coveted response was as follows.

“These are cigarettes with tobacco aged in oak barrels.”

Wow. Just wow. This kid could have been a regular, reasonable person and bought a pack of Marlboro Special Blend Reds (like me) for like 6 or 7 bucks and been perfectly content. But this kid went out and bought cigarettes rolled with tobacco that have been aged in oak. FUCKING. DUMB. Cancer can come to you at $6.50 pack, or it can come to you at $10.50 a pack. At least when you’re paying $6.50 a pack you’ll have more money for chemo. But that’s irrelevant in this conversation. This is the greatest, most hipster-esque response to anything ever said to anyone in the history of hipsters, mankind, or anything that’s ever been cool or distinguished. So for all the thousands, probably millions reading a blog called, “All White Panda,” I give you hipster gold. Sleep well my friends; Somewhere out there, you can find tobacco aged in oak barrels.

The word that has started to define a generation; hipster. Whether you attribute these people to a cycle of post modernism, or to people just being fucking pretentious assholes in order make themselves feel better and seem like they know the niche pockets of art, music and writing, they’re around. They’re at your local coffee shops (but come on free internet for a cup of coffee seems fair); they’re at your local art galleries; they’re at your neighborhood barbers. They’re even at your local supermarkets. So what can you do to protect yourself from the modern day hipster? Absolutely nothing.

The hipster in its natural habitat only feeds off of your insatiable desire to mock them and regard them as morons that only use words like, “It’s” and, “Better” and, “On” and “Vinyl.” Because you are the masses; those that do not understand how to appreciate the truly avant garde forms of art, music, writing, vinyl, and more vinyl. SO MUCH VINYL. By mocking hipsters and calling them out for their total bullshit, you actually only make them more pretentious, and more into themselves; more into the idea that they really do understand who the true artists are (anyone and everyone not on the radio). It’s the worst kind of vicious cycle known to man kind. So if hipsters drive you nuts, just fucking get over it man. They’re always going to be around so you better learn to deal with it. Some people will always have the desire to be different regardless of what they do in order to achieve it. Hipsters are only a product of the society we cultivate, which currently has a extremely high level of appreciation for art and music; that’s what post modernism does.

But before you go around ignoring all the “hipsters” world-wide, we need to understand how to classify our hipsters. Some people actually do know a lot about art and music, and it would be a damn shame to walk around disregarding anyone who speaks on the topic(s). We’re going to use music as our standard art form because I think that’s your everyday hipster’s most common mode of hipstering. A hipster is one who tends to ignore all popular music of any genre, because of the simple fact that it is popular. It really has nothing to do with the quality of the music itself, and only to do with that fact that so many people like it. They believe they are so much smarter and have tastes so refined, that if most people like a certain band, there’s little to no chance that it could possibly meet their standards. So, they seek the small bands with, “no radio broadcast contract clauses” in order to perpetuate the idea that these bands are the true artists; the ones that meet their refined tastes. The really annoying thing is, there are actually people out there who just like weird fucking music. Personally I don’t think I have particularly weird music taste as a whole; my three favorite artists are probably The Strokes, Kanye West and Alt-J. But I’ll get down to some Amok every now and then, and some Animal Collective too. St. Vincent is probably as weird as I’ll go. But as a whole, I’d say I’m not really into obscure bands. But there are plenty of people who are into weird indie synth pop or whatever genre that odd shit gets put into, I don’t know. The worst part is hipsters are so good at twisting their language to make themselves sound like they actually know what they’re talking about, that it’s borerline impossible to determine who’s a hipster and who’s not. It takes some time and some legitimate conversation. Maybe bring up a fake band name every now and then, ask if they like them. If you reel in a couple, “I’ve heard little bits of them and I like how progressive their style is, but I can’t say I know any of their songs” or, “Yeah I heard they were at Burning Man last year,” you might be talking to a hipster. Just be careful. Labeling someone as a hipster is something that they’re not coming back from for a while once you put that idea in your own head. Tread carefully my friends. Don’t let the hipsters get to you, and fret not; it ain’t nothin’ but a hipster thang.