15/06/2008

The Hipster

This is not a piece about why hipsters suck. In fact, it's more a piece about what the hell it is, why I don't care about it, and why you shouldn't either. When people started using the term a hipster was someone who listened to the latest music, someone who was en par with good musical journalists (MTV does not count), and often listened to stuff that most people hadn't even heard about yet. Now, it means more or less the same as indie used to, before that became mainstream too. Hell, hipsters are turning mainstream as I write this. If you listened to Feist, Regina Spektor, Justice and so on before they became famous via iPod commercials (the bane of any hipster status a band might have), the latest album or whatnot, chances are good you used to be a hipster. It's not as clear if your one now though. I guess it depends on what you listen to really. Ever heard of Danger? If you have, you might be a hipster, if you haven't, it's one of the better French electro acts, along with Surkin and SebastiAn. Yeah, I'm a hipster, at least when it comes to music, and of course I'm a hipster of the old school. Sounds like a really dumb fucking thing to say, but there it is. A hipster is not all about the music though. There's also a certain kinda of clothes that's considered "hipster". The "terrorist scarf" for instance, add a couple of Converse, glasses with thick black rims, a beard and a band tee for some obscure Japanese folk or something. Maybe a plaid shirt too? It doesn't really matter as much though, since a hipster to me is mainly about the music, and not about how you look. If I thought it was more about how you dressed, I wouldn't be calling myself a hipster. That, and I'm hoping some hipster might get angry at me for calling myself a hipster... Either way, a hipster now is a middle class young adult with nothing better to do than spend hours on Pitchfork and music forums, whining over the latest record by the Animal Collective. The hipster is the new indie, and it wouldn't surprise me if the label hispter is attached to any band who is indie, but not indie rock in a few years time. But I get why people don't like hipsters. Because most hipsters are so into music, they tend to frown and look down upon anyone who don't truly listen to anything, and at least a few bands who most people haven't heard of. No wonder ordinary people wanna punch them in the face from time to time, but if they're one of these faux hipsters who only follow Pitchfork, don't discover music themselves, and are still acting like you're a cunt for not having heard Bjorks latest album... Just punch them in the face.

The Swedish FRA-law

The FRA-law is a law that basically means that the Swedish goverment have the right to check all Internet traffic passing trough Sweden. This means that they don't need any permission to check what I'm writing here, in case they can come up with a reason to do so. In a sense it's more or less the same thing that goes on in China, Burma and other dictatorships. What shocking with this is that it's in Sweden of all places. The closest they've ever come to a terrorist attack was when a bunch of angry people burned a Swedish flag by mistake while they were protesting against the Danish Mohammed drawings. Though that's apparently enough to start turning Sweden into an Orwellian state. I'd imagine the next step would be a small forest of surveillance cameras all over the big cities. Then maybe we could have a curfew, to prevent "suspicious activities"? And you might think I'm being a bit "end of the world" here, but when spokespersons from Goggle say that "this kind of thing shouldn't have any place in a western democracy." And say it's more the kind of things you'd expect from China or Saudi Arabia, we can start worry. The law also works against journalists and the media, since they'll have a harder time keeping their sources secure. The law also states that traffic that doesn't cross over the Swedish border wont be monitored, which is of course pure bullshit, since almost all traffic taking place between people in Sweden pass the border anyway. If you know how the Internet works, that would come as no surprise to you, company's have servers all over the world, so there's no way to make sure your traffic stays national. Basically, Swedes might soon be guilty until proved innocent, and there would be no way of stopping the government from registering peoples opinions if they want to. Hopefully the law wont pass, but I'd advise any Swedes to start getting encryption keys, using darknets and so on. Or just start chain letters about murdering politicians and blowing up buildings. And you have to wonder, why would this law show up all of a sudden? It seems to have an uncanny resemblance to the undemocratic Patriot Act, and I wouldn't be surprised if there is a connection to the US somewhere along the line. Terrorism seems to be the universal excuse to push trough laws and regulations that the people don't need or benefit from these days, so it wouldn't come as a surprise if that's at least hinted at if the law is passed. I'm betting "state", "security" and "safety" will be used too, all words that seem to be closer to fascism than their literal meaning these days...

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