random thoughts that came into mind while reading this:
- i'm very sympathetic to the idea that "actually cool people dont think about what they put on" which makes BBSP as a whole seem like a bit of a paradox, but in the end i think there's space for jawn theory to enrich the experience, as long as it acknowledges that swag ultimately flourishes naturally and has no rigid guidelines
- i understand punks using controversial symbols only for the sake of transgression, but the minute you start actually thinking about it, it stops being punk and becomes an act of sad mental gymnastics attempting to be edgy
- ergo, someone might be in a mood to rock a specific piece of blackpilled swag that matches their energy on a given day and they can pull it off, but the moment they start trying to explain themselves or think about it too much (as opposed to wisely "Letting context freak it"), it's over (i think this point applies to clothes broadly but ESPECIALLY with blackpilled stuff)
- the point made by Emily in a previous comment about context makes a lot of sense to me. that's why i made enfasis in the mood and "specific" piece in my previous point. a personally antagonistic relationship with the piece you are rocking makes it make sense. and it doesn't have to be something "elaborate" like the climate journalist, it could just be someone who had a hard time quitting smoking rocking some Cursed Fire Poison-Merchant Memorabilia
- i'm afraid a "cool Dimes Square kid" would use blackspilled swag unironically, a lot of them seem to be fully in the "own the libs" camp by now because they're too desperate to be controversial
- i wasn't sure what Miramax was and had no idea of its association with Harvey Weinstein, so i didn't understand the controversy when i initially saw the hat. i guess nowadays the name "Harvey Weinstein" is a lot more reckognisable worldwide than the name "Miramax", so this supports the idea of repurposing a logo or going back to its original meaning
- off-topic: i use graphic tees but i draw my personal line at graphic hats (even though i think they're fun and look cool sometimes) because something about the fact that they are worn in the head would make me feel too much like a brainwashed walking ad, even if it's for something i unironically enjoy/endorse 100%, whereas i feel like t-shirts leave more room for interpretation/nuance/irony/ambiguity/flavor/playfulness
I have an old Tsubi tee with “SAFE IN HEAVEN, DEAD.” screen-printed on the front. And it gets all sorts of reactions. And I love it, still, for this very reason.
Def rocking some cursed shit at present (Valvoline crewneck, D.A.R.E. long sleeve), but this dude does some really cool stuff to old Texaco jawnz (I snapped up one):
as someone that has worked for 20 years in both the fashion industry and the MILIND complex... I have to say I really enjoyed reading this article as well as all of your super thoughtful and well articulated comments...I'm personally stoked that the comments seem to not fuck with these items and wont drastically effect the cost of my GWOT era trinket collecting... ill go back to lurking in the shadows now.
def found this interesting and worth thinking about, but if you're rocking some cursed shit with any kind of irony or intent to "reclaim"/freak it, you're going to find yourself having to verbally explain, and imo that is the enemy of any good outfit... nothing negates a fit like being asked every time you leave the house "what's up with that miramax hat" and having to go "oh i'm a fan of the movies, i'm like reclaiming it". context obviously adds layers to a fit or garment, and it's nice to be invited into the world behind someone's choices, but i generally believe fashion is a visual medium and wearing a fit that continually requires explanation/justification is kind of lame. i think there are levels to this – i fuck w the climate journalist in an earlier comment ironically rocking an Exxon bomber, but i don't fuck w your miramax hat friend. maybe it's because there are still plenty of people out there who are rape apologists who'd unironically rock something like that. idk! i guess i can't imagine myself ever leaving the house in something that, without the added element of my verbal justification, reads as me being chill w harvey weinstein.
Ayyyy hello - to the first point, I see what you mean, but all kinds of good outfits function as "conversation starters," in all kinds of ways. You could say the question then becomes, what kind of conversation do you want to start, which leads into your second point... I think a Miramax cap does allow for more "blessed semiotic maneuvering room" than, e.g., a Weinstein Company hat, in no small part because Miramax brings to mind (not just HW but) Sex Lies & Videotape, Reservoir Dogs, The Thin Blue Line, Pulp Fiction, Good Will Hunting, Clerks, Chungking Express, Walking & Talking, Velvet Goldmine, etc., etc. -- but for sure this is why I invoke a "third rail" in that passage and preface it by saying that "Whether you are interested in doing that meaning-bending yourself, through what you wear, is another question" : )
totally fair! i do see where u guys are coming from... i just think it's not for me personally. am def willing to be proven wrong upon encountering a thorny garment in the wild. all love !!
I don't think the average person thinks about the cursed-ness of whatever slogan or graphic is on your tshirt that much tbh or even registers it! Yes this is meant to address the eyes of the spyfriendly, but I also think there's not much point in refusing to wear a (likely well-made if it's that old and survived) 90s piece in 100 percent cotton, good shoes etc. just because the company is cursed.
Reuse, reduce, recycle means reuse ALL the stuff, also historical distance is a thing. I doubt anyone under 40 or non American even knows what Enron is (non American here), same with the investment banks merch, so no one is going to assume you're endorsing oil spills/accounting fraud, otoh wearing a swastika in any part of the western world will cause very different reactions. I mean, I get what the punks were trying to do, but I wouldn't do it myself.
And as you said, a lot of this is just performative - every so often for years before the Balenciaga outcry, I saw people wanting to boycott Chanel because old Coco was a Nazi collaborator.......which is fine, but even a cursory wiki (do people not google anymore?) shows that present-day Chanel is fully owned by the Wertheimers, descendants of the Jewish business partners she tried to sell out to the Nazis! There's far more poetic justice in that ownership than there would be in refusing to support a present-day Jewish-owned business because the long-dead woman who founded it had bad morals.
there is a funny irony (though it does dip a bit into sophistry) to the fact that wearing a vintage Exxon-branded hoodie is "better for the planet" than buying a new 100% organic cotton natural dyed hoodie
This was a magnum opus of jawn theory! Recently I've been haunted by an exceedingly cursed yet hilarious tee that I saw on @shopspacecamp's IG story: a Raytheon Engineers & Constructors softball team jersey. It was an undeniably tasty garm with a henley collar, patina'd off-white body, washed out navy half sleeves, and a crackly logo. There's something fascinatingly dissonant about imagining America's foremost death dealers getting together and playing a friendly game of softball. I wonder if Satan ever throws corporate BBQs to show his appreciation for the demons that make Hell possible.
BBSP on point. Would love to hear or read a convo between Jonah / Erin and W. David Marx (author of Ametora / Status & Culture) on these and related kindvibed kultural kibitzes.
I related to today's newsletter! I'm an investigative climate journalist and this year I published a book based on documents from a Canadian oil company owned by Exxon, Imperial Oil. While in Calgary, Alberta, on book tour I went to a thrift store and saw a quite cool Imperial bomber jacket, probably made in the mid 90s. I was going to buy and wear it to my book events but unfortunately there was a rip in the back. I liked the idea of fucking with people's expectations about the sort of clothes a climate journalist would wear, and to me it had potential for an ironic comment on greenwashing--ie someone like myself wearing this jacket would a ridiculous statement in favor of Big Oil, similar to the ridiculousness of an oil company claiming to be in favor of fixing the climate.
For my girlies who recently lost their prized possession: period panties. Due to Thinx being PFA positive it might be a fun time to rock some Dupont swag since they blessed us with the forever chemical.
Just want to acknowledge the thoughtful weaving and threading of ideas here, and the patient thought-scaffolding you build around a complex, protean subject matter. Still not sure what I think but I'm thinkin I'm thinkin differently having read it.
same here, im just in awe by the levels and layers of wisdom imparted in this BBSP masterpiece AND its rich comment section respectfully pushing back and adding nuance to some points
as someone perfectly said in a previous comments: This was a magnum opus of jawn theory
I think this is an interesting topic and one I ponder quite often, but it does feel like we haven’t quite addressed the most obvious factor in the jawn calculus: the impact. Whether you have fun, esoteric maxims towards your cursed garments, to the average person who is definitely not thinking much about what you’re wearing, it just reads as in poor taste. In which case, in some philosophical circles, you’ve still made the world worse despite your internal idea of reclaiming the symbol.
I told my wife about this article and she noted that it would be ridiculously cursed for her to wear the child smoking icon Joe Camel on her stuff given she's several months pregnant. SO METAL!!!!
This same allure led me to cop a Halliburton tshirt a number of years ago but tbh it just didn't work for me, the dark irony felt too put on. But the "anti" energy that I hold does still exist and is the root cause of the desire to hijack. An old friend of mine was in Africa in the 80s (I can't remember the country) and there were all of these incredible shirts that had a political leader on them who was quite polarizing. Vibrantly patterned they had a large image of his face on the back. When he lost the election the street sellers cut black "X"s and sewed them over his face, and then just continued to sell the shirts, but this time to his victorious supporters. This is a possible "hack for the hijack" for those of us who vehemently oppose these corporations. Time to start sewing.
random thoughts that came into mind while reading this:
- i'm very sympathetic to the idea that "actually cool people dont think about what they put on" which makes BBSP as a whole seem like a bit of a paradox, but in the end i think there's space for jawn theory to enrich the experience, as long as it acknowledges that swag ultimately flourishes naturally and has no rigid guidelines
- i understand punks using controversial symbols only for the sake of transgression, but the minute you start actually thinking about it, it stops being punk and becomes an act of sad mental gymnastics attempting to be edgy
- ergo, someone might be in a mood to rock a specific piece of blackpilled swag that matches their energy on a given day and they can pull it off, but the moment they start trying to explain themselves or think about it too much (as opposed to wisely "Letting context freak it"), it's over (i think this point applies to clothes broadly but ESPECIALLY with blackpilled stuff)
- the point made by Emily in a previous comment about context makes a lot of sense to me. that's why i made enfasis in the mood and "specific" piece in my previous point. a personally antagonistic relationship with the piece you are rocking makes it make sense. and it doesn't have to be something "elaborate" like the climate journalist, it could just be someone who had a hard time quitting smoking rocking some Cursed Fire Poison-Merchant Memorabilia
- i'm afraid a "cool Dimes Square kid" would use blackspilled swag unironically, a lot of them seem to be fully in the "own the libs" camp by now because they're too desperate to be controversial
- i wasn't sure what Miramax was and had no idea of its association with Harvey Weinstein, so i didn't understand the controversy when i initially saw the hat. i guess nowadays the name "Harvey Weinstein" is a lot more reckognisable worldwide than the name "Miramax", so this supports the idea of repurposing a logo or going back to its original meaning
- off-topic: i use graphic tees but i draw my personal line at graphic hats (even though i think they're fun and look cool sometimes) because something about the fact that they are worn in the head would make me feel too much like a brainwashed walking ad, even if it's for something i unironically enjoy/endorse 100%, whereas i feel like t-shirts leave more room for interpretation/nuance/irony/ambiguity/flavor/playfulness
word up !
I have an old Tsubi tee with “SAFE IN HEAVEN, DEAD.” screen-printed on the front. And it gets all sorts of reactions. And I love it, still, for this very reason.
Def rocking some cursed shit at present (Valvoline crewneck, D.A.R.E. long sleeve), but this dude does some really cool stuff to old Texaco jawnz (I snapped up one):
https://1offproject.com/collections/available-now/products/desert-center-snapback-3
as someone that has worked for 20 years in both the fashion industry and the MILIND complex... I have to say I really enjoyed reading this article as well as all of your super thoughtful and well articulated comments...I'm personally stoked that the comments seem to not fuck with these items and wont drastically effect the cost of my GWOT era trinket collecting... ill go back to lurking in the shadows now.
def found this interesting and worth thinking about, but if you're rocking some cursed shit with any kind of irony or intent to "reclaim"/freak it, you're going to find yourself having to verbally explain, and imo that is the enemy of any good outfit... nothing negates a fit like being asked every time you leave the house "what's up with that miramax hat" and having to go "oh i'm a fan of the movies, i'm like reclaiming it". context obviously adds layers to a fit or garment, and it's nice to be invited into the world behind someone's choices, but i generally believe fashion is a visual medium and wearing a fit that continually requires explanation/justification is kind of lame. i think there are levels to this – i fuck w the climate journalist in an earlier comment ironically rocking an Exxon bomber, but i don't fuck w your miramax hat friend. maybe it's because there are still plenty of people out there who are rape apologists who'd unironically rock something like that. idk! i guess i can't imagine myself ever leaving the house in something that, without the added element of my verbal justification, reads as me being chill w harvey weinstein.
Ayyyy hello - to the first point, I see what you mean, but all kinds of good outfits function as "conversation starters," in all kinds of ways. You could say the question then becomes, what kind of conversation do you want to start, which leads into your second point... I think a Miramax cap does allow for more "blessed semiotic maneuvering room" than, e.g., a Weinstein Company hat, in no small part because Miramax brings to mind (not just HW but) Sex Lies & Videotape, Reservoir Dogs, The Thin Blue Line, Pulp Fiction, Good Will Hunting, Clerks, Chungking Express, Walking & Talking, Velvet Goldmine, etc., etc. -- but for sure this is why I invoke a "third rail" in that passage and preface it by saying that "Whether you are interested in doing that meaning-bending yourself, through what you wear, is another question" : )
totally fair! i do see where u guys are coming from... i just think it's not for me personally. am def willing to be proven wrong upon encountering a thorny garment in the wild. all love !!
I don't think the average person thinks about the cursed-ness of whatever slogan or graphic is on your tshirt that much tbh or even registers it! Yes this is meant to address the eyes of the spyfriendly, but I also think there's not much point in refusing to wear a (likely well-made if it's that old and survived) 90s piece in 100 percent cotton, good shoes etc. just because the company is cursed.
Reuse, reduce, recycle means reuse ALL the stuff, also historical distance is a thing. I doubt anyone under 40 or non American even knows what Enron is (non American here), same with the investment banks merch, so no one is going to assume you're endorsing oil spills/accounting fraud, otoh wearing a swastika in any part of the western world will cause very different reactions. I mean, I get what the punks were trying to do, but I wouldn't do it myself.
And as you said, a lot of this is just performative - every so often for years before the Balenciaga outcry, I saw people wanting to boycott Chanel because old Coco was a Nazi collaborator.......which is fine, but even a cursory wiki (do people not google anymore?) shows that present-day Chanel is fully owned by the Wertheimers, descendants of the Jewish business partners she tried to sell out to the Nazis! There's far more poetic justice in that ownership than there would be in refusing to support a present-day Jewish-owned business because the long-dead woman who founded it had bad morals.
there is a funny irony (though it does dip a bit into sophistry) to the fact that wearing a vintage Exxon-branded hoodie is "better for the planet" than buying a new 100% organic cotton natural dyed hoodie
This was a magnum opus of jawn theory! Recently I've been haunted by an exceedingly cursed yet hilarious tee that I saw on @shopspacecamp's IG story: a Raytheon Engineers & Constructors softball team jersey. It was an undeniably tasty garm with a henley collar, patina'd off-white body, washed out navy half sleeves, and a crackly logo. There's something fascinatingly dissonant about imagining America's foremost death dealers getting together and playing a friendly game of softball. I wonder if Satan ever throws corporate BBQs to show his appreciation for the demons that make Hell possible.
BBSP on point. Would love to hear or read a convo between Jonah / Erin and W. David Marx (author of Ametora / Status & Culture) on these and related kindvibed kultural kibitzes.
he's a spyfriend and his books are great, could happen
I related to today's newsletter! I'm an investigative climate journalist and this year I published a book based on documents from a Canadian oil company owned by Exxon, Imperial Oil. While in Calgary, Alberta, on book tour I went to a thrift store and saw a quite cool Imperial bomber jacket, probably made in the mid 90s. I was going to buy and wear it to my book events but unfortunately there was a rip in the back. I liked the idea of fucking with people's expectations about the sort of clothes a climate journalist would wear, and to me it had potential for an ironic comment on greenwashing--ie someone like myself wearing this jacket would a ridiculous statement in favor of Big Oil, similar to the ridiculousness of an oil company claiming to be in favor of fixing the climate.
For my girlies who recently lost their prized possession: period panties. Due to Thinx being PFA positive it might be a fun time to rock some Dupont swag since they blessed us with the forever chemical.
https://www.etsy.com/listing/1355128814/
!! that “Dark Waters” Cursed Banger
Just want to acknowledge the thoughtful weaving and threading of ideas here, and the patient thought-scaffolding you build around a complex, protean subject matter. Still not sure what I think but I'm thinkin I'm thinkin differently having read it.
same here, im just in awe by the levels and layers of wisdom imparted in this BBSP masterpiece AND its rich comment section respectfully pushing back and adding nuance to some points
as someone perfectly said in a previous comments: This was a magnum opus of jawn theory
I think this is an interesting topic and one I ponder quite often, but it does feel like we haven’t quite addressed the most obvious factor in the jawn calculus: the impact. Whether you have fun, esoteric maxims towards your cursed garments, to the average person who is definitely not thinking much about what you’re wearing, it just reads as in poor taste. In which case, in some philosophical circles, you’ve still made the world worse despite your internal idea of reclaiming the symbol.
Top tier corporate/military industrial swag-
The Chapo bootleg Zapata oil hat
I told my wife about this article and she noted that it would be ridiculously cursed for her to wear the child smoking icon Joe Camel on her stuff given she's several months pregnant. SO METAL!!!!
This same allure led me to cop a Halliburton tshirt a number of years ago but tbh it just didn't work for me, the dark irony felt too put on. But the "anti" energy that I hold does still exist and is the root cause of the desire to hijack. An old friend of mine was in Africa in the 80s (I can't remember the country) and there were all of these incredible shirts that had a political leader on them who was quite polarizing. Vibrantly patterned they had a large image of his face on the back. When he lost the election the street sellers cut black "X"s and sewed them over his face, and then just continued to sell the shirts, but this time to his victorious supporters. This is a possible "hack for the hijack" for those of us who vehemently oppose these corporations. Time to start sewing.
this is some top-tier cultural criticism!!! assigning this to my college students!!!
looking forward to the day I can bless college students with cultural wig splitters.