The detachment of cool
Century of the Self, part 1: A series on the hyper-commodification of hip and individualization of culture
Summer’s gone and we’re back in the drudgery. Trudging along the hamster wheel of mundanity. Brat-summer is over and now ascends demure autumn. Yet I still find myself alarmed by the phenomenon Charli XCX thrust upon the internet world. Alarmed and slightly ominously frightened…
For whilst the brat-ification of internet culture draws its dying gasp and the prognosis-makers of culture (the stalwarts of meme-stagram) await the new fad, the new *insert unknown buzzword*-core: it seems to be with new power these structures of hip-dom ascend…
As much as I never want to mention the word brat again, like ever, I declare now that I will in this essay - but for good reason. For the brat-phenomenon marked a paradigm shift in its power of influence - not for us (who are doom-scrolled and addicted to the diet Prada, Socks house-meetings and Saint Hoaxes), but for them: the others…
Because for the others, the un-initiated, the power of brat came as an eerie apparition of grainy fonts in lime-green: with a word simultaneously far derived and far detached from its original meaning: it became, yet again, as the Gangnams and Planks before it: one of those weird internet-things. I would know, since I had to explain its appearance on evening news, to my parents: and how this came to be one of the factors in the launch of a bid in a presidential race in the US …
So its not like those deeply invasive trends before which lands far into mainstream culture from a meme-culture which (let’s be honest), starts deep in the recesses of hip-stagram. This was no cringe-worthy «Pokemon Go to the polls», quoted to Hillary Clinton in her presidential bid of 2016. Politicians, like her and others, hitching on youth culture to garner the younger votes is nothing special.
Yet this time it was far more invasive - due to the fact that there behind this fad now was 1) an actual product/work of art behind it, 2) a concerted effort behind it from Charli xcx’s marketing strategists and 3) an official appropriation of it in the heart of mainstream-popular-culture, through Kamala Harris’ campaign HQs use of it in their twitter/X-header with «kamala hq» replacing brat (yet the font and background color identical).
These three deliberate and rather powerful efforts above in confluence with a pervasive internet-trend, is new territory. The creators of this wave (brat) of hip (xcx and her marketing team), its act (the brat-dance and inflation of the term: the bratification) and its franchise appropriation (laying aesthetics for the official democratic campaign bid for the US presidency) betrays a frightening, consumerist conveyor belt: the hyper-commodification of cool/hip.
And what’s worse is that this final manifestation does more than just cement internet culture’s vulnerability to manipulation and pervasive power…it is a clear statement that what is perceived as «cool», in the end is a phenomenon which is birthed, lived and killed in a completely virtual sphere.
What is «cool» has become far removed from the birth of the «cool» (cool being the timeless, figurative apparitions of hip-phenomenons): being it the jazz-heads of the 40s, beats of the 50s, hippie/counterculture of the 60s or the «groove» of the 70s.
They and brat all have music, buzzwords and terminology attached. However, the ones mentioned above, take the counterculture of the 60s for example, were birthed through actual cultural movements (the student-protests of ’68), with actual political participation/demands (Vietnam-protests, wish for end to conscription of American youth and end of the war), actual aesthetics (Woodstock-adjacent music, acid-culture and overall «hippiedom») and with actual coherent value structures (free love, peace and non-violent civil disobedience).
If the presidential-bid and Kamala herself is brat (according to the brat-movement’s founder and de-facto custodian, Charlie xcx). And as we’ve argued for above, brat is the contemporary manifestation of hip - thus the momentary emblem of «cool»:
We, the initiated (enthusiasts, consumers and creators of contemporary culture), have a serious issue.
If Kamala Harris (an anti-immigration, anti-union, war-mongering, genocide-backing acting vice-president soon to be democratic presidential candidate) is brat - then I ask myself?
What is «cool» anymore?
Whatever it is, this «cool», has become completely removed from the fabric of reality and whatever countercultural zeitgeist it originally came from!
This is why I have taken upon myself of writing this investigation into what I believe is «The Detachment of Cool».
It will be a series in melee between sociology, cultural criticism and good ol’ gonzo journalism. Mostly music and film/tv will feature as the push-off points for discourse, but also general weird thoughts from me cold sagging my way towards the end of the year.
So stay tuned. Hang loose.
- ‘gassed out
