I think people forget that punk didn’t just get reduced to an aesthetic by the kids on tiktok or whatever. Like don’t get me wrong I hope kids do learn about punk and its roots in homeless and working class youth and the music that basically is at the root of punk as a subculture, but like lol people act like kids today are to blame for that. Kids today are introduced to punk through an already preprocessed, hyper consumptive lense as a result of punk becoming an aesthetic via the fashion industry and corporate interest making it into a pop culture phenomenon for a profitable market that essentially ended up stripping it of its counter cultural or sub cultural nature.
Fashion industry is essentially what caused a great divide between punk’s subcultural aesthetic with deep roots in poverty and resourcesfullness vs punk REDUCED to aesthetic with stereotypical hallmark pieces with more popularity amongst the general public as said aesthetic following its decline in media hype. What we know as iconic and quintessential punk looks and templates, like say the Vivienne Westwood tattered sweaters that Sid Vicious wore, her breast t shirt or anything in her and McLaren’s famous shop SEX that was used by the most popular punk bands of the time etc were already highly curated, already expensive pieces actual kids in the punk scene could not afford. She is literally credited as commercializing punk lol
Theres a huge fashion culture of creativity and socio political history based entirely on these poor and homeless youths that has often been overshadowed if not just straight up forgotten as a result of how much attention and how much credit designers like Westwood have gotten as like pioneers and shapers of punk fashion and the culture itself which is like ludicrous if you think about it.
Not to mention so much of corporate interest in punk as a profitable music market ended up really dulling the teeth on a lot of artists music. There were still an edge of politics in it but I think there was so much refinement to a lot of the most popular bands that signed with labels that most punks started seeing that as selling out, and what sold out was what became pop culture and started being seen by people within the subculture as anything BUT subcultural.
I love the “glasses are disability” thing because it applies to basically every complaint abled people have about disability
- “You’re not even that bad, why would you get that?” Have you ever used a magnifying glass for small details or zoomed in on a picture
- “Why do you have that accommodation TODAY?” Why do you wear reading glasses when you’re reading
- “It seems like your ‘needs’ are inconsistent.” Yeah and you wear sunglasses when it’s sunny and not all the time
- “But you can technically walk without that.” Yeah and if I put the page really close to your face you could read it, it would just hurt and be hugely impractical, inconvenient, and limiting
- “But you COULD go without it all the time, you don’t NEED it to live.” And maybe you could technically see without your glasses, doesn’t mean it’s comfortable or practical day to day
- “If you REALLY had a hard time seeing you would have glasses.” Have you ever known someone who couldn’t afford a new pair of glasses? Or eye appointments? Someone who needed vision therapy or special prism glasses? Someone whose vision only gets bad during migraines or seizures? Someone with astigmatism that glasses can’t help? Someone who didn’t qualify for LASIK?
- “You only use it when you’re out in public.” Have you ever gotten up to use the bathroom at night without putting on your glasses
- “Decorating it is just trying to get attention, and it’s a medical device so stop glamorizing it.” Do you hate any patterned or colorful glasses frames too? Art with characters who wear glasses? People who make OCs with glasses? Glasses chains, prescription sunglasses, aesthetic fake glasses with tinted lenses?
- “There are secretly lots of people just using aids for fun and attention.” There are secretly lots of people wearing fake glasses or colored contacts for fun and attention, it does not affect you
- “We need to find fakers, they’re stealing disabled resources!” Someone pretending to need glasses is “taking” a seat in the front from someone who might need it more. That sucks and they shouldn’t do that. But I’m not going to scrutinize every person who wears glasses to see if I think they really need that seat. You personally are not the arbiter of who is (based on the random times you’ve seen them) secretly not disabled
- “My friend has that and doesn’t act like that.” Does every pair of glasses in production, or even every pair close to your prescription, work for you? Is your vision identical to every other nearsighted person?
- “If you can do X why can’t you do Y? Some people with that can do Y.”/“But if you have that how can you do X? People with that can’t usually do X.” Some people are nearsighted and some people are farsighted and some people are both. Some farsighted people can read some without glasses and some can’t. And good distance vision doesn’t mean you don’t ever need glasses, it’s just an entirely different reason you’d need glasses
- “You’re too young to need that.” And there are young people who need bifocal lenses
- “Why don’t you use this DIFFERENT aid though, it would look like you didn’t even have an aid.” Why doesn’t everyone in the world wear contacts
- “Why can’t I/my friend/my kid play with it?” Do you let random strangers and children try on your glasses at the grocery store
- “I was just trying to help, I thought you’d need a push/you were in the way.” Are you cool with me suddenly pulling your glasses off your face to clean them, or because the glare was distracting me
- “You’ll eventually stop using it though right?” Are you planning on no longer needing glasses someday
Disabled people are free to add
I am aware this is not a 1-to-1 perfectly accurate post. Do not come into the notes trying to “um actually this isn’t a perfect comparison.” I know. Just don’t
be mad
This meme is tongue in cheek, but this too is part of class warfare. In this case, keeping the law too complex for non-experts to even begin to have a chance to understand it means that only those who can afford to hire experts can protect themselves adequately and engage in ventures and activities that don’t directly relate to subsistence.
(via spongebobssquarepants)
