The Sorry State of Today's Rebels

[hooplala]

"When I was young there were beatniks. Hippies. Punks. Gangsters. Now you're a hacktivist. Which I would probably be if I was 20. Shuttin' down MasterCard. But there's no look to that lifestyle! Besides just wearing a bad outfit with bad posture. Has WikiLeaks caused a look? No! I'm mad about that. If your kid comes out of the bedroom and says he just shut down the government, it seems to me he should at least have an outfit for that."  -John Waters

[LMNO]

Isn't "bad outfit and bad posture" pretty much the entire premise of his first four movies?

[Cain]

But it does have a look.  Pale, black hoodie, glasses, cheeto dust everywhere.

[Cramulus]

I dunno, there's something to be said for the ambiguity of the modern activist. They're less easy to stereotype away and dismiss when they're not dressed like hackers from a movie. You'll recall the early days of Occupy, when they refused to let the protest be pigeon holed into a discrete list of demands which could be dismissed. That's because there's a certain kind of power in formlessness.

The society of the spectacle does not demand change, it demands the theater of change. Becoming something like the hippie movement, with all its associated fashion and spectacle, would be the death knell for anonymous hackers. They would immediately become caricatures and nobody would take them seriously.

[LMNO]

A couple of things.  First, I think we're talking past each other.  This is John Waters that's being quoted.  It's not about having a uniform or a label, it's about having Style™.  Read his essay on Comme des Garcons in Role Models.  He's saying they have no sense of style, of flair, of panache, no inividual look, attitude, or anything that speaks to who they are.

Secondly,

You'll recall the early days of Occupy, when they refused to let the protest be pigeon holed into a discrete list of demands which could be dismissed.

And that went so well, as I recall.

[Cramulus]

Read his essay on Comme des Garcons in Role Models.

link?

He's saying they have no sense of style, of flair, of panache, no inividual look, attitude, or anything that speaks to who they are.

Who specifically doesn't? There are tons of hacker subcultures. Many of them have associated fashion. They're just all over the board... For every hacktivist who owns a Guy Fawkes mask, there are numerous others that roll their eyes at it.

I was at the HOPE convention a few years back and it was almost like being at a cosplay convention - definitely no absence of style.

Secondly,

You'll recall the early days of Occupy, when they refused to let the protest be pigeon holed into a discrete list of demands which could be dismissed.

And that went so well, as I recall.

As a PR tactic, it was successful. Thousands of reporters showed up to figure out what the protest was about. And if you read their web postings, there was never any question what they were there for, they just refused to boil it down to a sound byte that could have been dismissed on day 1. They refused to pick a spokesman that would have immediately been crucified on his individual merits. It's hard to attack something without a face. The visibility had to come later, the group wasn't on the same page yet.

Kerry Thornley's intro to Zenarchy fits well here: http://www.impropaganda.net/1997/zenarchy1.html - he writes about what the west coast movement was like before they were called "hippies", and how it changed as soon as it was named, easy to pin down and dismiss.

[LMNO]

Read his essay on Comme des Garcons in Role Models.

link?

Sadly, (or maybe not so), it's part of a book, so you'll have to go to the library.  Or buy it.  I'd suggest buying it.  Fantastic read.