Spot The Difference with Macklemore

About five years ago, whilst holed up in the rural recesses of southern Japan, I received a phone call from a dear friend. I say phone call; what with being separated by the vast expanse that is the snowy wilderness of Russia, this call was brought to glorious life via the then relatively new and awe-inspiring medium of Skype.

Yeah, that's right, I was totally using Skype before any of you wannabes even heard of it! (Being ironic here; more on that later....)

Unlike the inoffensive ranblings and general platitudes that I had become accustomed to, however, this conversation began with some urgency.

"Grae!" Cried my friend in a panicked tone, previously unheard of in his usually dulcet Welsh ambiance. "You need to burn all of your clothes!"

"Crickey O'Riley!" I gasped, clutching my tattered green velvet jacket "Why by great Blessed's beard would I do that??"

And then he uttered a single word that to this day sends shivers down my stylish yet affordable spine...

"Hipsters."

hipster¹

hɪpstə/

noun

informal

noun: hipster; plural noun: hipsters

1. 1.

   a person who follows the latest trends and fashions.

Origin

1940s (used originally as an equivalent term to hepcat): from hip³ + -ster.

Hipsters, it transpired are young semi-professionals who dress in mismatched vintage clothing,  women's scarves and/or witty/nostalgic t-shirts, have been listening to every indie band under the sun before you ever heard of them, drink rum and cokes, smoke Malboro Lites and are generally better than you could ever be, ever. And they freakin' hate Coldplay. Sadly, as hipster as it is to say, I was hipster before hipster even existed. Seriously. Ask anyone. It's true. 

Today, however, I found myself walking through Waterloo Station, humming the Kinks to myself, as is the fashion, only to discover that the 2014 incarnation of the hipster seems to have spiralled somewhat out of control. 

As I stood outside the station (smoking a Marlboro Lite, wearing a pashmina and not 

listening to Coldplay) a horrifying reality dawned upon me;it is now nigh on impossible to tell a hipster from a homeless person.

As I watched one would-be homeless gentleman walk past, his scruffy shoes dragging on the ground and his patchy jacket flapping in the breeze, he pulled out a brand-new iPhone seconds before being greeted by a group of like-fashioned colleagues. Moments later, a young woman who I was certain was a member of our generation's yuppie elite approached me and asked for fifty pence, explaining that she had sold out of Big Issues today but was still short of enough for the shelter this evening.

My mind, dear reader, has been blown. Is this seriously the fashion today? A time when young people, earning enough to live in London and socialize therein choose to dress like beggars, whilst the street societies actually look healthier and smarter? It beggars belief! (Excuse the pun)

Young people! Sure, keep your vintage jackets, your pashminas, your ironic t-shirts, but please, have some self respect! Get yourselves to a decent charity shop and find something that doesn't look and smell like R-Kelly pissed on it! You are giving hipsters a bad name. And, as one of the first of your kind, I take offense!