The Latest Unlikely Hipsters: The Amish
With Mormons and Presbyterians co-opting the term hipster, the trifecta of unlikely hipsterdom was just waiting for the addition of an Amish hipster. Our "homespun hipster," Miriam Jones, no longer lives in an Amish community, she's now a hairdresser in Los Angeles. But, "growing up Amish is not something you outgrow," explains the Los Angeles Times' Gale Holland. And like all of our unlikely hipsters, Jones's hipster status has more to do with fashion than actual "cool."
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As with our Mormons and Presbyterians, the Amish are unlikely cool characters, as Amish society has lots of rules and involves very little fun unless you're a teen on rumspringa. "When you're Amish, you work all the time and you don't work for money or for any other reason than God wants you to," Jones told Holland. But, ignoring the fact that the Amish don't drink or believe in irony, there are parts of Amish lifestyle that can be labeled "hipster" only if you render that term entirely meaningless. Take some of Jones's hipster cred: "She's butchered large farm animals, killed snapping turtles with a crossbow, sewn her own clothes, grown and canned her food." Yes, there is likely someone in Brooklyn right now describing how good their cross-bow shot snapping turtle is. But that is someone who will go home and Tumbl about it from the comfort of their 21st century gadget-laden home. Jones did it for real.
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But there's no reason to quibble with such characterization because, as it stands now, hipster culture boils down to just pants. "Amish inspired" clothing is in, as you can see above. (One of those photos was not taken as a part of a fashion spread.) "The clothes are soft, draped, plain, and the boys are wearing flat, wide-brimmed hats," reads a New York Times post from last year's fashion week titled "Amish Fashion Week." Last year's fashion week is this year's street fashion, with Urban Outfitters selling dudes Amish-inspired suspenders (right) to hold their pants up. So, yet again, with another very uncool sect adopting the term, we see the term diluted, now synonymous with kind-of, sort-of trendy. But, who's next? Hassids? Oh wait, that might have already happened.
