======= ======= ====== ====== ====== ===== ==== ====== ====== ===== ==== ======= ======= ====== ====== ====== ===== ==== ====== ====== ===== ====
I saw the headline and rolled my eyes. For some reason, on July 3rd, Flavorwire decided to run the take, “Bad Movie Night: Yes, The First ‘Independence Day’ Was Terrible Too.” There is no valid argument to support this obnoxiously cinephilic take. Is it “Citizen Kane” or “The Godfather?” Of course not, but “Independence Day” is still a fun, entertaining movie. You’d better believe it’s on my July 4th watch list. But we’re all familiar with this style of Internet content now. It’s trendy to dislike popular things. It’s cool to go against the mainstream. It’s a “hot take.” And that’s just a load of hipster trash. It’s okay to dislike select popular things for a valid reason, but disliking popular things for the sake of getting attention is the lowest form of content. Disliking popular things does not make you an interesting person.
And this goes far beyond movies and other forms of pop culture like music and theatre. I’m sure “Hamilton” is great and I understand why people like Beyonce (although I don’t think she’s particularly vocally talented compared to her peers). But I also don’t feel the need to insult popular trends to make me look cool. Fashion bloggers, food bloggers, memes, and life-hacking gurus—everything should be judged on a case-by-case basis. And what about food items and drinks? “Ten Reasons LaCroix is Actually Awful” is a take I’d expect to see one of these days, if it hasn’t been written already. “Pizza is Overrated.” “Gourmet Ice Cream is Un-American.” I recently had the displeasure of being told bourbon is an inferior sipping liquor. Give me a break. Thanks to these people, nonconformity is ironically becoming unoriginal.
And what’s wrong with some conformity? There’s a reason some things are popular and that other things are not. As much as I may rag on New York City for being a dirty, smelly homeless shelter, I have fun when I get the chance to visit, and it’s one of the few cities in the northeast that is resistant to the southward migration of the population. There is something to like there. There’s a reason Ferrero buys a third of the world’s hazelnuts—because people chow down on Nutella because it’s delicious. Why are guys neglecting their girlfriends to play Fortnite? Because it’s a good game. But at some point someone is going to tell you, voluntarily, without you asking, that they don’t like them, and they do this because they know they will get attention.
So it does feel a little ironic that I’m ragging on the seemingly popular act of telling everyone you dislike popular things, but maybe outside of the Internet it’s not a majority opinion. It wouldn’t be a popular thing to complain about otherwise. But I digress. The fact of the matter is that hating popular things for the sake of hating them does not make you cool or an interesting person. It makes you just another contrarian. Maybe it’s time to be relatable again, because we’ve taken hot takes about as far as they can go..
Respond
@5OClockShadow_
Shots fired at Duda
Just @ Duda
Now we just sit back and wait for “Enjoying popular things is overrated” to come out.
I hate popular and unpopular things all the same. Equal opportunity hater
Great take, but don’t think NYC is immune to the southward migration
People like or dislike popular things based on when it’s in style. Everybody is in on the “people who hate popular things are cynical hipsters” for now but in 5-7 years we’ll be back on the “popular things are overrated” train. This article should really be titled “learn to think for yourself, dipshit”.
To be honest, this has been going on since (or before) the days of “angry style reviewing” and dudes copy that style just to sound cool & unique. It’s mostly from nerdy and rocker dudes who think they’re interesting just because they made a rant on how awful modern pop music is and think they’ve made an impact because of their smug opinions made them popular or “e-famous” on the Internet. Most of them lamented of how pop culture today is not “as good” as in the 80s and 90s, but when I was a 90s kid, I’ve known people who complained about how awful pop culture was in those decades. I used to date and befriend a few of them in college because they were praised for expressing their disdain over popular things. In retrospect, they were all insecure douchebags who wanted to extreme amounts of admiration from impressionable kids.
After growing up, I’ve realized that every decade is going to have their theme and you don’t have to get into it. I’m not into Marvel’s superhero movies, Instagram makeup trends, and most of today’s pop music, but I’m not going to sit there and look down on people who love them, that’s not how I roll. They’re allowed to dislike any popular thing they want, but they need to stop acting like special snowflakes because they hate things the masses love.