Oh, the irony!
Sorry, it had to be done…

Does this crush the foundation of modern hipsters’ modus operandi? Discuss.

Irony, at least in this way of using the word, depends on intent. If you are intentionally engaging in behaviour you think is contradictory to the standard subtext then yeah, its ironic (thought I believe mocking would be a better word). If you are doing it because everyone you think of as ‘cool’ is doing it then you aren’t being ironic. You’re just being a tool. Likewise, if you are doing something you enjoy but couch it in terms of irony then you are being cowardly. If you drink PBR because you like it and want to drink a PBR then that’s great. Don’t say its because you are engaging in some sort of social commentary though. If you are drinking PBR even though you’d rather be sipping a Franzinkaner Hefe Weisse but want to make some statement then you might be ironic. Perhaps an idiot, but ironic. If you are drinking PBR when you’d rather drink something else but you can only afford PBR then you aren’t being ironic. You’re just broke.

Re: “Does this crush the foundation of modern hipsters’ modus operandi?” (~ Laura)
————
No, unfortunately not. I think the tendency to point out ironic aesthetic in hipsters is itself just another cultural group behaving by its own unspoken laws: trend journalism attempting to attach meaning to burgeoning trends. Hipsters were around before anyone felt the need to define their socio-political “statements”, and they didn’t know what statement they were even making at that point. Someone came along and said “ooh, they’re using their style of dress and social habits as a means of commenting on the social structure and folly of American culture.” That didn’t make it true across the board and it only encouraged the perception that youth with emergent (non-mainstream) “style” differences are attempting to make socio-cultural “statements”. I just don’t buy that. Remember what it was like to be a teen, a young adult, and remember how much you thought about society and culture and how little you were truly capable of making social or cultural statements of any kind, let alone a cohesive one. There’s no way all these little hipster brats are truly seeing themselves as a movement — deep down, they feel the clothes, the lifestyles, suit their unfocused and ill-defined emotional state, so they mimic or progress the perceived image. The hipsters are not undone with this catching out — the undone would be those who attempt to exploit the pseudo-causal idea of irony being so consciously utilized. Yes, some within the assumed hipster community are probably nailed with this, but the more likely recipient of the strips bullet (intentionally or not) is the group of pretenders, both public and private, who think they are latching onto a social movement, mimicking an imaginary cultural change, which will be best felled with Girl’s statement. Now let’s sit back and wait for WalMart to start selling a line of pseudo-ironic tee-shirts and too-tight, faux-retro jeans.

i like cat and girl

hahahahahaha! this is funny! I’m new to the whole webcomic business, but wow! this is so funny!!! will swing by again for sure!

yes! i very much don’t like when people do not use irony in its correct way. as in Shakespeare.

Why do I get the feeling that we will never see Alex again.

at first I sided with Girl, as I generally do.
but there’s always something snidely accurate about Cat’s observation.

Every day that passes, hyper-prescriptivism looks more and more ridiculous.
Maybe ‘ironic’ really does mean whatever Cat, Alanis Morrisette, you or I say it does.

I didn’t read it as having much to do with prescriptivism. It’s about irony as a shield.

You *can* wear a trucker hat ironically (I am not saying you should). The hat bears a message (“Redneck and Proud!”), but the fact it’s on you undercuts the message and states something entirely different (“Urban and Sort of Conflicted!”).

But a lot of people use “I enjoy this… ironically!” to disguise the fact that they actually do in fact dig on corny low-brow shit sheerly for its own intrinsic qualities. I say those people should just own up to it, and I say that as a man who owns polka albums.

Also honestly I don’t think it’s possible to ironically enjoy a food, no matter how you’re using the word.

I think we can all agree on hating good looking skinny people who are really phony and just move beyond that forever now. Please. On a totally unrelated note, I thought the cartoon about hiding behind irony was funny.

Are you trying to rip me off or something?
Ironic Preferences
Meh. I suppose great minds just think alike.

That’d be convergent observations, Christopher. I always sympathize with Girl’s taking the annals of postmodernism way too seriously.

Irony’s always been around, it’s just gaining linguistical currency and suffering from popular reductionism, like the words “random” and “literally” being used differently from their prescriptive meanings or the use of “irregardless” and “I could care less” without any attention given to their inherent irony. Irony is a means of subversion and has always been a basic tool of counterculture, and hipsters are just the most modern incarnation of a relatively nonthreatening counterculture. So there.

Are y’all not reading the last frame or what?

LONG POSTS AND IRONY DO NOT MIX WELL

When somebody “likes something ironically,” they make an ironic statement. They express their disapproval of something when everybody understands that they truly like it.

Wow, that’s the most massive burn I’ve ever read. Ten comics from now, they start talking again…

One: irony–in this sense–has not always been around. It’s a modern movement. Our forefathers weren’t necessarily smarter than us in this area, they just didn’t care about fashion and pop culture like we do, most likely because it wasn’t crammed down their throat 24/7, but that’s besides of my point. I can say with utmost certainty that no one wore grey petticoats in Victorian England to be “ironic.” They had a word for what we’ve deemed “ironic:” affectation. Because they knew my second point, which is: whether you do something ironically or not, you’re still doing it. You’re still listening to pop, or Jewel, or Journey. You’re still wearing 80’s fads, or trucker hats, or swooping your hair. And the fact is, you’re not making a statement. We, the observer, just think you look like a jackass. So stop trying to be pseudo-intellectual and do what you really enjoy.

Thinking about this a bit more thoroughly than I usually do, I think Cat may be right.

In Cat’s use of the word ironically there is a difference between the signifier and what is being signified, which counts as irony to me.

The problem is when you adopt a signifier that is deliberately at odds with the rest of your identity it rapidly becomes contextualised in that the new interest or way of speaking starts to carry meaning in terms of how it interacts with other interests.

i seriously think this is the comic that’s warranted the most extensive commentary. someone say something ironic about that.

@donricklesleftear Your rant on PBR made me laugh, I want it on a poster in my dorm.

I agree with chase’s point. Particularly if you start to claim to enjoy too many similar things ironically, then at some point you become a part of whatever subsection of society you’re pseudo-mocking. At some point you stop being seen as one who likes to make fun of it and become a part of it. Because ultimately everyone defines himself in opposition to some standard of society, and attempts to be seen in a specific light.

Even Joshua is doing exactly that; he’s attempting to define himself in opposition to those who supposedly act in a certain way so that society will view them as a certain type of person. And yet, in doing that, he’s creating that kind of persona for himself.

Ironic, don’t you think?

I use PBR to make welsh rarebit.

Then we need a different word for enjoying things that are not part of one’s own cultural context, but only when taken in consideration of their original cultural context…

Zing!!!

I like liking things “ironically” ironically.

I like PBR because the entertaining character played by Dennis Hopper in the movie “Blue Velvet” likes PBR. I dislike Heineken for the same reason.