[dimitar]

Well you can make the case that people don't have to dress a certain way because we are much better insulated (metaphorically and literally) from the environment. And there are of course no sumptuary laws.

So clothing can be more fun, if people want to of course - look at how music subcultures have incredibly varied ways of expression through clothing - metalheads, hiphopheads, punks etc.

[atoav]

I think you hit gold there, todays lack of interesting clothes is in my eyes related to two things:

- market logic made work clothes boring (think about guild clothing, the only interesting thing I see from time to time is the chimney sweeper)

- less people are inclined to feel part of a subculture and/or express that in their fashion choices

As someone who was a teenager in the 2000s, back then I had at least 6 different outwardly recognizable subcultures in my school class (Metalhead, Punk, Hiphop, Emo, Raver, Goth) and that was more or less normal within my generation.

My small brother and nieces were teenagers during the mid 2010s and in their class all people looked the same. Not only did they look the same, they felt the pressure to all look the same and get similar brands and so on. It just appears that it is a more conforming generation, maybe due tonthe role social media started to play for them. When I grew up social media existed but in a class of 25 maybe half would use it (maximum). And all social media algorithms were strictly chronological.

[_DeadFred_]

Young people today have as many self imposed rules as my grandmother used to have. Rules about being cool. Rules about gatekeeping. They would 100% be calling people out for wearing white during the wrong season back in the day, only they'd call it clowning on them as if it's any different.

[colechristensen]

These are things that go in cycles. When people have been doing things in a bunch of subcultures it becomes "ugh, why are you trying so hard to be different" and when people have being all doing the same thing for a long time it's "ugh, why are you trying so hard to fit in". You hit a peak then everybody gets disillusioned and starts doing something different. It's cool to be ahead of the trend.

[082349872349872]

So how, instead of with clothing, do subcultures express themselves now? By choice of memes? Which fanfic they read? Do people wear boring clothes but pick subculture-signifying avatars?

EDIT: Looks like goths are still a thing? https://www.youtube.com/shorts/zjg1P_2IPOQ

[colechristensen]

What happened is all of the counterculture/subcultures/whatever got so popular and kind of mellowed out and melted together into a bunch of samey stuff.

Like how music went through this phase where "not mainstream" music started getting really cool but now all of those sounds are just what everything sounds like now, you can't rebel against mainstream music right now.

[shadowerm]

This had always happened. Metallica is a great example of music that was once underground becoming huge and popular.

What changed is there is no new "underground" culture to take the place of what had become popular and mainstream.

Witch house in 2009 or so I think was the last gasp of the underground before shortly running out of air.

Now young people just doomscroll tiktok instead.

[082349872349872]

That may be true, but I'd be willing to bet that in 2038 we'll be able to go on whatever the successor to YouTube might be, and find someone commenting, somewhere, that a particular clip "was the last of the real ${ADJ} ${NOUN} genre" and that the young people don't realise that what they call music can't hold a candle to 2031.

Lagniappe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQxq_-dWYsc (in the fine tradition of pastiches combining video with unrelated audio)

[harimau777]

The way that I've heard it described is that capitalism now appropriates any subcultures that arise. That both serves as an avenue for profit and has the added benefit of suppressing anything that might inspire people rebel against the status quo.

[colechristensen]

This is just a weird attempt at being edgy about capitalism.

A new subculture either grows or dies, if it grows people start making money off of it and it gets diluted by the popularity into something more beige and palatable. It isn't about capitalism it's just when you add more people, they take it less seriously and hardcore becomes bland.

[shiroiushi]

>look at how music subcultures have incredibly varied ways of expression through clothing - metalheads, hiphopheads, punks etc.

Metalheads? Huh? I like metal, but metal fans are some of the most boring dressers I've ever seen. Go to any metal show and you'll just see a bunch of guys wearing jeans and black T-shirts from their favorite bands' prior concert tours. Some of the musicians used to dress pretty flamboyantly back in the hair-metal days of the 1980s, but those days are long past; the musicians these days are in their 60s and dress rather casually and plainly.

[saaaaaam]

Sure, but if you put a metal fan alongside a punk and a hip hop fan you’d be able to tell the difference, right?