This might be a useful image for talking about the commodification of protest and “alternative” culture. It was being sold at the H&M store in Pasadena. It’s the latest in a progression of the co-opting of the punk aesthetic–first stores like Hot Topic started selling clothing with rips and safety pins and such in them, so you could go pay a lot of money for pre-packaged punk or goth looks. Now it’s gone a step further where they no longer even bother to put a real safety pin in–now you just get pictures of safety pins, meant to evoke that sense of non-conformity in the safest, most easily-marketed way possible, along with your Sum 41 (or whatever their name is) CD.
Comments 7
Brady — December 4, 2007
Heck, you could say that the commodification of punk started with Malcolm McLaren, the Sex Pistol's manager, who came to the US, saw the New York Dolls, went back to Britain, and started selling the $#!^ out of "punk" fashions in his London boutique.
Sociological Images » THE COMMODIFICATION OF NOSTALGIA — July 6, 2008
[...] remind me of this T-shirt with pictures of safety pins on it. When you’re so old school that you, um, buy a t-shirt [...]
Sociological Images » CO-OPTING SUBCULTURES: GOTH PUNK BARBIE — November 29, 2008
[...] other examples of the commodification of punk or alternative subcultures, see here and [...]
Sociological Images » GUEST POST: REBELLION + AUTHENTICITY * COMMODITY = PROFIT! — December 1, 2008
[...] other examples of the commodification of sub- (counter?) cultures, see here and here. addthis_url = [...]
Arkilokus James — December 2, 2008
The commodification thesis assumes (1) that there are authentic alternative/countercultural spaces wholly distinct from and/or opposed to mainstream capitalist culture and (2) that these authentic alternative/countercultural space eventually become appropriated by mainstream culture, thus getting absorbed back into the capitalist system.
These assumptions have been roundly critiqued. See Thomas Frank, The Conquest of Cool. He's sloppy and irritating at times, but he's got a point. More generally, see Adorno and Horkheimer, The Dialectic of Enlightenment, especially the chapter on the culture industry. They, too, are sloppy and irritating at times, but they, too, have a point.
The critique is basically that these supposedly authentic alternative/countercultural spaces were never really all that authentic to begin with, that they and the supposedly counter-hegemonic values they espouse are creations of business culture, and that if you want a genuine alternative to the mainstream, you need to look somewhere else. For Adorno and Horkheimer, you have to look to so-called high culture; for Frank, it's...well, he's not really very clear on that point, but you get the idea.
The Commodification of Rebellion » Sociological Images — January 26, 2010
[...] more examples of commodified resistance, see our posts on the (not a real) razor necklace, H&M’s safety pin shirt, goth punk Barbie, “pre-stressed” guitars, and Ben and Jerry’s ice cream. [...]
Caramel Hitaco — July 17, 2021
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