I absolutely hate aesthetics

What do you mean by punk aesthetics?

 

I think it's referring to the thing on TikTok where subcultures like punk and goth are watered down to simple fashion trends, or aesthetics.

 

Yeah, Celle (a tattoo artist on YouTube) talks about it in one of her recent videos.

 

I definitely hear what OP is saying here, because a lot of folks don't even understand what punk and goth actually are or stand for due to how much the actual subcultures have been oversaturated and capitalized. Especially with social media and companies promoting "microtrends" more than actual alt media is being talked about or discussed on any platforms. Of course, there's no one simple solution to this capitalist bullshit, but there are definitely ways we can combat it collectively. After all, the commodification of our subcultures is unfortunately nothing new, as I'm sure many of my elder punks (who've been in the scene longer than I) can attest to. To be honest though, the labeling aspect has also always gotten under my skin. What I mean by this is when people just look at someone's clothes and assume they're emo,goth,punk, etc. That part's a real pet peeve, but in actuality, it doesn't by large do much harm. Not until alt only starts to mean an edgy kid wearing all black and shopping at overpriced shops, which seems to be all it means to most folks now. How have all of you dealt with this personally? How shall we kill what is killing punk/alt scenes (crapitalism) before it kills us?

 

here's a tip for ya: get of social media. i only use youtube of all those websites but thats mostly for downloading mp3s to later burn em down on cd or put them in my flip phone's memory card. social media makes people more stupid, most forms of online entertainment does if not used in moderation; but social media is the worst by far. its nice to live in your own bubble like people used to before the rapant use of social media, to live in the now and live your own life with the actual people in your life etc etc

 

"Aesthetics"? I guess that is how younger people refer to 'posers' these days. The problem is you are so focused on them that you are on social media consuming their bullshit. And the way social media operates where it keeps feeding you the crappiest of the crap, you fall into the vicious circle of sorts. You hate the poser shit on social media but the social media keeps giving you the poser shit that makes you miserable. It's a trap of crap. I occasionally watch some of those well-known YouTube "punk" channels out of curiosity or boredom (or stupidity) but always click the "Do Not Recommend Channel" if I find myself getting too annoyed. I focus on things that make me happy (or at least try).

But either way, posers will always be around. Even as a kid, decades ago, I never let them annoy me. I didn't want to associate with them or have people think I associated with them so I wouldn't dress like them. I remember seeing some preppy at high school wearing a Misfits shirt and thought to remind myself to not buy a Misfits shirt. This was way before they reformed without Danzig, but their status was already breaking out of the underground when Heavy Metal clowns Metallica had already started to wear their shirts and cover their songs. When some bands were getting more well-known and their stuff was more recognizable I went deeper underground. If I felt DK, Exploited, Subhumans, etc. were too well-known I veered towards BGK, Vicious Circle, Upright Citizens, etc. Of course, I had to make my own band shirts because some of those weren't being sold. Then I started designing my own original graphics on shirts. And the thing was I rarely wore black shirts. I hated looking like everybody else that were always wearing black band shirts so I would make my designs out of red, yellow, blue, purple or whatever other color.