afrodesiaq:

niggazinmoscow:

It’s the circle where people pretend the American Dream is real so want the aesthetic that shows they worked their way out

so when i was a teenager, i was homeless, and also did a lot of activism surrounding the issue of homelessness among queer youth. occasionally some newspaper or magazine etc would do an article about this activism.

there was one time that stands out to me in particular because a fashion magazine had done an interview with me and subsequently sent folks to do a photoshoot to accompany the article. they had a stylist they sent down to select clothes for the photo shoot who, i am dead serious, was picking out clothing they thought fit The Homeless Teenager Aesthetic. artfully pre torn and frayed $250 jeans (studded, for extra Edge, with a skull design. in rhinestones.) a $70 tank top with Graffiti Print Design. (the clothes did, in fact, still all have price tags on; i gathered they had some sort of policy around keeping them in Like New condition for… return? reuse on different photoshoots? i wasn’t really clear on what happened after they had served out their life making real homeless teenagers look fake homeless.)

i tried explaining that this was Kind Of Silly and didn’t actually look anything like the clothes i wore, since what with the homelessness and it being chicago and, uh, cold, i preferred my clothes as hole-free as possible for as long as possible in order to be alive.

but they were very insistent. people will expect you to look the part.

and, you know… subsequently go out and buy the expensive clothing that tells them exactly how to look the part, from the comfort of their cushy homes.