I have a recurring nightmare where I’m being stalked by a doppelganger. She looks better than me, and dresses better than me, and makes jokes that make people laugh so hard that milk shoots out their noses. In one dream, she walks in with a new top that’s exactly my style, and when I ask her where she bought it, she responds, “Actually, my dead grandmother passed it down to me–sorry!” Cut to me–wearing a shameful frown and my college puffer-mangy jeans combination for the fourth time that week. Just as it starts to feel like I’m living a remake of Black Swan, I wake up.
It’s a weird dream, but what’s weirder is how it made me realize my defiant desire to be special; unique. If you ask me: would you lose your arm or always be one step behind someone who is just like you? My response: does the missing arm make for a good story?
I don’t believe I’m alone. Across the board, people are preening in anticipation, vying for a chance to prove to the world that they are different, and hence, cool. In nearly every online trend, there’s a new distinction to be made; a new way to categorize and differentiate people. Is she the blonde to your brunette? Which one of you is dark curls and which one is watercolor eyes? Are you the mom of the group, or are you the baby? Are you a Blair Waldorf it girl or are you an Elle Woods it girl? (god forbid you be a Bella Swan pick me girl). Are you Chase Atlantic punk rock or are you Arctic Monkeys leather clad? Are you black cat or golden retriever or husky or orange cat or doberman or dachshund or chihuahua?
It feels like everyone is living the Black Swan nightmare, losing faith in their one-of-a-kind-ness, and clawing for some form of distinction. We need to complain, in an almost childlike manner, “Hey! Look at me! I’m special!” Of course, everyone is special. But have we always cared so much to prove it? Today, it is drilled into the head of every single person: Stand out. Be different. Every icebreaker asks its interviewee: “What makes you special?” The obsession with separating the self from the crowd has become pervasive. Now, from the clothes we wear to the music we listen to, there is a palpable and constant pressure to differentiate ourselves, to be saying something.
It is unclear to me whether this cultural obsession with individuality has grown in recent years to consume us, or whether I only grew to notice it. But I suspect it has evolved, and I suspect the culprit, as usual, is capitalism. In a post-Fordist capitalist landscape, everything is constantly fighting an uphill battle to differentiate–companies, brands, people. Since industrialization, things have become more and more homogenous, from the products we consume to the workplaces we dedicate half our lives to. Everyone has the same CeraVe skin wash (I give it 2/5 stars) and the same converse shoes, the same iPhone and app widgets. Everyone shares the same future: tech or finance. In a world where everyday looks like a sea of blurred faces and blurred brands, novelty and difference is sacred.
As I became more enthusiastic about thrifting and growing my tchotchke collections, two things became clear to me. #1, My wardrobe and possessions identified me with more precision than my thumbprint or any biometric data ever could. And #2, It was the tip of the iceberg (and the beginning of the end for my bank account). Because it is not just how we dress or decorate–it is also our music taste, our media intake, our dreams and ambitions. We have become what we consume.
It is no surprise, then, why we have become so fixated on thrifting and collecting; it is a means to find one-of-a-kind items which can define us, to show to the world the one-of-a-kind type of person that we are inside.
Companies did it first; they rarified products to make us consume more. New fall line, new seasonal flavor, new brand deal, limited time item drop! You make it exclusive, you make it coveted. Then comes the trusty invisible hand, and suddenly a million slightly different marketing ploys are competing with each other to sell the most product. Now, the entire cereal aisle in grocery stores is filled with identical cereals by different names.
Somewhere along the way though, our identities got mixed in with the breakfast cereal. Instead of solely being obsessed with what we consume, we have also become obsessed with how we market ourselves. We desperately advertise our identities the same way Kellogg advertises its corn flakes. Economics has become us. We view ourselves as consumers, but also view people–including ourselves–as commodities. We buy stuff to build a unique identity with which we can associate, then project that identity to sell an image of who we are.
So we obsess and stagger different aesthetics and combinations of labels to define ourselves as if to say, look, I’m relatable but different!, not so unlike the cereal aisle.
Image Credit: Michael Dornbierer/CC by 2.0 Deed via Wikimedia Commons
