Time Magazine’s Hipster Parenting Article: The Blogosphere Reacts
First, I know, I used the word “blogosphere.” I apologize. Second, in case you haven’t heard, James Poniewozick wrote an article for Time Magazine last week essentially saying that so-called “hipster parents” are, as Aidin Vaziri of The Poop puts it: “douche bags.”
Because Poniewozick singled out Babble as “part of the problem,” as it were, you best believe that we here at Strollerderby had something to say about it. Those of us connected with Babble/Strollerderby also chose to address the article on our personal blogs.
But other bloggers chimed in as well. Mo Comedy called Poniewozick out for failing to see the irony of being a douche bag hipster parent writing about how lame hipster parents are. CrunchyCarpets
writes a blog post which I think supports Poniewozick’s position, but I
couldn’t quite tell because she makes a big to-do about her husband
bonding with her kid while playing XBox. (Isn’t that a hipster parent
rite of passage?) She claims that the ripe old age of 37, she’s an “old
fart Gen Xer/old nerd” who thinks sites like Babble aren’t geared for
her. (CrunchyCarpets, as a fellow 37-year-old “old fart Gen Xer,”
please accept my apologies for failing you.) Brian is kinda ambivalent. And, of course, the child free sites are having a field day with such an easy target. “Hardcore!”
If
you’ve read the article and have something to say about it please let
us know by commenting and/or linking your posts below. Now if you’ll
excuse me, I have to take my kids to get new leg warmers right after
they get their faux-hawks trimmed. Otherwise they’ll look like complete
fools at the Franz Ferdinand concert we’re going to later. After we
stop for sushi and colonics, of course.
Hi!
I look information about [url=http://insurance-marketing.lll1l.info]insurance marketing[/url] or [url=http://life-insurance-settlement.erw1r.info]life insurance settlement[/url]. May be you advise me other sites?
Good God, I’m in highschool again, the cool vs. the uncool parent. What exactly makes a “cool” parent? The parent who acts more like a friend than an authority figure? I think we all know the dark path that leads us down.
The bottom line is, if you are doing your job as a parent and setting rules and boundaries for your kids in order to shape them into wise, well rounded adults, somewhere along the road your child will see you as uncool. And that’s okay. That’s the way it is supposed to be, it’s a right of passage in parentdome.
Hello!
PingBack from http://www.kellybeanz.com/?p=398
http://kellyology.blogspot.com/2007/02/hipster-parenting-not-so-trendy-after.html
James Poniewozik, author of the much Babbled about “Too Cool for Preschool” piece in this week’s Time Magazine, kindly agreed to answer some of our questions about his problem with hip parent bloggers and writers. STROLLER DERBY: You seem concerned that
First of all, the time article was beyond bad – it lumped a bunch of blogs with different personalities together with a very weak argument about kids in the spotlight. The article just did not make sense. It seems that the article itself was written more for hype then anything, and maybe the person who wrote it’s kids will be embarrassed reading it. Would be kinda ironic if that happened.
All I can say, is if I looked back at a blog my mom wrote (my mom does not have a blog but she does try to skype me now and then) where she put me in a sex pistols onsie – I would think that is much cooler then the uncomfortable dresses I was put in. So moms and dads – blog on!
I found the article greatly disturbing and had to address the issue as well.
http://weirdgirl.typepad.com/home/2007/02/rolling_with_el.html
As a dorky suburban mom, I was surprised to find that Time had lumped in my blog, Baby’s First Blog, with the likes of Babble and AlternaDad. But I do think there’s another theme that ties all of us together that no one has addressed yet in all their solipsistic naval gazing about what kind of parent label they aspire to, or not. Namely, what will all this parental oversharing do to our kids? We make choices for our kids all the time and hope we are doing the right thing. The best I’ve done is try to keep stuff off the blog that will embarrass my daughter when she’s a teenager (or worse yet, traumatize her). I had a fairly fucked up childhood and the last thing I want to do is fuck up my kid. But yeah, I still have the blog.
PingBack from http://peruseme.com/parenting/?p=101
Jah, that’s petty. Stick with comments of substance, please, or keep your confusion to yourself.
“It doesn’t matter how you raise the kid, as long as he/she turns out to be a descent human.”
Jah shake his dreads in confusion. What is a “descent human”? Is this statement of Darwin – man descent from the ape? A human like Jacques Cousteau who always descent into the ocean? A child forced to only go DOWN the stairs? It hard enough to grasp concept of hipster. This only add to Jah’s utter cluelessness.
Jah
http://southernmomof2.blogspot.com/2007/02/not-hip-nor-young-nor-urban-but-always.html
It doesn’t matter how you raise the kid, as long as he/she turns out to be a descent human.
Yeah, I don’t fit into the mold of a Dad in dockers, driving a Volvo and reading Time magazine while the wife bakes cookies. So what.
http://vampdaddy.blogspot.com/2007/02/hipster-in-me.html
Those of us who are a little older (42) and whose kids are a little older (11) had to suffer through our loss of alterna-status without the comfort of blogs to reassure us that we could still be hip and be parents. Once your kids get to be tweens, they will tell you you are too old to still be listening to that music or wearing those clothes. My kid has a strong sense of what a Mom is supposed to be like — and I am not measuring up. He tells me I can dye my hair pink and ride a moped when he’s grown and out of the house, but not before. Still he is growing up to be what I consider an awfully cool kid and I like to take the credit. He likes WWE, sure, but he also listens to the Pogues and the Sex Pistols. And he is the most politically aware kid in middle school.
I read the Time article and thought it was B.S. 1) a tad bit hypocritical 2) it lumps “hipster” parents all together as if they/we are all the same with the same values, parenting styles.
I don’t consider myself a “grup” or “hipster” but I do some things that may label me as such. I sometimes pine for the days that I smoked cigarettes (and more). I drink in front of my daughter. I go to special stores own sometimes to find cute, ethinically relevant clothes, because you can’t find a cheung sam just anywhere and Asian American themed clothes aren’t sold at Macy’s. She listens to all kinds of music, not just Barney or the Wiggles and she has an iPod dedicated to her. I sometimes get frustrated with having to go home from a wedding early to tuck her in, because I wanted to dance. But I do go home early. I blog on occasion, though due to the lack of complete anonymity and love of raging against the in-laws, I’ve had to cut down.
If that makes me a hipster to others, I can’t help that. I don’t feel hip, I don’t look hip, I don’t think hip. If that makes me a bad parent, we have totally different definitions of parenting and you can keep your judgements to yourselves. You being generic and not specific to any one poster.
I have to say that I love Babble and parents blogs in general. Some many bloggers, so many opinions -some I agree with, some i don’t – so much free advice. I feel like I’m not alone and since most of my friends don’t have kids yet I don’t have a lot of people to turn to here.
I honestly think that my parents were pretty similar to us, but they didn’t have the internet to publically talk about parenting. But they bought Dr. Spock and other parenting books. How is that any different than Babble really? He was a pediatrician so he could get scientific and he had cred then. But I think we can all agree that parenting is a learn as you go experience and it’s nice to hear support and advice or to get slapped upside the head in a constructive manner on sites like Babble.
PingBack from http://blog.rookiemoms.com/too-cool-for-preschool-not-me-i-wish/
Birdgal, I think you make an excellent point. Many of us who write for Strollerderby are not big-city dwellers. I moved from San Francisco to the ‘burbs just 3 weeks ago. (No one handed me a Kenny G CD and a pair of sensible flats the moment I crossed the border.) I think “urban” is a state of mind. We may live in the city or the sticks, but share the same sensibilities. Perhaps those sensibilities are as simple as that as parents, we don’t want to lose our sense of self but that doesn’t mean we don’t know how to love and care for our children. There is no “one size fits all” parenting site or blog as far as I know. If Babble/Strollerderby offers a perspective you can relate to no matter where you live, then we’re doing our job.
I have not read the Time magazine piece, but have read all of the entries here on Strollerderby, as well as the readers’ responses. Is it just me, or does this whole debate seems like a useless us vs. them rhetorical exercise–and for both sides equally?
Coming from Europe, I can’t help thinking that this is a conversation that would not even occur in most countries there. Like birdgal above, I don’t consider myself particularly “urban” or “hipster” but I appreciate much of what Babble has to say. Likewise, I tend sometimes to put my son above all else, and while I do plan to have a career (an Identity, you see), I am not in a hurry to do so yet. I read Babble and Babyzone with equal amounts of curiosity. I relate somewhat to both sets of readership.
So, I just don’t understand what the big deal about hip vs. non-hip parents is. What if most people are neither?
I just don’t get all this ‘label’ crap. I live in a decidedly non-hipster southeastern state, in the SUBURBS, clothe my daughter in pink occasionally, and own no ‘ironic’ onesies. But even though I have a child, I still have my own identity! Imagine that! I see Babble as an alternative to such things as Parenting and appreciate the different perspective that Strollerderby and the other blogs bring to child rearin’ in the 21st century. I may not be the ‘urban’ parent that Babble is being marketed to, but I’m sure as hell not ‘offended’ by it. Let’s try to see beyond the labels, shall we?
PingBack from http://crunchycarpets.com/archives/77
PingBack from http://crunchycarpets.com/archives/77
And here I thought parenting was going to be a safe haven of squareitude, the ONE thing I could do without having to worry about whether or not I was “cool.”
Damn you people.