What

9:00am. Just had an omelet at Schafer Court Dining Center. Not the healthiest choice. Feeling pretty good after a couple drags off a menthol camel cigarette. On my way back to my dorm to do some research and homework assignments. On the way back to my dorm at Gladding Residence Halls, what do I encounter but the drone of countless identity worn youth pursuing degrees in essentially domestic professions, all going to their favorite AM classes. Not only do I encounter this, but I encounter a bombardment of North Face and Ugg boot fashioned  youth. 

Now I believe in any type of  self-expression. As long as the slightest attempt to create one's identity in any sort is an attempt and a step in the right direction at least. I think that wearing North Face and Ugg boots is no representation of any type of individual identity, but rather the attempt to avoid this agenda all together. It creates a self-prescribed uniform for daily usage and diverts any creative expression that is put forth through the many possibilities fashion leaves open. It is not the actual act of putting on a black North Face jacket in the morning and some moccasins from target or Ugg boots from Ugh land, but rather the very idea that this is appropriate attire in the 21st century that perturbs me the most. How can someone so willingly prescribe themselves to a standard of an unattributed, nondescript class that wears the same clothing, drinks the same drinks, and eats the same food is absolutely frightening to say the least. 

Essentially, what's yours is yours in life, and merely surrendering to the status quo in anything is a forfeit; a surrender at most. The appeal of North Face is analogous to the appeal of disappearance. Why is it that our culture is almost obsessed with notions of blending in to a crowd, when less and less people are participating in large groups altogether. The trend recently has been niche audiences and demassification in media abroad. 

I guess that the craving for stability must be fulfilled for the undergraduate youth of the United States by wearing a uniform clothing and prescribing to a worn stereotype voluntarily. 

And I know what you may be thinking. I am the shallowest, most nihilist cynic that ever existed and that I should leave those to have the freedom to choose what they would like to wear at any given point in their life. But, unfortunately, that is the reason for my problem with North Face exactly. Wearing North Face is not a choice, or at least a choice influenced by any personal choice, but the choice made by others that created the trend and allowed for the look to become popular. 

Whatever happened to the idea of not being popular as being cool? The "I'm so uncool I'm cool" mentality wore off quickly with the advent of the North Face mentality. What you wear is what you are to those who glance at you in passing. So make an impression, and I am not saying this in any sort of Project Runway, Tim Gunn, way at all. I think that clothing is a reflection of who one is or wants to be. So decide. Don't just fall into a stereotype that is so conveniently placed before you.