Quirky App Of The Day: Emo Quiz
by Kathryn Zane
June 21, 2011
First of all, what is "emo?" Emo is an abbreviation for the word "emotional." An emo kid usually wears black with Converse shoes, skinny jeans, the rocker hair from the 80's, and talks about the uselessness of caring about life. Everything revolves around sad music that most of us are too involved with corporate music labels to have ever heard of. When life has become too overwhelming, cutting is the best release and scars are more trophies than tragic. Fishnets are a fashion must, and eyeliner is unisexual.
Is this stereotyping a group of people trying to make a statement about personal expression? Yep. Take a stroll through some websites like Go Cry Emo Kid to get a good look at some of the styles that pervade in the community. Well, the site is actually dedicated to the overly dramatic and melancholy nature of the fashion, but it's still a good reference point for what an emo kid looks like.
Each decade since the 1950's beatniks has had its own derivation of the original source. The 1960's were the intellectuals who were in the monumental shift from structuralism in art and writing to post-structuralism following the divergence from democracy to communism in both Russia and France (both of which played a huge shaping in the literary and academic world).
The black and bleak nature came from new philosophy of the "death of the author" and the "death of the reader." All points relative to those who read, saw, or heard the art was irrelevant to the art itself. What was left to the art, I don't know. The rejection of the generally accepted practices of the masses came in a time of confusion of government unease and social tumult. The Americans were experiencing the JFK assassination, and the middle of the Vietnam War. France's government had failed and different factions for democracy and communism a like were rallying. The world was immersed in The Cold War. Nothing was certain, and no one was trustworthy. Everything in literature, music, and art was reflecting the inability to take the face value of the piece. Even how the piece should be interpreted was turned on its head.
The 1970's and 1980's saw the rise in punk fashion. Coming from the UK in the 1970's, it hit popular heights in the 1980's in America. The printing of purposefully offensive clothing (T-shirts with profanity or pro-nazi themes) became popular and sold at stores with equally offensive names like SEX. The studs accenting the leather jackets of Greasers of the 50's and the bangles of 60's became popular as well.
The 1990's saw the real emergence of the goth. The combination of the extreme fashion of the punks with the nihilism of the beatniks. The subculture is known for their obsession with death, dark fantasy, and artistic nature. Makeup for men became more popular and prevalent in the goth culture. Like black fingernail polish with matching lipstick and hair dye.
Now, we have emo kids. The term "goth" is being reserved for those who are little older. The younger generation is taking up the title of emo. Why in the world would I go through all that history just for the sake of a silly emo quiz? Why would I waste my precious breath in a subculture that I don't believe in? Because people don't change. That's why.
The Emo Quiz acts more for me as an indicator of the same return to the same roots that happened back in the fifties. Once the world stopped believing that the person mattered in art of any kind, the obsession of death seeped in to main culture. It's true, many emo kids, goths, beatniks, hippies, greasers, and punks will all defiantly raise a fist to the air that they are, in fact, different, and the world is full of posers. I think I've illustrated well enough that the only ones that get a claim to originality are the greasers and the beatniks. Everyone else is a reformation, adding its own personal tastes and definition of the corporate man.
The Emo Quiz shows the current fads of rebellion. Someday, my kids will grow up, and they will have their own names for what they believe to be social rebellion. They will also go on about how enlightened they are compared to the world around them. Then, they'll ask me for a ride to the local hang out place of their compatriots.
I don't believe in blind obedience. I never have. I don't believe in blind rebellion. I never will. I believe in the power of the individual. When a movement in fashion and culture is so influential that it gains its own terminology and begins attacking other groups as a whole, then the power of the individual loses ground. The power of the group starts imposing rules and regulations on what is and is not acceptable.
Singular attributes are nothing new. They've been around since the day the human race began. Our individuality is the sum of our parts. I've mapped out stereotypes. Nothing more. I've said nothing of the hopes, aspirations, or life styles of the people who were in an of themselves individuals.
So take a quiz. Have some fun with it. It's really funny. Just know that if you're obsessed with establishing yourself as something different from "mainstream culture," you have a better chance defining yourself as "me" than if you tag yourself as an emo.
[gallery]
The Emo Quiz is available at iTunes for the awesome price of FREE!
