Cool Paper Draft

James Dean was your now-cliché leather jacket style cool. Guns N' Roses were the edgy, hair-band rock lifestyle cool that is still so popular in rock music. Kid CuDi is the new-school class clown and pothead cool kid. While these different examples have certain separating factors, the most important part of their 'cool' pose is that which they all have in common; they perform the role of unique individuals who say screw you to 'the man' in order to do 'what they love'. The trend of being edgy and rebellious has been the universal slogan for cool regardless of what movement it was. From the Greasers to the Hipsters of williamsburg Coolness has, despite generational gaps, remained largely unchanged by the times. The same general ideas of cool that were held 50 years ago are still maintained, and we only see more and more aspects being tacked on to the 'cool' cork board. Examining trends of cool in the past and comparing them alongside views held today, we might be able to get a look at where cool came from, and even where its going.

My closest tie to the generation immediately prior to my own for me is my father. Having conversations with him about what life was like for him growing up gives me some minor insight into what it meant to be cool as a teenager growing up in fairly rural Ireland in the 70s. He was alive at the right time to catch the flame of the punk movement across western Europe. Bands like the Sex Pistols were gaining their fame and causing quite a ruckus for the old Catholic folk in Ireland. dad recalls times that he'd overhear other parents talk furiously about the punks who came through town, playing shows literally on trash can lids and beaten up instruments, almost for the simple sake of making noise. It was an outlet for teen angst like there never had been, and it was an embodiment of cool as we've seen it before; pretending that you don't give a fuck, that you run your own life, that you don't have to take shit from anyone....at least until you get to be 30, settle down in a respectable field, and put your 'rock days' behind you. Cool is a fickle beast, only around as long as you are young enough for it to be considered a 'phase'.


Argument 2: Results of independent research conducted into trending topics of times past.

Argument 3: Cross-examining those older ideas with the current ideas.