It all started fairly simply. Johnny Depp stars in a movie about pirates, it blows up, now everybody wants to be a pirate. The skull and crossbone logo, once only reserved for anti social high school students is now trendy, gracing bags, binders, caps and clothing. Men are now wearing crazy Jerry Seinfeld-esque puffy shirts. It has even infiltrated facebook...with applications allowing you to recruit pirates for some reason. Is Johnny Depp the only reason that pirates are popular? Are there other factors influencing this? Maybe we just love the idea of swashbuckling and stealing a cool treasure. Or maybe everyone just love a puffy shirt.
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Pirates: When will the Fad End
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You missed a key step in the Pirate fad's rise to power. It has a multi-tear support structure. I made a power point. It won't go. So I will describe it for you.
On one major branch, those high school kids you were slamming, it turned out that whatever they do, the trendy group adopts some time in the near future. This is why anti social kids go nuts! They keep having to out-anti-social the hip croud. Eventully it all gets commercialized, by places like Hot Topic. Thats why I can't admit to my friends that I don't really like 8 bit games. They are a novelty at best. Though, I can't beleive I had to get rid of my Mario ring tone after everyone else started using it. It would go off public and 53 people would reach for their pockets.
On the other major branch is the age old fued between pirates and ninjas. They are just 2 sides of the same damn coin. Socially, they share a co-evolution. When ninjas got all popular, pirates were elevated by association.
This ultimately lead to the commercialization of the pirate fad, a string of Disney movies, and at least 1 porn that I know of.
I can understand why you would think that the movie launched the fad. I mean, Disney is the only real company that keeps brutally raping the pirate fad. They have coined more pirate merchandise than anyone else.
As a cut-throat pirate myself, I have to defend my people at least a little. All of the skulls that are all over everything are not necisarirly pirate in theme. The same symbol has also been heavily accepted by the punk community. If you don't want to be forced out of the trendy punk community, savagely beaten by those skate boards all the trndy kids ride on, then you had better be sportin' at least 1 fleshless head, and maybe some leg bones for good measure.
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