Aesthetics rule

knightly@pawb.social to 196@lemmy.blahaj.zone – 816 points –
85

I thought thigh highs and cat ear headsets are the style of the modern hacktivist?

20 years ago, it was The Matrix. 10 years ago, Guy Fawkes masks. Thigh highs and cat ears are the least cringy of the possibilities to date.

to be fair, while not much of a hacker since the days when you could just open windows and delete the password, most of my casual wardrobe could pass for 'cozy pyjama party matrix cosplay'.

but new images are always nice.

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That, or a fursuit! There's definitely a current aesthetic imo, but obviously it's a generalization that not everyone fits, as has always been the case.

It's either that or a fursuit

A dude in a full Fox fursuit is the face behind the string of shutdowns that slowed the nation to a halt. I can see it now, FBI dragging the poor guy out of his room, knocking over models and plushies off his desk as he struggles to get his message out to the public.

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Wow, I can't believe nobody's even bothered to mention the style from the definitive hacker movie. Just absolutely gobsmacked. You may not like it, but this is what peak performance looks like:

Notably missing from this picture: rollerblades, fingerless gloves, neon dyed hair, tons of fishnets (which I guess you could probably stylize as fish.nets or something), puffy vest, etc.

In my day, being a hacker meant dressing like a weird raver/punk and sending people a GIF of a laughing skull, and that's how we liked it

They dressed like JP from Grandmas Boy.

It's literally part of hacker-ethics to not judge people by their fancy exterior:

Hackers should be judged by their acting, not bogus criteria such as degrees, age, race, or position.

https://www.ccc.de/en/hackerethics

Thanks for posting this!

For those who aren’t familiar - CCC is the chaos computer club, they have lots of talks and events all about tech, politics, intel, hacking/security, etc.

Great resource to socialize with

I believe that’s the origin of “tits or GTFO” came from too, a cringey way of saying that they don’t care if your a girl if you say something dumb online. Though predictably it morphed into incel taunts and male chauvinist bullshit once the meaning was lost.

ccc.de is the Chaos Computer Club? How is that spelled in German? Computerchaosclub?

FFS this comment section is mostly people misunderstanding that John is likely saying this tongue in cheek.

People need to brush up on their cinema.

Even his face always looks like he's waiting for you to laugh at the funny thing he said

I think most anti status quo people wouldn’t be interested in the clothing industrial complex

Maybe people are just more comfortable expressing themselves in different and unique ways that don’t conform to one “outfit/style”

Punk tends to lean towards modifying what you have with what tools are available, and shopping second-hand. As a bonus, the inherent aesthetic is harder for the fashion industry to co-opt.

The punk aesthetic was invented by a man who owned a fashion label and had his own storefront.

He ripped it off from a man who was one of punk's founding fathers.

Give us a name to go with the face, at least.
I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that's Richard Hell.

Correct!

For those not in the know, he was a member of a number of New York punk bands in the 70s. Malcolm McLaren nicked his style (along with that of others) and brought it over to England to sell in his clothing store Sex.

Punk, like 80s punk? Safety pin piercings, jackets with the arms torn off, covered in handsewn patches, egg-white hair glue?

I think hand repaired and hand sewn stuff could easily be it. “I made this dress before taking down the stock exchange”

Maybe. But it's a craft that takes a lot of practice to get good at, and a lifetime to master.

Yeah, you can't expect to be successful the first time you try to take down a stock exchange

I still don’t think anyone who’s in the hacktivist scene really gives a shit or at least doesn’t give a shit on whole any more than any other group does.

Let me spend several months trying to identify exploits while siting at my computer but also take the time every day to coordinate a cute outfit…

We're the black hoodie guy, which is the media aesthetic the way Ninjas are decked in Kabuki black.

Real ninjas look like peasants because they're covert operatives. Hacktivists look like lower class tech geeks with a band or brand tee (maybe an overworn prized possession like a 1980s Apple tee). The thing is, we willfully choose to look bland, to be not noticed.

I met Waters once at a viewing of Pecker. The dude is a gem.

He was on my Southwest flight to LAX in 2001 and there was a palpable buzz among the pax.

Then ran into him while we were waiting for our rides at the white zone, which is for loading and unloading only.

I presented him with a super tacky giant gold coat button I had just found at a payphone as if it was an achievement award, and had a fun quick chat. Lovely and delightful guy.

When I met him, we had some absurd questions during the audience participation part. My friend asked, "suburban Baltimore is such an interesting backdrop for a movie. Both mundane and interesting. As a young black artist in America, I'd like to know what you think about lowriders."

My other friend had him sign her maxipad wrapper. This friend also happens to be the nice of Patsy from Ab Fab.

a what

When you get together with the homies and view each other's peckers in a heterosexual way

ah, like the business card scene from american psycho

"Look at that subtle off-white coloring. The tasteful thickness of it. Oh my God, it even has a watermark..."

Yes please fit into a nice cultural box so you’re easy to profile, entice and hunt

Edit to say you don’t need an age to be an activist. Does hacktivism have an age? Idk I guess younger folks are more likely to do it right now. Maybe hacktivism just needs a democratizing platform. Like enable grandma to ddos

Personally I think the modern activist should dress like Devo

We are living through a devolution, after all.

But not the Mayan pyramids Devo, I wanna see the potato bodies of the "Oh No It's Devo!" phase.

I do feel kind of simillarly betrayed. Watch Dogs were my forst point of reference into what hacker subcultures look like, and it has shaped a large part of my life - next month i's going to be 5 years I've worked as a Red Teamer in a cybersec company. I'm also mostly a poser, and the aesthetics simply makes it way more fun - making art that's tied into what you do is great, assuming you dont take it too seriously, of course. Not that I do it, but the way Watch Dogs portraied it, it was fun.

Is it neccessary? Of course not. Is it a shame there aren't many hackerspaces with cool street art, and hacktivists making over the top manifests ajd cool streetart around our town? A little bit.

black hoodie in a dark room, maybe even a guy fawkes mask