HW 37 - Final Draft

Cool. So many things can mean cool. Now in this day and age, people think the key to being accepted is by being cool. Whether it's trying to wear expensive clothing, getting tattoos. Getting piercings everywhere. The whole nine yards. Cool is a pose that creates a certain identity for a person. Like trying dressing a certain way to create this type of role so you can be that cool person. Everything that we do is caused by society’s image of how life should be and how people should be in order to be that special someone. People weren't born with a million piercing or a fitted cap. We are putting costumes on to create ourselves, all for the purpose of being accepted and cool at the same time. People act out as a person that differs their appearance and personality in order to be cool and fit in as the person who is well known and accepted.

What is cool to someone who is already accepted? When you are already accepted as being that "cool" person there are a lot of things that come along with that pose. You have the power of choosing who you want to hang out with and you decide in some ways whether or not. Cool only signifies to other people that you are somewhat better than somebody. It can also lead to having people think that you can be a leader in some ways. Cool is just a name that people want to have as part of their personality. That’s why people who are cool tend to get most of the attention. People want to be like them and admire them. It's like a goal that people, more like teens, try to strive for so they can have those types of "benefits".

One tactic people tend to use to try and become cool is dressing up and wearing expensive clothing. Trends have been a significant part in this tactic. People look at trends and they scope it out and see what people’s reactions towards it are. If that trend is what leads to being cool, then that was people would start to follow that trend as well because they feel that is the route that would lead them to acceptance. Cool is a “Stance of individual defiance” (Cool Rules), it puts a person in a state of mind where they have to do everything in their power to be cool. People use clothes because it’s their exterior part and that’s what people tend to judge and go by. As Andy said in class it’s “Forming ourselves to this particular character”. People wear these clothes because it’s part of this cool act. These expensive clothes in some cases is part of this cool act because you want to show people that you have so much money and that you want to be center of attraction. Great attraction from people defines cool in some ways and that is what makes people want to be dumb, expensive clothes so they can portray this type of image. When I interviewed my brother about why he liked wearing expensive clothing he said “Ladies.” Stuff like that is the perfect example of why people wear expensive name brand stuff. Attraction is one of the keys to being cool. And yourself up in these clothes is what people think would give them this cool attraction. People dress up and want this main attraction by wearing expensive clothing in order for them to feel cool and feel accepted.

People also use hair as another way of trying to be cool. For girls it’s the long hair in a nice style or the Halle Barry type of style, and for boys it’s the short cut with the shape up and the waves in their head. Hair is a very personal trait in a person. It’s a powerful trait due to the fact that it is part of your external appearance. And external appearance is everything to a person that wants to be cool. The 4 principals of hair is length, color, quantity, and styles. And this is so important for a person who tries to be cool because this is what people who are cool do; they put their hair in certain styles and customize themselves with these principals. “Hair is one of the most powerful symbols of individual and group identity. Powerful because it is physical and it’s in the public.” (P. 103). People change the way their hair is and make it to look acceptable to the external world so they can be in the circle of cool. Hair and the type of styles that people have is only one of the many ways people use to change their appearance in order to become cool to the outside world.

Dick Pountain explains the change in a person’s personality when trying to be something that he isn’t and wanting to be cool. He talks about this kid who decides to take over his inner personality with trying to buy stuff for his outer self that is the total opposite of the kind of person he is. He is trying to change his personality. “Cool’s real work is done inside: inside the seventeen-year-old lad who spends his money on deodorants and Tommy Hilfiger and likes what he sees in the mirror (while fighting down his internal panic that his true feelings might rise up and overwhelm him.)(P.22). He changes his external personality from what his real feelings are because that is the only way he would be accepted. He realizes that even though his inner personality isn’t cool he decides to change; because that’s the only way he is able to be known. By him doing this and have split and changed personalities, it shows how people would differ who they are on the outside just so they can be in this world of cool and be accepted in this “cool” people society.

Cool is only a way of showing people you are somebody in this world. People would do anything to be cool whether it is changing the way their hair looks, or wearing expensive clothes and jewelry, or even changing your personality to better your appearance. Throughout all of this, it clearly shows that people change their personality and their appearance in order for them to feel like they are being accepted and wanted in this whole cool circle that everybody gets judged by.

cool rules text
hair text
family survey blog entries
andy quotes