If you spend any amount of time on X (formally known as Twitter), it’s hard not to notice the incredible amount of daily anxiety people experience.
It’s all over. There’s political anxiety, height anxiety, weight anxiety, relationship anxiety manifesting in an accelerating gender war, and, of course, class anxiety. And my God, the class anxiety is so painful, so fraught, and so vapid. Really, it’s so absurd you have to laugh.
In our degraded era, developing into a civilized, literate Westerner is considered boring.
“If I have to read one more post about what something ‘codes as,’ I am going to throw my phone through the (insert expletive) window.” That was my sentiment about three days before I finally muted the phrase, “codes as.”
Code breaking
For those not in the know, the latest trend online seems to be analyzing a person’s every sartorial/consumer/personal choice and determining what it says about their status. In other words, what it “codes as.”
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It gets old quickly. How many posts can be made analyzing what a car “codes as”? How many hot takes can there possibly be on the apparent class-signaling evident in how a woman does her hair? How many overwrought opinions clearly overcompensating for a hidden fear about “downward mobility” can really be sent out into the X-verse?
It appears there is no limit, no ceiling. This silly, trite — though pretending to be enlightened and insightful — discourse knows no end.
Mixed signals
We all know that we all send signals all the time. Sometimes we send them intentionally, other times unintentionally.
We understand that what we wear says something about what we value. That how we speak reveals something about our upbringing.
The watches we wear, the music we hear, the way we talk about faith, and the way we voice our disagreements with those opposite us all speak volumes. The way we talk about money — or more importantly, the way we don’t talk about money — the manners we have or the ones we don’t have, all these things are signals.
So what’s wrong with analyzing these signals?
Trend traps
Nothing. It’s the talking about it publicly. It’s a bit gauche, especially when it leads to obsessing over our own choices and what they communicate to others.
Being in a constant state of trying to anticipate trends or copy the taste of others is exhausting. To base your identity entirely on signaling as a certain class and how others see you as an embodiment of that class is silly.
It’s a sign of having no internal compass, opinion, or taste of your own. It’s a sign of extreme over-socialization. It’s closer to slavery than freedom. It’s no way to live life.
Improving your manners is good. Manners are a sign of dignified civilization. Trying to dress well out of respect for others is also good. Dressing well is a sign of decency. Becoming musically literate so as to understand some of the most beautiful music ever written is key to understanding the greatness of Western civilization. These things used to be attached to class in some way. Now, not so much.
Personality void
In our degraded era, developing into a civilized, literate Westerner is considered boring. Today, class anxiety mainly revolves around buying the right things and consuming them in the right way.
It’s what happens when one lacks a personality or confidence. It may sound strange, but it takes confidence to be who you are, enjoy what you enjoy, pursue what you believe, learn about art and culture out of genuine curiosity, and be a decent person because it’s the right thing to do.
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If you are in a constant state of reacting to the world and then becoming whoever you are based on that reaction, what are you? Is there anything in there, deep down? Do you have autonomy, or are you just a pinball bouncing around?
That’s the problem with all of this. That’s the story under the story. That’s what the obsession with what everything “codes as” reveals. A lack of self and an inability to be someone — anyone! — without first consulting the trend opinions of everyone else.
It’s a life lived for others. A life without honest direction or authentic intention.
Men’s style, Menswear, Lifestyle, Codes as, Class, Status anxiety, The root of the matter
