"Helpsters" Are The New "Hipsters"

Has the Age of the Hipster come to an end? And if so, will "helpster" be the next word that everyone calls other people, but no one uses to describe themselves? That's the question raised in this New York Press article, which details the rise of "helpsters" — socially conscious cool kids who have stopped acting like "disaffected aesthetes with nihilistic tendencies" and started becoming "motivated and committed Samaritans."

Though they are partly to blame for the gentrification of their communities, helpsters possess a "gentrifier's guilt [that] has spurred them to want to halt any further changes, and they are increasingly working to empower and enrich their neighborhoods." So they've taken to organizing concerts by bands like They Might Be Giants to raise money for a community center in Williamsburg, launched "guerilla gardening" campaigns to create new greenspaces, held bicycle demonstrations and protests, and pushed to establish Brooklyn's own currency. Helpsters even helped New York Cares have a 30 percent increase in volunteers last year, 60 percent of whom were between the ages of 18 and 34.

The nascent helpster movement might be gaining followers, but it's not necessarily easy to convert hipsters to their activist ways. "We have a really hard time at NAG [Neighbors Allied for Good Growth] to find people who genuinely want to volunteer if there's not beer involved," said volunteer Emily Gallagher. "Seriously everything has to be like a singles event." If hipsters do embrace volunteerism, they could turn out casting it aside in a few seasons like the trucker hats of yesteryear — yet some activists remain optimistic that civic engagement might become hip.

"What would it look like to have a cultural movement that doesn't suck, that isn't 'activism'?" asked Beka Economopoulos, cofounder of the art-and-activism collective Not an Alternative. "What if Williamsburg looked that way? If we weren't just the harbingers of next season's fashion trends?" Whatever, we were into helping people like three years ago.

Contact the author of this article or email tips@gothamist.com with further questions, comments or tips.

By Ben Muessig in News on January 27, 2010 5:02 PM

Comments [rss]

Billy

Taffey Dollar wrote:

> Hey helpsters, here's an issue for you!

If you read far enough into the original NY Press article that sparked all this (as opposed to this comparatively vacuous blog post), you'll read that many of the organizations mentioned have been consistently fighting and pushing back against Big Real Estate for years now. Sucks that NYPress had to invent such a dumb, link-baiting label and then apply it towards the folks mentioned.

They could really use your help! It's all about organizing and working towards shared goals. It's up to you to get involved. The folks mentioned in the article that I know personally are normal, hard-working people who decided to get organized in their community. I don't know a single "trustafarian" among them, and contrary to the NY Press article, I don't know any of them who works in the community to absolve some sense of guilt for existing, for deciding to take up residence here.

Anyway, I would rather think, based on the tone of your comment, that you ought to encourage such activity. It's groups like these that build the kind of true grassroots organizations you need to take on entrenched issues (or state-wide office holders).

acerbicbubblegum

Wow, this comment thread really makes me hate people.

Taffey Dollar

I thought about that too, Griz. But then, I read about the Wall St. bonuses and figured just one of those bonusus could probably fund our fair city for years. And also don't forget about all the Bloomberg campaign money coming in. Compared to that, hipster money is just a drop in the bucket :)

Seriously though, I don't have much trust in trickle down economics. I get that Williamsburg, Greenpoint, Park Slope, LES are the bait big real estate uses to attract suburban $$, but the $$ trickle down to those communites and greater NYC is disproportionate to the damage it does. I'd be more comfortable if the "helpsters" would organize for some kind of tax on big RE and the money used for rent stabilization, low income housing, more tenant protections etc. No one seems to want to address the displacement and landlord/tenant law abuses that follow this kind of money grubbing. Its also sad when our attorney general and gubernatorial candidate is so obviously in the pocket of big RE. Hey helpsters, here's an issue for you!

grizzzly

I'm a fool for getting into this, but I think that in all the cultural backlash surrounding New York's "cool" we're perhaps forgetting that contemporary hip culture - of which hipsters are certainly a successful (in the Darwinian sense of the word; they have reproduced prolifically) part - drives the NYC economy in a big way. While there are certainly downsides and trade-offs (gentrification, a manhattan-centric culture, etc) all of the income, taxes and jobs created by galleries, bike shops, brunch places, and tight jean distribution centers does help to fund maintenance of parks, roads, social services, etc. citywide. So if we're going to tell all the kids to go back to Ohio, they're going to take their parents' money with them. I can't say whether the net result will be a more authentic city or a poorer one, but I do suspect that these folks who we so casually deride and tell to go home throw more money into the city than they, on average, get get back in services. TLDR: Hipsters are good for the economy and their cash is used to benefit parts of the city they don't live in.

Bike Rider

+1 for "tight jean distribution centers" :D

grizzzly

It's my hypothesis that the average pressure (in PSI) of the the male thigh (as a result of pants squeezing) increases in direct proportion to the concentration of brunch eateries in a given area, but my study is currently stalled in ethics review dependent on finding a humane way to get objective data.

wow 14th street

I am an oldster.

How the heck, born in the 1930's did I

ever do without TV, the Telephone and drugs

and read newspapers, wow!

bigmikebrooklyn

aww man, you must have been kicking yourself for not being born a few years earlier and missing out on legal coke and weed. coca cola, can't drink just one, right? I do have a legit question though, were you employed at any point as a newsie? i've just always wondered if they all really wore those hats like in that disney musical newsies. that's what the williamsburg kids should go for next, forget the flannel, waxed mustache, and confederate cap civil war lumberjack mashup, youse guys should be rocking the knickers, suspenders, and newsie hat getup, you could run up and down bedford screamin' "extry extry, read all about it, animal collective too fat for tight jeans, dash snow dead from overexposure, trust funds shrink by 30% in stagnant economy, bike lane protest at pete's candy store" you could carry a real deal newspaper around every where you go, and read it at starbucks and make fun of all the hipsters on their macs and ipads, and just when it starts to become a little tiresome, zoot suits. again!

i don't really know where i'm going with this or why i started, so... apologies.

hunter.blatherer

I don't know where you're going with this either, but I know I like it!

hunter.blatherer

You had no drugs? You didn't know the right hepsters!

Tip 'o the hat to ya, grandpa ;)

potsmoker

im not a hipster but i certainly HELP.

i donate my used trucker caps to the salvation army.

i buy my elvis glasses at thrift stores to help the environment.

i joined a facebook group, so my click counts.

i help save cats by trolling the cacc website and forwarding pictures of cute kittens to my friends asking them to adopt.

i give homeless people change, after all i voted for obama and his slogan is change.

i read on wikipedia that guilliani saved nyc on 911 and i tell all my friends how safe times square is.

kleinpeter

If they wanna help someone, send them all to Haiti and see how helpful they can be there... and see how fast they get Mommy and Daddy to fly them back safe to their Williamsburg.

blueballs

By the way, someone should tell Ben Muessig that Jen Carlson hacked into his account and began posting horse shit

wobbleSmith

frequent gothamist reader zing of the day!

unsunghiro

the ny press is still around?? why?

this article is ridiculous. i don't care what they're called, sick of the hype. when is gothamist ever going to write about trends among Brighton Beach Russians, or Tibetan restaurant owners, or 2nd generation Mexicans in NYC, god SOMETHING other than the wburg/greenpt/bushwick community.

ur doing it rong

I'll help you score some coke, if I can get a bump.

birdword

"helpster" sounds pretty cool, i hope that sticks

safetytowhere

"Yessir, these young people aren't just following trends anymore. Their newest trend is to try to help their respective communities."

1stephanie

I'll try to sound like so many others here: "Phuck philanthropy! Baaaah benevolence!"

safetytowhere

I'm all for benevolence. What I'm not for is moronic journalism that has to anthropologize every development in the northern parts of Brooklyn as some kind of hipster trend.