HW#37 Final cool paper

Whats does being cool mean to you?

Most people would say that being cool is about fitting in, and being liked by nearly everybody, yet be envied, to be beautiful, stylish, and have a great personality, which varies with each person. People waste money to get expensive cool things, to make people like them more, because humans fear being alone. So coolness is a type of armor people wear to protect themselves from being uncool and the loneliness that comes from it.

From most of the people i asked about what being cool is like, they all said fitting in as the major thing about being cool, and some other traits, like tattoos, dying the hair, and looking good and having a nice personality, and a one or two said that being yourself is cool. When asked where they got this idea from, they mentioned things like magazines, TV, celebrities, and friends, which contradicts the part of being yourself because how can you be yourself when everything you do was taught to you, and influenced you. Like for example you were taught to act politely to people with power from your parents and teachers, and you were influenced by your friends and the media to act another way to be more cool, and fit in more, like getting a tattoo or piercing even though some parents dont like either of those things. So we can never really say we're being our true self when our true self is the result of all the teachings and influences you've gotten in your life.

To me being cool is someone who, again, fits in, someone who has a cool style, and has a nice, yet kind of bad assy personality, and is open to things. For example this story i wrote portrays what i consider is a cool person:
She had her choppy layered dyed a deep red hair pin up with some strands in her face, she had this bored yet patient expression on her face as she play with her piercings while she listen to her friend talk on and on.
"I just dont know what to do anymore, one minute hes all over me, and maddd sweet and the next hes around a bunch of other girls and acting like he never said those sweet words to me"
she sighs and looks her friend in the eye and speaks with a calm almost voice
"look dude, i really think you should just get over him, hes obviously just looking for some ass, so why dont you do yourself a favor and not be interested in him anymore" she puts her hand on her friends shoulder and grips it gently "you deserve better, so dont sweat over it"
her friend smiles, and seems to feel better
"you know, you're right, thanks you're the best" the friend hugs her, and says with a grin "you know if i was bi, i would totally fall for you
She grins back, winks and blow kisses
"who wouldnt" she says jokingly

In my story the character is one of those kind of "punkish" people, with those calm, almost emotion or apathetic voice, and the dyed hair and the piercings, and her personality was a calm one, almost non-caring, yet really sweet/nice, and silly too at times. My point of coolness kind of contradicts as well, because to be non-caring, you have to not care about anything at all, and we all care about being cool and fitting in, even if there arent many moments of those feelings, we still yearn for some companionship, its in our nature. Also the emotionless part, i think i got that from all those movies and stories where the main character is so emotionless, that it just becomes a part of the cool package, and also i guess because to be cool is to be strong and or to have power, and back then the people with power/strength were always emotionless because they couldn't let others know how much effect something has over them, because then that'll become a weakness, and when you're weak people have power over you, but even when you're cool it seems people still have power over you, to change you even if you always realize it. Like when i was little i didn't really understand crushes and was just some tomboy, but once i hit 8th grade and starting hanging out with girls instead of running around with the guys, i starting liking this one guy, and just people he liked the goth style, and clothes from hottopic, i started to dress like a goth, which did not make me cool, or make him notice me. Even though i was doing fine, and had some friends, and was considered somewhat cool, someone else who seem way cooler managed to change me into something that wasn't very common or popular afterwards. I guess you're only cool when its a kind of style thats actually common, which contradicts the whole "being different from others" part of being cool, or maybe it just depends on the person.

This really shows how much of media really influences our opinion of what cool is like. Like all the models and beautiful celebrities show us how much beauty really accounts to being cool, and we look at all the attention they get for it, and strive to become the same, because we want that attention as well. Also it isn't just media that affects us, the people you know affect how you act too. Like your friends will show you how to act in school, like skipping classes or school, or not doing you're homework. When i was little i would do all my homework and never skip school, but once i got to middle school, i started skipping a lot, and not do most of my work, because i'd rather be out chilling with my friends than in school, and skipping is a cool thing to do. You're gone for one day and than when you go back the next, people will start talking to you, to see if why you weren't there, and having all that attention on you makes you feel good because it means people notice you, which makes you feel less alone since you're significant enough to be remembered, even when you're not there, which makes you seem less alone.

There are a few reasons as too why we have this emptiness inside of us, it could be because we're just one out of many people in this world, and since there are so many, we can't help but feel as if we're just one piece of hay in a haystack, nothing special, no different than all the others, which is why we try to make ourselves stand out, even though there are still many people doing the same. We think if we change ourselves into something much more cooler, we'll seem more significant and more important. Also the fact that we're all going to end up dead might have something to do with it, who wouldn't like to be remembered even after we're no longer alive. So to make ourselves important enough to be remembered, we style ourselves in a way people are sure to stare. Because we all know we're going to die and fear it to the point of forgetting about it, we put ourselves into a different role we played before so people will look at us and know our existence and remember us, since "nobody likes to be forgotten", i know i wouldn't.

In conclusion, the definition of coolness varies depending on the person, but one thing that everyone seems to agree with is that being cool means you fit in and that our influences come from our surroundings, TV, computers, celebrities, friends, and family. Also that our want for being noticed comes from our want of being different from all the rest of the people in the world, and to be remembered as a significant person before we die. I think if we thought more on death and didn't seem to mind/fear is so much, we'd probably wouldn't try as hard to fit in, sure we'll still be trying to fit in, but not as hard as we'd be doing if we didn't distance ourselves from the thought of death. So in a way coolness really is just a armor we put on ourselves to protect us from the loneliness of rejection and being uncool.