LET'S DISCUSS! THE Y2K AESTHETIC, AND CULTURE APPROPRIATION.
lets begin by defining cultural appropriation. cultural appropriation is defined as “ the unacknowledged or inappropriate adoption of the customs, practices, ideas, etc. of one people or society by members of another and typically more dominant people or society.” if you are unsure of what the y2k “aesthetic” is, to summarize it as easily as possible, it is a style of fashion that bring backs popular clothing items in the 90′s and early 2000′s. usually those items are mesh or handkerchief/bandana tops (remember this on, its important) shiny pants and shoes, pleated skirts, bucket hats, big purses, crop tops and many many more. .
what’s important to note here is that a majority of these clothes were in fact NOT (originally) worn by white people, though its entirely possible, the popularity of these items most definitely did not come from white people.
since you’ve read that previous paragraph,you may be asking “what’s the big issue?”
the issue with the sudden surge of the y2k aesthetic is that, the true creators of the items that appeals to the aesthetic have not been given credit.
if you don’t believe me when i say it has been single handedly created by black people, look up y2k fashion that was actually around then and look at how much black culture influenced the y2k style. people often assume that the y2k style only has inspiration from films like Mean Girls, A Simple Life, and House Bunny once and think that’s all there is to y2k fashion. (oh also, Bratz.)
one clothing trend that is extremely overlooked is one called “logomania,” a trend where one of the same logos is printed all over the item of clothing. its highly unlikely you’ve never seen clothe like this, but for reference, below is a picture of what logomania looks like.
“Daniel Day,” better known as “Dapper Dan” would illegally print luxury brands logos all over his designs. black artist are the reason that high fashion culture is as main stream as it is today. he is one of many black people who created things like this.
black people would wear clothes that they enjoyed, but were called “ghetto” and “trashy.” if a white person wears those clothes now, they are seen as “trendy” and “so y2k,” even though black people did it first.it is no surprise to me that the y2k (among many other styles) have been whitewashed so quickly.
do you remember that bandana shirt i told you to take note of?
good. that is important now.
bandana shirts have been worn by chicana/latinx/hispanic men and women for YEARS, and were often referred to as “trashy” when they wore it. the term chicana/chicano means a female or male who is a Mexican-American. A chicana/chicano is someone who was raised in the US, but also has Mexican origin or a person who was born in México but has a US citizenship. The reason why chicana and hispanic culture got offended by this video was because these are clothes that chicanas wear, who have been judged for this clothing and were not treated with respect.
well, now that you know this information, what do we do now? if you are remotely interesting in anything y2k fashion related, please try to find where it originally came from. know who ORIGINALLY made the trends you adore so much. you’d be surprised that a majority, if not all, of the trendy things you wear now, were made popular by black people.
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