On whatever day that was, the Hipster-in-Denial answered to his previous posting and my subsequent comments in bold. After a small discussion on Twitter, the Hipster-in-Denial decided it was best to drop his side of the argument having accepted the defeat of being unable to change my outlook on life. But, if you didn’t scroll down to read the comments, here they are again. With my answers in bold again. 
ENJOY!
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Hey Lee, I started drafting this on twitter yesterday, then realized it would probably end up breaking into dozens of separate tweets. So I figured I’d send it to you in this way. I don’t know if it’s claptrap or not (it is), but hopefully you’ll have a look before passing it along to the land of spam. I’m not going to try to escalate by responding to your commentary above; I’m more interested in a bit of resolution. Please read the words that are here rather than putting your own spin on them. What I mean by that is that I’m asking you to pay attention to what I’m saying, and its intended tone, rather than assuming that these here are fightin’ words (I didn’t take them as “fightin’ words”). For instance, you said above that I judged you. In fact, if you read again you’ll find that the portion that you took as judgment was actually a string of questions that I posed without making any attempt at offering an answer. Pretty much the only concrete statements I made were those in which I described my own feelings about the whole thing. (My point was that most people were taught the common decency and etiquette to remove one’s hat when indoors.)
Anyway, here’s what I started to send you yesterday when we connected on twitter:
Lee,
It’s really none of my business, but does being a “hater,” even an
equal-opportunity one, really make you happy? (Yes, it does.) I’m referring to your
tweet, in which you claimed to be an “equal-opportunity hater,”
explaining that “working with the public for 4 years will do that to
you.” Well, working with the public has nothing to do with it, believe
me. (No, it did. Believe me.) Something like that (actively looking for things to hate) (which I’m not doing) is a
conscious decision made daily. I’ve worked with the public in one form
or another since I was 15 (in varying jobs, including a position at Disneyland). Many people do, while still managing to stay
positive and kind. And while I haven’t always loved the people I’ve
worked with/for, I found myself a much happier person once I stopped
identifying with my anger, (I don’t identify with anger. It’s a valid emotion to have and express as a human being) choosing to let it be my defining characteristic. As you stated in your post, it’s your right to be an
asshole (your word, not mine), but you might ask yourself if it has
really added to the quality of your life. (It has.) Being a gay male has probably
made you tragically aware that the world has more than enough hate as
it is. And being a part of the furry community has probably made you
more than aware that people often lash out at things of which they have
little or no understanding. The world has enough unpleasantness
already; why burn calories finding ways to justify contributing to it? (I can burn calories being mad? Why am I still fat, then?)
It helps nobody, least of all you. I don’t know you personally, so I
cannot judge how happy or fulfilled you are in your life. Still, even
if you are incredibly happy and couldn’t feel more fulfilled, I doubt
it’s because of your “hating.” (You doubt wrong.)
My real point of commenting on your post was to make you aware that you
were kind of talking out of your ass (which we all do from time to
time), and that it was ignorant, unkind, and unfair. (This is what assholes do, duh.) This is not a
personal judgment, but a judgment of how you presented yourself. And
believe me, you have EVERY RIGHT to feel that way, especially as an
American. And you have every right to express those feelings and
qualities. Every right. The flip side of the coin is that I get to
respond. Yes, you removed my comment and snarked up the blog entry
that I commented on, (Because it is my blog and website.) but my response did get to your eyes, which was
all I wanted in the first place. I wanted to offer you perspective, to
make you realize that though it might be easier to view others as stock
characters in the story of your life, that’s just not what they are.
You can’t pretend to know a person based on a couple of outward
characteristics. Or rather, you can, but it doesn’t necessarily make any of your presumptions correct. (True.)
And though I’m not really interested in bickering about labels, it’s
just flawed logic to state that a person’s denial that they are
something (be it gay, hipster, or weird) MUST be concrete proof that
they are that thing. “He seemed so offended when I implied that he’s a
Scientologist, that he MUST be one, right? I mean, why else would he
be so defensive?” (Well, if you implied it, I could see why that person would take offense.)
See what I mean? For the record, I’m not even
entirely sure what a hipster is. (There was a video explaining the evolution of a hipster in my other blog post.) So maybe I am one. I couldn’t say. Maybe my taste in music, theatre, or fashion lumps me into that
category. I really don’t know or care. (If you don’t care, why the dissertations?) I wasn’t reacting to the label
so much as the hatred, and presumption that you knew anything about me
based simply on an article of my clothing.
The internet is a glorious place, somewhere we can all connect with
people who have common interests and ideas. But it’s also artifical,
customizable to the point that it ceases to be an accurate reflection of
reality. What I mean by that is that the internet is a place where we
NEVER have to be wrong, because we can say our piece, put it out there,
invite like-minded people to back us up (no matter what we say), and
shut out any communication that doesn’t. In the artificial world of the internet, we have that kind of power, the power to create the illusion of infallibility. And when we’re never wrong,
we never have reason to learn or grow or even consider the words and
perspectives of anybody who doesn’t echo our own opinions and
prejudices. (I never said I was right or wrong. I said this is my blog and I can do with it as I want. And that you’re a hipster.)
The internet has also become a social crutch, allowing us to
communicate with each other from a safe distance, helping us to mostly
avoid any interactions that might make us even a little bit
uncomfortable. It has carried many of us to the point in which we feel
uncomfortable to tell the waiter that he got our order wrong. (I don’t. I tell waiters when my order is wrong.) We think
twice before we ask our neighbor to please not let their dog run loose
in the front yard. (Nope, I still tell my neighbor things.) We decide not to ask a simple request of a
stranger, something as basic as removing a hat. (Live performance, we didn’t want to interrupt the performance, and most people have the common sense to not wear a hat indoors.) And we justify it. We
create elaborate fictions in our heads about how this other person is
awful, how they’ll probably react badly, how we’re probably better off
playing the martyr and silently but unhappily suffering through our
imagined slights. We convince ourselves that interaction and
confrontation are synonymous, and so better avoided.
No, I explained several times why my friend chose not to ask you to remove your hat. She didn’t want to disturb a performance in progress by leaning forward to ask you to remove your hat. When you first removed your hat, she assumed that you remembered you were wearing it, and you were removing it out of the common courtesy for the audience members behind you. But, when you chose to re-doff your hat, it annoyed her further when you were just doing the little asshole move of putting your hat back on. Indoors. Hence, the irony of it when I commented about it later. My friend, out of respect for the cast and the performance, decided not to interrupt by asking you to keep your hat off. I knew nothing of it until after the performance. And since you’d seen the performance multiple times before, and you sound intelligent enough to have had some sort of decent raising, we thought you’d know that it’s impolite to wear a hat indoors. I guess we were mistaken.
Well, I’m not in the habit of reading minds. Most people aren’t. I’ve
had a lot more peace of mind since I realized that I don’t have this
skill, and that nobody should reasonably expect it from me. This is
why communication is so important. (Or, you know, manners.) When there’s gaps in the
information we have, our imaginations tend to fill those gaps in for
us, and we end up reacting to a view of reality that might not be even
the slightest bit accurate. And that, of course, leads to lots of
misunderstandings and needless frustrations.
I’m sure that you’ve heard the mantra- I think it’s the serenity
prayer- in which you say “Give me the strength to change the things I
can, accept the things I can’t, and the wisdom to know the difference
between the two.” I think a great deal of the avoidable frustration in this world comes
not from people who can’t accept the things they cannot change, but
rather from people not realizing how much in their lives that they CAN
change. You follow me? There’s so much around us that we can affect
and improve if we’re just willing to accept that we CAN affect at least
some of the changes that we desire, so long as we’re willing to step
out of our comfort zones and interact with, rather than react to, the
world around us. (So says the person that issued me two lengthy dissertations.)
I don’t know if any of this will get through to you because I don’t
know you. I don’t know if you’re the sort of person who will just blow
all of this off, and consider me a dick for bothering to say anything. I don’t know if you’ll use my long-winded diatribe as an opportunity to ridicule me.
And I don’t know if you will take my words in the spirit they are intended, and gainsome perspective that you’ve never
considered before. Maybe I just sound touchy-feely. I really don’t know.
But I do know that fabricating ways to hate the people around you in
order to justify not engaging with them will only lead to sadness,
loneliness, and many missed opportunities for human connection. (I don’t have these. I bond with other hipster haters.) And I
do know that preemptively calling yourself an asshole before anybody
else has the opportunity to it, pretending to proudly own the quality,
is just a defense mechanism that further shields you from the
expectations and uncertainties of sincere human interactions. (Nope, I’ve been called an asshole before. I just accept the title.)
I don’t know how to close this, so I just will. I just wanted you to
be aware that things could have been different the other night had you
just approached the moment with a different mindset. Instead of
constructing an armor of reasons not to assert yours or your friend’s
simple desire, you could have taken a chance. You could have reached
out and communicated. You know, used your words. (No, again, we have the courtesy not to interrupt a live performance.)
It’s possible that I might have reacted badly, and justified all your suspicions about me
and my character. On the flip side, though, I might have been very
pleasant, gladly acquiesced to your simple request, and you could have
enjoyed the entire evening and gone home without a thing to complain or
feel resentful about. Just something to consider.
And by the way, I’ll relay your thanks to my wife, the grammar nazi. 
(Thank you, I appreciate her efforts.)
Be well. (Always am.)
-TWO
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The Hipster-in-Denial can be reached on Twitter at @MisterFizzy. I can be reached at several places, but my Twitter is @Eccentriclee. The rest of this can be found on the Hipster Saga tag.
