Last Minute Gifts for Your NYC Nano-Influencer Boyfriend
Ladies —
We all know him. He’s got an Instagram filled with pictures of other people’s furniture, a Substack, or maybe even a blog much like this one (but definitely worse). If you’re especially unfor— I mean lucky, you get to call him your man. And he’s great, he does the dishes, buys you nice clothes, and doesn’t object when you sleep with other men.
But there’s one nitpick, bae considers himself a bit of a “tastemaker.” And boy, is gift-giving hard. He didn’t want the 990v5 he wanted the v3, that beige tote isn’t the right shade of boring, those vintage Carhartts don’t have the right amount of blue-collar ass sweat.
Luckily, we at JTTB pride ourselves on understanding what men want. And it’s other men.
Or um, I mean…
Here’s our list of the top gifts for your NYC Nano-Influencer boyfriend, guaranteed to spice up your Valentine’s Day.
Therapy
No one cares. Everyone agrees that Paris, Texas is good, Levi’s 501s have never not been in-style, and that quirky vintage tee cost you $90. Humans, being herd animals, have always looked to each other for inspiration and personality. To pretend that being a “tastemaker” is any sort of real role, let alone once deserving of encouragement, praise, and ego is preposterous.
The more easily something is defined, the more easily it can be replicated, marketed, and beaten to death. Next thing you know, you’re wondering what the fuck “Bookcore” is. (Hint: it’s an amalgamation of a dozen different styles coming together to make a whole lot of Nothing)
I’m not going to claim I’m above it all — I once bought a Tao Lin book and I own a hat for a bookstore I’ve never physically visited. But something else is going on. Fashion writers are desperate to ask the question “how can I dress not as someone I am, but someone I would like to be?” Inauthentic, lazy, reaching. And now as we try to box ourselves into silly new “cores” it becomes evident we’re attempting to dress for a lifestyle that never had a uniform to begin with.
Such behavior has always been a symptom of menswear. Take Sprezzatura — an entire wing of fashion about being obsessed with nonchalance. But nowadays, if you break the traditional rules, for instance combining a “streetwear” element with tailoring, menswear sociopaths on Reddit will belt you to a chair and “educate” you about what is proper and what is not.
Perhaps it’s because men’s fashion is, essentially, lame. The stereotypical male silhouette is a glorified rectangle, what is deemed “acceptable” rarely ventures past pants and flat(ish)-sole shoes. What it means is that, un/fortunately, most men can never really aspire to be anything more than stylish. Any attempt to be fashionable collapses into an inauthentic display of charlatanism — every cowboy hat at fashion week, avant-garde silhouette, and niche “-core” coming off as little more than a costume.
Why not just take a step back and admit none of it matters? Not in an angsty teenager who just discovered nihilism way but in an altogether pure way. Stop trying to dress up as someone else and please, for the love of God, stop liking what someone on Instagram, Substack, or the Podcast app told you to like.
Exceptions will be made for a certain Squarespace blog.
