A couple years ago, a certain term began to circle around society. Its a word used to describe a somewhat nerdy, retro, and somehow effortlessly unique person. Used both a noun and an adjective, the popular word,“hipster,” spread to the corners of the world until everybody who was anybody knew it. People adjusted, just as they always do, to fit into the new trend that had opened up to them. Now, there’s hipsters everywhere, whether they’re in social media, advertising, or picking exotic fruit in the supermarket.

These unique people have become more common, some would even say mainstream. How ironic that the simplest definition of a hipster is the exact opposite of mainstream. If everybody’s unique, is anybody unique? If everybody’s hipster, is anybody hipster?

Urban dictionary has a lot to say about what a hipster is. Many posts put hipsters in a bad light. One says the term “hipster” is just a “manifestation of posers desperate for a purpose.” The descriptions provided by Urban dictionary users go into detail about the average hipster life. On the contrary, Google claims that a hipster is simply one who follows the latest trends and fashions. This is such a broad term, including a vast number of popular looks.

The hipster fashion trends took a while to get used to. There were a few brave people in the beginning of it all that wore their skinny jeans with their Keds and square scarves. Now, clothing stores are filled with supposedly “unique” fashions that everybody has seen and worn. Horn-rimmed glasses, which were popular in the 1950s, have become a must-have accessory for boys and girls alike.

The word “hipster” is overused and it doesn’t mean what people think. Instead of the mental image we all get of a skinny guy sipping a cappuccino and typing on a laptop in a coffee shop, a hipster is anyone who avoids mainstream things. Since there’s now a coffee shop on every corner with 20 hipsters to go in each, they can no longer claim originality. The purpose is defeated yet the term is somehow still thriving. People need to stop saying “hipster,” and start calling it what it really is: typical.