For Fashion or for Show?

Along+with+other+brands%2C+Victorias+Secrets+PINK+is+well+known+throughout+RHS.

Along with other brands, Victoria’s Secret’s PINK is well known throughout RHS.

Anise Gonzalez, AME Reporter

Everywhere you look there has to be a kid walking in the hallway with the average hypebeast aesthetic just waiting for someone to ask them about their supreme backpack or Gucci belt. The real question is: why do teenagers care so much?

 Are these hundred dollar brands for the fashion because you genuinely like those products? Or is it a way to show off your $190 jeans? Why do we feel like we have to follow what brands everyone is wearing? Maybe it’s the Instagram models we see saying, “Click here to shop now!” or maybe it’s the constant drag of desiring to fit in. 

Do we actually have to keep up with trends to be accepted? I can’t help but think that these types of brands we buy play into what “high school clique” we’re in. Our peers influence our style and that’s the cold truth. 

The pressure to have to newest released brands are too great to resist even if these items are horrendous and overpriced people are still going to go against their persona to dress just like everyone else. 

Sophomore Paige Simpkinson shows off her rare and distinguished pairs of shoes. (Paige Simpkinson)

“Your peers shouldn’t influence your style, just because everyone else is wearing it doesn’t mean you should change what you like,”  Sophomore Brandon Barlow said. 

Teen culture shifts ridiculously fast and with a fast moving culture means, you guessed it, more brands! According to statistics, teenagers on average are spending $2,600 annually on food and clothes, a survey by Piper Jaffray finds. 

Many students have part time jobs that give them a little extra wiggle space to buy the more expensive and known brands.

The famous and well known brands are a driving force for a lot of styles here at Rangeview. If we take a look at the brands that influence what students chose to wear it gets to the point anyone can recognize your “style” as an everyday aesthetic. 

“There are some people that are more orthodox that try to be slightly different with their styles,” sophomore JaCey Sung stated. “Then, other people don’t confine themselves to brands at all.” 

You’re a teenager for a short amount of time just be who you aspire to and don’t let the clash of social acceptance affect you. 

Don’t give up your individuality for someone else’s conventionality.