# How did Pabst Blue Ribbon become hip? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 3, 2011, 6:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-pabst-blue-ribbon-become-hip/584173 "2011-06-03T06:46:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![NAF1138](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naf1138/32/3245_2.png) [@NAF1138](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NAF1138)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2011, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-pabst-blue-ribbon-become-hip/584173/61 "2011-06-08T20:03:24Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > Hipsterism is about being pretentious about how unpretentious you are. That is possibly the best description of hipster-ism I have ever seen. Well done. ---
**Author:** ![Mister\_Rik](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mister_rik/32/491_2.png) [@Mister\_Rik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mister_Rik)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2011, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-pabst-blue-ribbon-become-hip/584173/62 "2011-06-09T02:27:23Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > Hipsterism is about being pretentious about how unpretentious you are. And if you’re slow on the uptake, I’ll lay it out: hipsterism is a religion to which you got to be devout. Must be seen as in between unpopular and hated or else get excommunicated. – MC Frontalot, [_Indier Than Thou_](http://frontalot.com/index.php/?page=lyrics&lyricid=17) ---
**Author:** ![devilsknew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4da419/32.png) [@devilsknew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/devilsknew)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2011, 5:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-pabst-blue-ribbon-become-hip/584173/63 "2011-06-09T05:23:28Z")
You know who the original hipsters are? Elvis, Conway Twitty, Kenny Rogers, the Beatles, Eric Clapton, the Monkees, Canned Heat, Led Zeppelin, Lynrd Skynrd, Wavy Gravy and the Rolling Stones. Many, yet to come. Take Canned Heat… some musical historians and collectors, and contributors, that basically have gelled through cinematography, 70 % of what we know about the sixties ---
**Author:** ![devilsknew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4da419/32.png) [@devilsknew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/devilsknew)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2011, 5:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-pabst-blue-ribbon-become-hip/584173/64 "2011-06-09T05:52:02Z")
Oh, yes, but every hipster is so much more precious, concurrent, intellectual (or non-intellectual) than the next. ---
**Author:** ![Argent\_Towers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e8c25b/32.png) [@Argent\_Towers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Argent_Towers)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2011, 6:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-pabst-blue-ribbon-become-hip/584173/65 "2011-06-09T06:03:03Z")
I don’t love hipsters, but I have fond memories of them from college. Despite what everyone else says about them, in my experience, their parties were SO much better than the parties thrown by non-hipsters (i.e. frat guys and guys who wish they were frat guys.) Hipster parties took place in nicer houses, they had WAY better music, the people were better dressed, and I was far more likely to have conversations that I actually found interesting. The alternative, at my school, was basically blasting rap and Keystone Light in cookie cutter apartments with guys playing Madden and Halo on plasma TVs. And beer pong, beer pong, beer pong. Give me the hipsters any day. ---
**Author:** ![fusoya](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ecccb3/32.png) [@fusoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fusoya)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2011, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-pabst-blue-ribbon-become-hip/584173/66 "2011-06-09T17:51:51Z")
This is what I don’t understand. When I moved to Brooklyn in 2003, PBR was the hipster beer. Hipsters take way too much pride and effort in making sure they don’t do anything mainstream. But now it’s 2011 and PBR is STILL the hipster beer. Aren’t they all breaking their rules of conformity by drinking the same beer??? Or is it some degree of irony that I don’t get? ---
**Author:** ![Argent\_Towers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e8c25b/32.png) [@Argent\_Towers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Argent_Towers)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2011, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-pabst-blue-ribbon-become-hip/584173/67 "2011-06-09T18:13:18Z")
Because most of the hipsters grow up and then start drinking microbrews and craft beers. There’s always a new generation of hipsters. ---
**Author:** ![filling\_pages](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/b9bd4f/32.png) [@filling\_pages](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/filling_pages)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2011, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-pabst-blue-ribbon-become-hip/584173/68 "2011-06-09T18:20:23Z")
> [@devilsknew](#): > > You know who the original hipsters are? Elvis, Conway Twitty, Kenny Rogers, the Beatles, Eric Clapton, the Monkees, Canned Heat, Led Zeppelin, Lynrd Skynrd, Wavy Gravy and the Rolling Stones. Many, yet to come. Take Canned Heat… some musical historians and collectors, and contributors, that basically have gelled through cinematography, 70 % of what we know about the sixties Before that it was the beatniks. And before the beatniks came the hardcore jazz fans. And before that, something else. For as long as there has been anything like a popular culture, I’m sure there have been hipsters of some sort. ---
**Author:** ![Binarydrone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3da27b/32.png) [@Binarydrone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Binarydrone)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2011, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-pabst-blue-ribbon-become-hip/584173/69 "2011-06-09T20:30:14Z")
> [@kunilou](#): > > Red, White and Blue, Old German, Stag, 905 – back in the days of regional breweries there were a lot of cheap beers available in one place or another. But one of the cheapest beers available just about anywhere was good ol’ PBR, and it became the cheap, college beer as early as the '70s, if not the 60’s. Back in those days no one drank it ironically, we drank it because it was cheap! So I tied an onion to my belt, which was the style at the time. Now, to take the ferry cost a nickel, and in those days, nickels had pictures of bumblebees on 'em. “Give me five bees for a quarter,” \ ---
**Author:** ![johnpost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f17d59/32.png) [@johnpost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/johnpost)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2014, 10:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-pabst-blue-ribbon-become-hip/584173/70 "2014-09-19T22:55:50Z")
blue is now red. Ruskies bought it. ---
**Author:** ![actualliberalnotoneofthose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e79b87/32.png) [@actualliberalnotoneofthose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/actualliberalnotoneofthose)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2014, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-pabst-blue-ribbon-become-hip/584173/71 "2014-09-20T21:07:50Z")
I went to a rap concert in a bar a couple years ago, and it seemed like the only thing they had was PBR. They were really pushing $4 cans as some kind of huge deal. I didn’t get it. ---
**Author:** ![EmilyG](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/emilyg/32/364_2.png) [@EmilyG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EmilyG)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2014, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-pabst-blue-ribbon-become-hip/584173/72 "2014-09-20T23:19:43Z")
PBR: favourite drink of zombies. Goes well with brains. ---
**Author:** ![alted315](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/cc9497/32.png) [@alted315](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alted315)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2014, 12:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-pabst-blue-ribbon-become-hip/584173/73 "2014-09-21T00:10:43Z")
> [@Profound\_Gibberish](#): > > How did PBR become so hip? It’s a pretty obscure reason–you’ve probably never heard of it. 😉 I was going to say that joke, dammit! :rolleyes: [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-pabst-blue-ribbon-become-hip/584173.md?page=3)