"Where We Are Now"

Hello, I'm Special: How Individuality Became the New Conformity by Hal Niedzviecki #1

Part One: "Where We Are Now"

Part one discusses the issues currently consuming the everyday person on their quest to become their, very own person. Original, unique, and one of a kind. But while attempting to be as unique and as “special” as possible, certain things are beginning to take a back seat, being more of an after thought. Traditions are being rewritten, religions are redefining and rewriting themselves, and what success means and what it symbolizes and what symbolizes it. Niedzviecki writes: 

“This is the new conformity: part sociological phenomenon, part (pop)cultural practice, part challenge to the old orthodoxies of institutional expertise, and part expansion of an me-first agenda long promised by the abundances of techno-capitalism.”

Different people want to be special in different ways, seeking celebrity status any way they can. Today, society says that you can become a celebrity for almost anything. Niedzviecki says, “Where once scandal might have embarrassed those included, today it is welcomed as a way to get noticed.” Describing those who become famous for something they did which in reality they should be more so ashamed of. 

“If there is a single constant in the emergence of individuality as the new conformity, it is the ubiquitous preserve of celebrity” he writes. Celebrity doctors, celebrity chefs, celebrity entrepreneurs are just a few of the examples Niedzviecki gives as being new celebrity categories. He gives these examples as evidence to his argument that there exist more celebrities today than ever before and despite that fact, new categories of celebrities are popping up increasingly. 

The beginning of this book points out what nobody wants and has wanted to hear before and that is that it is almost impossible to be 100% special or unique and that many people try so hard to achieve that level of status that becomes less and less unique as people catch on. Everyone wants to be able to say that they are special, thus causing people to search for more, new, and different routes or ways that will allow them to be the person, the “special” person they want so much to be. But a reacurring problem conflicting with achieving the “I’m Special” status we all seek, is that there is always something could be better or something more that would help us and make us better and more special.