British Columbia’s hipsters have been thrown into the mainstream with the provincial government’s recent advertisements addressing the youth unemployment rate.
The ads specifically target those who consider themselves hipsters.
The ads, on which the BC government spent over $600,000 proclaim in a flowery white font that “hipster is not a real job.”
Many students said they are not amused with the ads targetting hipsters.
“Since when is ‘hipster’ synonymous with voluntary unemployment?” tweeted University of Waterloo student Lauren Burr (@burrlauren).
“Today students in British Columbia face record high tuition fee levels, crushing student debt, and a weak job market upon graduation,” said Katie Marocchi, chairperson of the Canadian Federation of Students in BC via email.
“The ads accomplish nothing,” she said. “They mock young people rather than offering help and don’t address the real issues.”
One of the ads asserts that “marrying rich may not pan out,” a slogan that is not even related to the issues at hand, Marocchi said.
“The BC government is using this ad campaign as a smoke screen to obfuscate 10 years of bad decision-making that has produced an economy that leaves young people behind,” she said.
“The truth is that young people across BC are leaving the province to find work in Alberta and elsewhere. What we need in BC are jobs, not jokes.”
The ads tell students “it’s time to look for a career,” referring them to the government-run website.
The website, called Career Trek, aims to encourage students to get job hunting through interactive videos and the help of two decidedly non-hipster hosts, Viviana and Brian.
Together, the two poster children for youth employment in British Columbia are featured in 52 online episodes exploring jobs from midwifery to truck driving and everything in between.
The lowest-paying job shown on the website pays $11,000 a year while most others pay somewhere between $44,000 and $66,000 a year.
According to Statistics Canada, 14.7 per cent of 15-24-year-olds in BC are unemployed, while the unemployment rate for the province in general is half that, at 7 per cent.
Some students said they see the ads as a way to entertain and catch the eye of BC youngsters.
“The ads are quite funny and were probably meant to get people smiling,” said John Xu, a math student at the University of Victoria.
If anything, Xu said he thinks hipsters are more employed than other youth.
“Some of my hipster friends are the most employed because they are the ones with money to spend trying to get that ‘hipster’ image,” he said.
