Influence on Culture Essay

Surely, not all upper middle class professionals in their late twenties or early thirties shared the same values or ideals. The media, however, used to popularize a certain image of the yuppie with features that became stereotypical and reflected, at least in the journalists’ opinion, the dominant trends in this environment. The yuppie was used to describe not only certain demographic characteristics, but also to denote a psychographic profile including â€Å"a set of behavioural and psychographic attributes that have come to constitute a commonly believed stereotype† (Wikipedia). Thus, yuppie values were supposed to be more conservative than even their parents who were often involved in social programs and idealistic movements of the 1960s and 1970s. Yuppies, on the contrary, were people tended to favour stability and devote more attention to their own problems instead of trying to reform the society. Stability for yuppies was embodied in ownership of material things. In their choice of purchases, they supposedly demonstrated a poor taste buying more expensive stuff in order to show off their wealth. Their lifestyle was heavily impacted by career demands. Career was a necessary prerequisite for sustaining a life of comfort, and its requirements acquired a paramount importance. This resulted in a frequent lack of time that took a heavy toll on their families. Family relationships were often jeopardized by the necessity to move to a different place once in a few years under the influence of the career necessity. The strain in their professional lives often resulted in moral and mental exhaustion, aggravated by the high level of competition in high-income jobs that has been labelled a rat race. Climbing a career ladder in a corporate environment requires a specific set of skills and mentality that were fostered by the yuppies with great persistence. Too often this career-making drive affected their relationships with families and friends. Yuppies were also believed to share â€Å"an entire code of unwritten etiquette can govern their activities from golf and tennis to luncheons at trendy cocktail bars† (Wikipedia). Although the yuppie social group was to some extent invented by the media, the existence of the social and political concept of this group had an undeniable influence on the conceptualisation of social realia by the contemporary society. This perception of social reality was bound to exert influence on cultural life and lead to several talented portrayals of the new groups in artistic works. The artists, unlike the media, often focused on the positive characteristics of the yuppie social group. A typical representative of the class â€Å"had high educational achievement, a high income, enjoyed urban life, had a success orientation, and was a hard worker† (Kawasaki 1994). They were able to achieve affluence in one swoop and therefore did not feel pressured to maintain aristocratic attitudes. As a result, the new generation was less obsessed with gender, racial or regional distinctions. There was even the term â€Å"buppie† – black yuppie. The yuppie generation was portrayed in the works by Jay McInerney, Bret Easton Ellis and Jill Eisenstadt, the most prominent writers of the yuppie era. The biggest success of their literature was the 1984 novel Bright Lights, Big City by McInerney. The novel also features a character seeking refuge from challenging professional environment in â€Å"Bolivian marching powder† (cocaine) to offset the continuous stress associated with crazy yuppie lifestyle (Nostalgia Central). Bret Easton’s most remarkable work was Less Than Zero (1985) in which he describes â€Å"New Lost Generation†, and Eisenstadt became famous with From Rockaway (1987). Tom Wolfe’s The Bonfire of the Vanities also depicted the effect of a decadent lifestyle on yuppie culture. This tender portrayal of the newly emerged social group was offset with indignation over lavish yuppie lifestyles, manifested through â€Å"Die Yuppie Scum† bumper stickers. Influence on Fashions Yuppies left a lasting impact on fashions of the 1980s, naturally affecting most the segment for expensive designer apparel. Their dressing style was supposed to demonstrate â€Å"conspicuous wastage† (Tomas 2001). They wore wide shouldered jackets in the day time, and on the weekends they changed to a Barbour for a country look or a ballgown that manifested their comfortable lifestyle.