How Birding Became Cool
Why your favorite rappers, activists, and brands are all picking up binoculars
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You’re walking at your college graduation, standing at the altar, baptizing your firstborn, or landing a hard-fought promotion. But try as you might, all you can think about is Buzzcut, the newsletter of close-cropped commentary on travel, style, history, and nature by writer, strategist, and object of your thousand-yard stare Zander Abranowicz.
This month’s essay was first published on the brilliant new climate news platform Heatmap. It attempts to answer why the subtle art of birdwatching is suddenly in. Once you make your way to Heatmap (and subscribe to its excellent newsletter), you can also admire its new identity and site, recently designed by Abbreviated Projects.
Buzzcut Reports
A comment on some subject of interest
How Birding Became Cool
When did birdwatching become cool — and why didn’t it happen in time to save me from the middle school nickname “bird boy?”
Truth is, I was fine with the light teasing I received for my teenage fixation on avifauna. It didn’t stop me from decorating the back corner of our biology classroom with clippings about Pale Male (Manhattan’s celebrity red-tail), or from earning a New York state falconry license at the age of 12, or even from watching Canada geese migrate over my high school campus while my peers ogled each other from the bleachers. Still, none of it exactly built my social capital.
That’s why lately, I’ve been delighted to see the cool kids picking up binoculars. The bird boys (and girls) won.
Something You Should Know
A sharp fact for your cocktail party quiver
Scientists are now breeding genetically modified hens who will lay only female chicks, eliminating the need for culling billions of males every year