What Do Hipsters and Supreme Court Justices Have in Common?

Only a third of all Americans have a favorable view of the Supreme Court. But at least the justices who sit on the nation's highest court score better than hipsters.

Hipsters - the sometimes grungy young adults with countercultural attitudes and an artistic bent - are looked at favorably by just 16 percent of the public, according a new survey from Public Policy Polling.

(Not sure exactly what a hipster is? Here's a full definition. And here's a recent New York Times report of a pilgrim to Brooklyn from Manhattan, who discovers hipster life in the "outer" borough.)

The pollsters had some fun with the survey, asking voters whether hipsters should be subject to a special tax on account of being annoying. More than one in four of the respondents (27 percent) said yes.

The pollsters didn't ask whether justices on the Supreme Court should be subject to an annoyance tax.

They did, however, find huge differences in name recognition, with Justice Sonia Sotomayor topping the list at 74 percent name recognition, followed by Clarence Thomas at 68 percent, Ruth Bader Ginsburg at 64 percent, Antonin Scalia at 58 percent, Elena Kagan at 55 percent, Chief Justice John Roberts at 48 percent, Samuel Alito at 47 percent, Anthony Kennedy at 41 percent and Stephen Breyer at 35 percent.

Supreme Court justices don't have to worry about being popular, as they have their jobs for as long as they want them. And hipsters? Well, being popular would be radically uncool.

 

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