Tea And Coffee

Caffeinated HouseCat

☕ You only ~have~ to drink tea & coffee if you actually like them. ☕

I've noticed a trend of people drinking tea to seem more Lolita or more like Emilie Autumn or even more Goth. Sometimes they video themselves drinking tea really awkwardly. It seems strange and sort of pretentious behaviour. They are clearly trying really hard to look like they are enjoying their tea and their tea-party, and while they might be enjoying the rest of the tea-party, they are trying very hard not to grimace at the actual tea. 

(An aside: I know that tea is an everyday beverage in the UK, and that there are places where tea being made with hot water, a tea-bag and possibly milk and sugar is something of a rarity, but it is a very simple process, and should be quite hard to get wrong.) 

Anyway, this is not about getting making tea wrong, this is about people trying too hard to be quaintly British-esque in search of being more subcultural. I am inherently quaintly British so have never had that as something I wish to become, and can't exactly see the reason why people so desire to be like this. The only motivation I can see is an idealisation of Victorian society and a belief that all Victorian people did is sit around on sunny afternoons drinking tea, playing croquet and, if female, doing embroidery. Victorian life was not actually like that. 

Maybe it is a reaction to the culture of youth binge-drinking, with drinking tea being a stereotypically "civilised" thing to do, and I quite agree that afternoon tea is far superior to evening drunkenness, but there are plenty of soft drinks that are not tea to drink if you dislike tea. There are exceedingly elegant and refined tea meals and ceremonies, and yes the 1840's Afternoon Tea, earlier 18thC tea and of course various Tea Ceremonies from the Orient are all elegant and refined occasions, but that requires more than simply the act of consuming tea from pretty containers or of eating cake off a tiered stand. And engaging in any of the above activities for the purpose of becoming 'more Lolita' or 'more Goth' is silly and a bit appropriative. 

Not drinking tea does not make one any less goth, in the same way that drinking tea does not make one any more goth. I'm not sure why this has become a hugely 'Goth' thing to do, any more than why drinking coffee black was a hugely 'Goth' thing to do when I was a teenage babybat. 

☕ "Give me coffee, black, black as my soul!" ☕

I happen to rather like coffee, but I have a caffeine intolerance and get a little too wired if I have anything other than decaff, and I like lattes. This does not make me less Goth. I also like frappuccinos. Most of all, I like rose milkshakes with real vanilla ice-cream, whipped cream on top, served in a tall glass with a straw and marshmallows. Hideously pink, calorific, and decidedly fabulous. Aesthetically one would look fitting in the hands of a Sweet Lolita, but food should not be about what it looks like, or which culture it is from, but about the taste. Really, only drink or eat things because you like them. This does not just apply to tea and coffee, but to sushi and other Japanese food, absinthe, red wine, snakebite & black or anything else that is edible and related to a subculture. 

Be yourself. Eat and drink what you enjoy (in healthy moderation, of course).