Wonderful Person of the Week: Rick Lee aka Hipster Cop.

In episode 22, Jacob brought up the amazing man that makes up Hipster Cop. The story goes that this police officer, who works the streets of the Occupy Wallstreet protests, likes to be a hipster. Now me personally? I don’t care for the word hipster. I think it’s a weird contradiction upon itself and me just saying that could make someone shout “hipster!!!” towards me. So other than that personal anecdote, Rick Lee seems like an all around cliche. He likes Mad Men, Radiohead, Ralph Lauren clothing, A Heart Breaking Work of Staggering Genius, and protecting the law.

In his GQ interview, he states that he dresses the way he does because he “learned early on that the way I’m dress (sic), or the way anyone dresses affects things. You have to know your audience. The people that I serve in this community are a lot like me. I don’t necessarily fit the stereotype of the word “cop.” So when they see that I dress kinda cool, wear thin ties, look trendy, it breaks a lot of walls down initially to get the bridge building started. It actually works. People go, “Wow! You wear Burberry. You wear Ralph Lauren. That’s cool.”

Now I’m sure there’s much more to go with Mr. Lee. I’m sure he has shirts from Gap and maybe has an on again off again girlfriend that breaks his heart every night, but who cares about things that make people real people, right? Surely not the internet!

We here at Based on Nothing dig Rick Lee, he’s a pioneer on…something. Unsure what. We’ll get back to you on that! The point is this hipster cop is some of the better things coming from Occupy Wall Street. With so much hate, confusion, and propaganda, it’s nice that something as silly as a police man who dresses like a hipster can make the internet laugh together. Stay gold.

Written by Spenser