Band Merch, Silencing, and Aesthetic Community

Felix Bräuer

doi:10.33134/eeja.563

Band Merch, Silencing, and Aesthetic Community

Estetika: The European Journal of Aesthetics

Volume 63 (2026): Issue 1

By: Felix Bräuer

Open Access

|Mar 2026

Abstract

This paper addresses a question that has sparked heated debate while mostly flying under the philosophical radar: should people stop wearing the merchandise (‘merch’) of bands they do not listen to? I respond affirmatively. People should stop wearing merch of bands they do not listen to because (1) doing so can silence people who wear band merch to communicate their taste in music and (2) this silencing threatens the valuable role that wearing band merch plays in the aesthetic lives of people who share a taste in music: promoting aesthetic community among them. As will emerge throughout the paper, this argument is relevant to the debate on silencing as well as the debate on the value of aesthetic community.

References

Boeschenstein, Lívia, and Pereira, Cláudia. ‘From CBGB to Forever 21: the Ramones T-shirt and It’s Representations on the Mainstream.’ In Keep It Simple, Make It Fast! An Approach to Underground Music Scenes, vol. 3, edited by Paula Guerra and Tânia Moreira, 185–92. Porto: University of Porto Press, 2017.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Boothby, Erica J., Gus Cooney, Gillian M. Sandstrom, and Margaret S. Clark. ‘The Liking Gap in Conversations: Do People Like Us More than We Think?’ Psychological Science 29 (2018): 1742–56. DOI: 10.1177/0956797618783714
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Bräuer, Felix. ‘Aesthetic Testimony and Aesthetic Authenticity.’ British Journal of Aesthetics 63 (2023): 395–416. DOI: 10.1093/aesthj/ayac045
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Caponetto, Laura. ‘A Comprehensive Definition of Illocutionary Silencing.’ Topoi 40 (2021): 191–202. DOI: 10.1007/s11245-020-09705-2
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Cíbik, Matej. ‘On the Immorality of Tattoos.’ Journal of Ethics 24 (2020): 193–206. DOI: 10.1007/s10892-019-09319-w
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Cross, Anthony. ‘Social Aesthetic Goods and Aesthetic Alienation.’ Philosophers’ Imprint 24 (2024): 1–15. DOI: 10.3998/phimp.3475
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Dodd, Julian. ‘Style Appropriation, Intimacy, and Expressiveness.’ British Journal of Aesthetics 61 (2021): 373–86. DOI: 10.1093/aesthj/ayab023
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Dotson, Taylor. Technically Together: Reconstructing Community in a Networked World. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2017. DOI: 10.7551/mitpress/9780262036382.001.0001
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Driver, Julia. ‘The Suberogatory.’ Australasian Journal of Philosophy 70 (1992): 286–95. DOI: 10.1080/00048409212345181
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Fingerhut, Jörg, Javier Govez-Lavin, Claudia Winklmayr, and Jesse J. Prinz. ‘The Aesthetic Self: The Importance of Aesthetic Taste in Music and Art for Our Perceived Identity.’ Frontiers in Psychology 11 (2021): 1–18. DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2020.577703
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Force, William R. ‘Consumption Styles and the Fluid Complexity of Punk Authenticity.’ Symbolic Interaction 32 (2009): 289–309. DOI: 10.1525/si.2009.32.4.289
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Fricker, Miranda. Epistemic Injustice: Power and the Ethics of Knowing. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007. DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198237907.001.0001
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Green, Mitchell S. ‘From Signaling and Expression to Conversation and Fiction.’ Grazer Philosophische Studien 96 (2019): 295–315. DOI: 10.1163/18756735-09603002
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Grice, Paul. ‘Meaning.’ In Studies in the Way of Words, 213–23. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1989.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Haslanger, Sally. ‘Social Meaning and Philosophical Method.’ Proceedings and Addresses of the American Philosophical Association 88 (2014): 16–37.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Haslanger, Sally. ‘What Is a Social Practice?’ Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplements 82 (2018): 231–47. DOI: 10.1017/S1358246118000085
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Hesni, Samia. ‘Illocutionary Frustration.’ Mind 127 (2018): 947–76. DOI: 10.1093/mind/fzy033
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Khoo, Justin. ‘Code Words in Political Discourse.’ Philosophical Topics 45 (2017): 33–64. DOI: 10.5840/philtopics201745213
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Kubala, Robbie. ‘Aesthetic Practices and Normativity.’ Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 103 (2021): 408–25. DOI: 10.1111/phpr.12727
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Langton, Rae. ‘Speech Acts and Unspeakable Acts.’ Philosophy & Public Affairs 22 (1993): 293–330.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Lessig, Lawrence. ‘The Regulation of Social Meaning.’ University of Chicago Law Review 62 (1995): 944–1047.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Lopes, Dominic McIver, Bence Nanay, and Nick Riggle. Aesthetic Life and Why It Matters. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2022. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780197625798.001.0001
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Mackk, Aaron. ‘Is It Cool to Wear Band T-shirts You Don’t Listen To?’ Medium, 21 September 2021. https://medium.com/the-riff/is-it-cool-to-wear-band-t-shirts-you-dont-listen-to-e00c9f5e1a62.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Maitra, Ishani. ‘Silencing Speech.’ Canadian Journal of Philosophy 39 (2009): 309–38. DOI: 10.1353/cjp.0.0050
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Nguyen, C. Thi. ‘Trust and Sincerity in Art.’ Ergo 8 (2021): 21–53. DOI: 10.3998/ergo.1139
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Nguyen, C. Thi, and Matt Strohl. ‘Cultural Appropriation and the Intimacy of Groups.’ Philosophical Studies 176 (2019): 981–1002. DOI: 10.1007/s11098-018-1223-3
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Nowak, Ethan. ‘Language Loss and Illocutionary Silencing.’ Mind 129 (2020): 831–65. DOI: 10.1093/mind/fzz051
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Riggle, Nick. ‘Aesthetic Value and the Practice of Aesthetic Valuing’ Philosophical Review 133 (2024): 113–49. DOI: 10.1215/00318108-11251345
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Riggle, Nick. ‘Convergence, Community, and Force in Aesthetic Discourse.’ Ergo 8 (2022): 615–57. DOI: 10.3998/ergo.2248
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Riggle, Nick. On Being Awesome: A Unified Theory of How Not to Suck. New York: Penguin, 2017.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Riggle, Nick. ‘Toward a Communitarian Theory of Aesthetic Value.’ Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 80 (2022): 16–30. DOI: 10.1093/jaac/kpab060
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Riggle, Nick. ‘Wearing Band T-shirts of Bands You Don’t Know.’ Bloomsbury Contemporary Aesthetics Case Studies. Edited by Darren Hudson Hick. 2024. https://www.bloomsburyphilosophylibrary.com/article?docid=b-9781350886445&tocid=b-9781350886445-016
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Riggle, Nick. ‘Wearing Band T-Shirts of Bands You Don’t Know.’ Splintered Mind. 30 March 2023. https://schwitzsplinters.blogspot.com/2023/03/wearing-band-t-shirts-of-bands-you-dont.html.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Sandstrom, Gillian M., and Erica J. Boothby. ‘Why Do People Avoid Talking to Strangers? A Mini Meta-analysis of Predicted Fears and Actual Experiences Talking to a Stranger.’ Self and Identity 20 (2021): 47–71. DOI: 10.1080/15298868.2020.1816568
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Sandstrom, Gillian M., and Erica J. Boothby, and Gus Cooney. ‘Talking to Strangers: A Week-Long Intervention Reduces Psychological Barriers to Social Connection.’ Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 102 (2022): 1–12. DOI: 10.1016/j.jesp.2022.104356
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Schroeder, Juliana, Donald Lyons, and Nicholas Epley. ‘Hello, Stranger? Pleasant Conversations Are Preceded by Concerns about Starting One.’ Journal of Experimental Psychology: General 151 (2022): 1141–53. DOI: 10.1037/xge0001118
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Schroeder, Mark. ‘Attributive Silencing.’ In Oxford Studies in Normative Ethics, vol. 12, edited by Mark Timmons, 170–92. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2022. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192868886.003.0009
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Sizer, Laura. ‘The Art of Tattoos.’ British Journal of Aesthetics 60 (2020): 419–33. DOI: 10.1093/aesthj/ayaa012
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Sklar, Monica, and Mary K. Donahue ‘From Punk to Poser: T-shirts, Authenticity, Postmodernism, and the Fashion Cycle.’ In Oxford Handbook of Punk Rock, edited by George McKay and Gina Arnold, 1–21. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2021. DOI: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190859565.013.32
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Stanley, Jason. How Propaganda Works. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2015.
Search in Google Scholar Back to article
Young, James O. (2005). ‘Profound Offense and Cultural Appropriation.’ Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 63 (2005): 135–46. DOI: 10.1111/j.0021-8529.2005.00190.x
Open DOI Search in Google Scholar Back to article