While browsing through Urban Dictionary’s entries defining the word “gatekeeping”, I came across several different variations, some of which gave the word a pretty negative connotation. However, the entry that I feel most accurately explains the concept, reads, “Gatekeeping is to make your interests exclusive in order to protect them from becoming mainstream.”
Don’t get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with commenting on the TikTok of the girl with the perfect frilly dress you’ve been looking for, asking where she got it. I do it all the time. The issue starts when people who make that comment go absolutely feral when she doesn’t respond. Dang, she didn’t tell you where she got her dress from? Call her a gatekeeper and burn her at the stake, I guess.
Seeing someone else wear something you really like and not being able to find it is frustrating. It’s like when you hear a song you love in a restaurant and after you leave, you try to figure out what it was called but you just can’t find it, then it drives you crazy for a few days. That being said, you can easily find a similar dress with a few Google searches. Even if you don’t find the exact brand, it’s not the end of the world. On top of that, you can’t blame the content creator for not responding to your comment. They don’t owe you anything. Maybe they didn’t see it, they don’t know where it’s from, or they don’t want to start a micro-trend.
Some people argue that an influencer who gatekeeps a product is selfish and only wants it for themselves, preventing other people from enjoying the benefits of said product and depriving the brand of new customers. While I’m sure this is the case for some, there is actually a very valid and unselfish reason to gatekeep that many people might not know. That’s where micro-trends come in. At first glance, it seems like letting a few thousand people on TikTok know where you got your product would benefit the company that sells it, but the micro-trend cycle can actually hurt the brand. When a product goes viral, it typically has a quick rise and fall, meaning all of the sudden everyone wants it. When they see that everyone has it, suddenly no one wants it. There’s a lot of pressure on brands that have that one product that went viral to keep the momentum going because the steep drop in sales that follows ultimately hurts the business.
Business matters aside, there is just no need to copy someone else’s outfit. It’s better to take inspiration from someone else’s style that you resonate with and find similar things while also incorporating your own personal style. People like to have their own sense of individuality when they dress up and I wouldn’t say that’s selfish. Influencers don’t owe you answers about something as simple as boots, earrings, or socks.
I have a core memory from a few years back of visiting a small shop in Italy. I noticed that they had a variety of different garments but not a lot of each kind. I asked the shopkeeper if they had a shirt that I wanted in my size and she told me they had only made two that had both been sold and they wouldn’t be making any more. “Here in Italy, we don’t like to sell too much of one garment, because we don’t like to see everyone in the streets wearing the same thing.” was her response to my tragic reaction. That system is not so different from the gatekeepers of TikTok. While I was upset that I never got that shirt, what she said stuck with me. If fashion lovers adopted that mentality and abandoned the obsession with finding out what everyone around them is wearing, we would have a much more sustainable and interesting industry. I know that ending the trend cycle is impossible, but we don’t all need to have the exact same shoes from the exact same brand all the time. While constantly chasing individuality is unrealistic, there’s nothing wrong with wanting something unique that suits you well to be your own special statement piece that nobody else has. The role of the gatekeeper may seem like an evil one but at its core, a gatekeeper is a kind of protector who, in this case, may not eliminate, but definitely does not enable the trend cycle, making it a necessary role in the fashion industry.
Words by Mishi Ali.
Graphic by Josh Jamili