Knock It Off With These Stupid-Ass Headphones

These idiotic around-the-neck headphones have been everywhere lately, and I have no idea what and why they are. What in the hell, man?

So technically they’re called “neckband-style” headphones, which is a little too close to “neckbeard” to be a socially acceptable term. I don’t get it. It’s hard to make them look cool, honestly. Remember those headphones in the early 2000s that came with a DiscMan? They had these little discs you’d hang over your ears with a little plastic band that wrapped around the back of your neck to connect them. They were uncomfortable, but they were ostensibly “in style.” But that style fell by the wayside for a reason. I thought we had moved on. I thought we had evolved. But as with all things terrible in culture, the old becomes new again. Now, we have people wearing superfluous plastic bands around their necks. It’s dumb.

Let’s explore these for a moment:

Yardwork, cool!

Consumer electronics! I feel terrible.

My friends at Gizmodo tell me that these things are Bluetooth headphones: The little plastic band that sits on your neck is where the battery lives, and thus your headphones come with their own little iron lungs. So they’re both ugly and inconvenient! I don’t get the appeal, especially when you still have to stuff your phone into your pocket or purse or what-have-you, or at least be within range of your device. That seems to defeat the purpose of not having wires to begin with.

The only conclusion I can draw with any certainty here is that this aesthetic is perfectly suited to old people: These things pair nicely with one of those emergency necklaces with the button you press when you fall down. Don’t wear them.