Lounges to logos, the endless scramble for new status symbols

It wasn’t supposed to be like this! When I was growing up, every year for summer holidays, my brother and I spent a week at the ancestral home of a loving neighbour. Set in the middle of a big paddy farm, the verandah of the house, proudly and puzzlingly, had a pair of aeroplane seats. I spent hours sitting on it, pressing the silver button that moved the backrest, fantasising about flying in a real plane one day: all shiny and sparkling, with a smiling stewardess uncomplainingly allowing me every whimsy. Buses and trains were transport. Flying was the ultimate status symbol, significantly out of reach and flawlessly beautiful. Even by the time I managed to board my first flight, in the early 1990s, the reality seemed like a slightly frayed, sticky-taped version of the fantasy. The seat corners were flecked with grime, the air hostess’s smile did not quite reach her eyes, everyone was doing their job which, it seemed, was just to take us from place A to B, not to make me feel like an important person.Medium108411814 That first airplane ride also planted in me the sneaking suspicion that adulthood itself might not be the shimmering mirage of my fantasies, but perhaps it came with the shocking tastelessness of rice and chicken curry served in silver foil. Groucho Marx famously said that he refuses to join any club that would have him as a member. Similarly, my first flight demonstrated to me that by the time I can afford something, it’s likely already lost most of its exclusivity.Cut to thirty years later. Airports are bursting at the seams, flights are rickety, everyone is pushing and shoving in order to be the first ones out. If you haven’t bust a blood vessel from the stress, you can count yourself lucky. But, for a small segment of fliers, there was still a little bit of luxury to hold on to — The Lounge. While the masses went to the food court to eat overpriced fast food, the privileged could head to the lounge, settle into the comfort of overtly cushioned seats and help themselves to some finger food, a beverage or even a whole meal if they chose to. It was an oasis of calm, a way to relax even with the stresses of travel, a brief escape to tell yourselves that even if you were condemned to fly in a no-frills airline, you were a little bit better than your fellow passengers. Alas, that privilege too has now been snatched away.Social media is now filled with the shrill laments of “old lounge users” aghast at the fact that just about anybody with a credit card is now pushing and jostling their way into that sacred space. What used to be a relatively quiet refuge even five years ago is now filled with the cacophony of excited “new lounge users” slurping their sambhars and belching it out proudly, it seems. What’s an upper middle class person got to do to cling on to some semblance of status these days, they moan, before plugging their ears with headphones and putting their indoor sunglasses on, determined to remain an island of affluence even when everything around them goes to seed.Medium108411815 The super rich are, of course, way ahead of this game. They fly private, and the selling point the providers of these services tout about is the reduction in the number of “touch points”, that is the number of times a person has to encounter a fellow human being. If you fly commercial, you have to deal with more than 700 touch points, if you fly private, it’s only 20. The symbol in the status It’s not just at airports, and it’s not just in India that the moneyed are encountering the difficulties of staving off the baying masses nipping at their heels. All over the world, people are desperately seeking new definitions of status symbols to somehow communicate privilege. In the US, this forms an entire genre of TikTok videos. The rules are varied and sometimes, quite contrarian. One popular line of wisdom suggests that real status is about owning these symbols — expensive cars and bags — but not using them. Designer logos are another area of hot contention. Those who can newly afford them flaunt big logos but those who are truly privileged prefer to go minimal and underplay their expensive gear. No logos for them. In Silicon Valley too, the prevailing trend is expensive clothes and shoes that look, rather, ordinary. Think Mark Zuckerberg’s grey T-shirt, ordinary to look at, but worth $400.Smartly managed brands understand this market in contrarianism, offering products that are so banal they constitute a category called ‘Ugly Fashion’. Wealthy Park Avenue mums now ironically wear Croc heels or slouchy No 6 clogs. Like the monotone greys and blacks in the TV series ‘Succession’, it’s a secret code and you have to be a true insider to understand it. Anything to help tell the world, I am special, look at me. Three-ring circus In India though, the ultimate status symbol has always been access. Who do we know and who can we say knows us. A friend who used to work in the IPL tells me that match night parties are often, literally, three-ring circuses. The notionally privileged are allowed into the wing of the hotel the team is partying in. The slightly more privileged get to actually be on the dance floor with the players. And the really privileged are walked into the adjoining private room where the movie star-team owner is holding court.What can the seekers do? Like at the airport, all they can do is inch their way forward to the shinier, more hallowed space while constantly looking over their shoulder to make sure the crowd isn’t catching up. Who said it’s easy being erm…only moderately wealthy?Veena Venugopal is the author of Independence Day: A People’s History