idle gaze 074: in praise of gateopeners
There are guards that keep and hoard, and there are guides that show you the light.
“Can we get a recommendation for the readers?” Vogue recently asked Tyler, The Creator. The journalist was keen to get a scoop on the rapper’s favourite fashion stores in London.
I’m good, cos I gatekeep,” Tyler quips back. “I like special things, and damn, that’s my thing! That’s just me though. Companies, restaurants, and clothing that some people really love can get f*cked up because someone makes a TikTok and now everything is sold out.”
Tyler’s pushback exemplifies an increasingly common sentiment. The aggressively efficient social algorithm has a tendency to blow things up. That hard-won insider tip of a neighbourhood bar à vin in Marseille. An indie music gem from an obscure Japanese shoegaze band. A boutique jewellery brand from Athens. Some small batch skincare product with a gooey miracle ingredient. Suddenly, that secret thing (which was wholly unprepared for such an enthusiastic swarm of interest) has unavoidably become everyone’s thing.
With this in mind, the re-emergence of gatekeepers was bound to happen. The gatekeeper - broadly defined as anyone with the power to control information or access - is increasingly viewed as a necessity, to safeguard our favourites from the brutal rapture of the feed.
Despite the gatekeeper’s perceived necessity, no archetype is quite as contentious as the one who restricts the flow of culture. Amid digital and physical abundance, the gatekeeper is perceived as gluttonous. The stubborn, unyielding gatekeeper selfishly hoards something that deserves (demands!) to be free, to run wild. The anti-gatekeeper fights for culture to exist as an artery of abundant rivers, not as a system of tightly controlled, gatekept dams.
The gluttonous hoarder: that’s the singular image of the gatekeeper that reigns supreme today. The tight-lipped, greedy elitist. Someone who fiercely guards hidden treasures, for fear of losing the valuable currency that puts them at an advantage in society.
However, this homogenous idea of the gatekeeper obscures a more nuanced reality. Gatekeeping isn't a single practice, but a spectrum of behaviours and ideals. Each with a fundamentally different value system, trading in distinct forms of cultural capital.
They serve a variety of functions in the cultural ecosystem. Some guard knowledge. Some guard literal access to a space or experience. Some are in place to keep the gate closed. But others are driven by a desire to (cautiously) permit entry to the right people. A gate can be closed. But equally, it can be opened. This is the often forgotten duality of the gatekeeper. As Ruby Justice Thelot remarks: “only seen to be a fence, its hinge is forgotten”.
Across our research, documenting various kinds of gateopeners and gateclosers in culture, idle gaze has identified 4 prevalent archetypes:
The snob, The enthusiast, The doorman and The host.
The snob is the gatekeeper who hoards knowledge to maintain their cultural edge. They are the Rick Owens fanatics who pride themselves on encyclopaedic knowledge of rare archival pieces, and relentlessly judge the dilettantes who lack that wisdom. They are the crate diggers who linger in the local record store, fiercely guarding their rare white label releases and track IDs. Snobs are the staff at Dover Street Market who are trained not so much to sell you garments, but to judge your worthiness to wear them.
It’s tempting to dismiss the snob as prickly and rude, but deep down, there’s a sense of vulnerability. They live in constant fear, because they have constructed their social worth around exclusive cultural knowledge, a currency always at risk of depreciating.
Have you ever walked towards the entrance of a club and felt your heart pounding? Have you ever felt your palms go sweaty dialling the number of a hyped restaurant, praying for a miracle reservation? Then you may have been in the presence of a doorman - the cold, intimidating arbiter between the inside and the outside.
While the snob hoards information as a mark of superiority, the doorman deals in vibes and clout. The snob might care about what you know, but the doorman needs to understand who you are, to quickly and efficiently place you in the social hierarchy. As Quentin Belt, front of house at the (once upon a time) zeitgeisty restaurant Casino in Dimes Square explains in a feature on the gatekeepers of New York’s most coveted tables: “I’ve already googled every single guest… I mark them if they’re industry. I mark any publication someone’s connected to. And then, any names I recognize.” This determines who gets the best table in the house, and who gets to sit in proverbial Siberia.
Paris’s most renowned restaurants, London’s most desirable members’ clubs and New York’s top-tier wellness studios all have doormen, dressed up in all kinds of guises: squads of maître d’s, bouncers and unscrupulous membership selection committees designed to create an unobtrusive barrier between the eager crowds outside and the carefully curated atmosphere inside.
When we think of gatekeepers, we usually think of the above - the snobs and doormen, who operate first and foremost as gateclosers. However, in our research, we uncovered two other parallel archetypes. Gatekeepers driven by a desire to (cautiously) share and permit entry to the curious and deserving: the enthusiasts and hosts.
The enthusiast - like the snob - deals in knowledge. But instead of hoarding and protecting, they are driven by an urge to shepherd people beyond the sea of mediocre slop to discover awe-inspiring music, literature, art and food. To guide them towards the light.
A few months ago, I found myself in the presence of an enthusiast at the Zenner Ballroom in Berlin. Derrick Gee was hosting his ‘Radio Hour Live’ show. Derrick is a music curator who found widespread fame on TikTok diving into obscure trivia and nerdy music discourse, with topics ranging from Korean alt-rap, to explaining the vintage soundscape of Mitski’s latest album (an effect called “slap-back echo”), to the details of his at-home hi-fi sound system (rare La Scala’s, copped from eBay).
Framed as a mix between a listening session, live podcast and talk show , ‘Radio Hour Live’ featured Derrick sharing a playlist of songs, enjoyed collectively in silence, interspersed with spoken word essays about the virality of Aphex Twin and the merits of Ed Sheeran. Seated in a space designed to resemble a temporary living room, adorned with houseplants and a sofa, I felt as though a gate had been opened into a deeper, more considered world of music beyond the cold and shallow metrics of our Spotify algorithms.
While the snob belittles those with inferior knowledge as a means to boost their own ego, enthusiasts - like Derrick - are driven by an impulse to share their findings. However, there’s a caveat: the sharing of these hidden treasures can only happen in the right intimate setting, free from criticism, in front of a crowd who are open to expanding their taste.
Unlike the snob, the enthusiast does not believe in good culture (to be gatekept) vs bad culture (to be dismissed). What matters is curiosity and open conversation. As Derrick explains in a Ssense feature:
“It's all about positivity. It's knowledge and passion, and a personality that is non-judgmental. I'm not out to criticize anyone. If you think some album that I hate is the best album of all time, I'm very happy for you.”
The doorman - driven by a desire to block someone’s access - also has a softer, more considerate alter ego: the host. If the doorman is a gatecloser, the host seeks to open the gate to the deserving but underrepresented, to invite those who might otherwise feel unwelcome.
Keith McNally, the legendary restaurateur known for defining New York’s downtown dining scene with iconic restaurants like The Odeon, Balthazar, and Pastis - showcases all the hallmarks of the host.
Keith’s establishments maintain a standard of consistent exclusivity. Getting a reservation at the Odeon is no small feat. But what makes him unique in fine dining is his urge to disrupt the classic social hierarchies found in luxury hospitality, creating welcoming, intimate spaces otherwise dominated by snobbishness and exclusivity. Ex-Balthazar staff Cheutine Fong recalls a conversation with Keith about his desire to greet the right guests warmly:
“There are going to be people pushing their way to the front of the line to the podium. And then, there are gonna be people who come in, who are going to be intimidated because of the grandiose nature of how big and bustling Balthazar is. But I want us to go to the back of the line and help those people, who don’t feel like they belong here.”
With recommendations for outfits, restaurants, skincare routines and home finds becoming the bread and butter of the algorithm, while streaming services offer a bottomless well of content to consume, the gatekeeper plays a dual role in culture.
We undoubtedly need gateclosers to stem the flow of interest and crowds. But with such sheer overwhelming abundance of content to discover, places to go, things to buy, gateopeners play an equally important role. But it’s a delicate art: the ability to cautiously permit entry and introduce new knowledge to the genuinely curious. It requires discernment, authority and impeccable taste, to sift through the slop and lead us in the right direction.
We need gateopeners just as much as we need gateclosers, because culture ought to exist as an artery of abundant rivers, not just as a system of tightly controlled dams.
welcome back alexi :)
Wow, what a wonderfully written piece. Thank you.