It's hard for me to figure out hot to articulate this gripe without sounding like a fussbudget or one of those fellas on those fashion shows: "Ugh... White shoes after Labour Day with a pin stripe halter top? Girl, go back to Idaho." The other risk is that that I might sound like an geriatric fart: "Why in my day, seeing a girl's ankles would send my flagpole a-quiverin.'"
Basically, modesty, class and public decorum has gotten the old "Heave-ho, 'ho" treatment and in it's wake we find a skankified and casual wardrobe that leaves us either cringing or salivating.
On the whole, we're all right. Same ol' business suits, same old WalMart turtlenecks and polyester slacks. Where we're lacking, though are in the public arena. When we were kids flying was a big deal. Everytime we had to travel my mom put on a nice skirt and matching jacket and we kids were jammed into slacks, oxfords and clip-on ties. It's a habit that I haven't abandoned (well, I finally figured out how to make the rabbit go around the tree and through the hole, so the clip-on's been sh*tcanned), but I find myself in a sad minority as everybody else is decked out in shorts, those goofy f*cking track suits that the ladies are wearing and even pyjamas.
Yes, pyjamas.
In fact, I recently stopped by a neighbourhood drugstore to get a pair of sweatpants to wear for the gym. I couldn't find any, but in their place I did see a whole pile of PJ bottoms. They seem to be all the rage.... Some girls have even managed to wear them to school, as their mothers (wearing either a similar pair, or those aforementioned sh*tty looking track suits) drop them off.
As if those moms aren't fashion-less role model, you can make matters worse by filling up Tiffany's toybox with those little Bratz trollops. That's nice. Give them a little leg up to hussy-dom so when they get to college they can wear those tasty sweatpants that sit right at the edge of the pube-line in the front while a nice thong peeks out the rear. That might bring your attention to the hot and "original" tattoo they just got.It's not just the ladies, either, though in place of thongs are a pair of boxers - while pants that are obviously a few waist sizes too large sit precariously, ready to drop to the floor. It's nice that all the accomplishments of the prison inmate who's had to remove his belt can be honored by so many.
I don't know. Maybe it's just nitpicking and I'm just a being a blowhard. I've got to go out to dinner with the wife tonight anyway.
Prego Woman? We're late! Where's my tank-top? You know the one with the palm trees in the front and the chili stains I got at the last church lawn fete
Wife It's on the laundry pile, with the pyjama bottoms
Prego You didn't wash it with your thongs, did you? You know my 'no tops with bottoms' rule.
Wife Groan.
24 comments:
It's all about tradition and certain segments of the population not wanting to follow convention. Older generations think certain habits are "proper", but who said they were proper? ...and should they still be proper?
This is a stretch, but perhaps it's all related to our culture being perhaps overcapitalistic. It's all about efficiency and trends. We don't have time to wear a suit and hat everyday because we have to go to work to work 50-60 hour weeks. And the other part is that people like to do what's cool. Our capitalistic market-driven society is constantly coming up with new ways to dress to make money for companies that sell clothes, fashion items, music. These tend to be "anti-establishment".
I was typing as I was thinking so if it doesn't all make sense, I apologize.
Yeah, I teach junior high and I'm constantly amazed at what the little rascals wear. I have no desire to see boxer shorts hovering above a kid's jeans. Neither do I want a twelve-year-old girl's belly button staring out at me. I'd like to make them all wear Grranimals or Tuffskins or some other wonderful 1970s clothing that clearly identified the wearer as a child who was not going to be going clubbing any time soon.
If you're to ask my girls what the word Bratz says, they'll tell you, "Hoochie mama" and they're not allowed what so ever in my house.
I went through a fashion delima along these lines a few weeks ago when I finally wore out my last pair of pre-kid jeans that I had been hanging on to for 10 years when I got back down to this size.
Unfortunately I am forced to wear jeans that go just above the pube line because they just don't make normal jeans anymore at a price that a family with 4 kids and one income can afford. Lucky for the public my thongs don't show because I was forced to buy new underwear to go with my new jeans.
Like you, Rob and I for the most part were expected to dress nice when going places. I expect the same from my kids. I have a cousin on the other hand who wore nothing but PJs for 5 years. It didn't surprise us when she got pregnant her senior year of high school and dropped out.
I must be getting old too. Excuse me while I put my honey's wife beaters and baggies in his dresser.
i wear jeans just above the pube line because any higher and no matter how many sit up per day i do my tummy hangs over!
but pyjama?.... NO not even to bed.
and those bratz things are gross. they just look like a bunch of goths to me, yuk.
i do my bit fasion police wise myself and though casual and 'destressed' is fine by me (hell it often matches my mood), i still think we should dress nice.
btw the boys are stunning. money well spent on the photos. gorgeous*
Like you, Rob and I for the most part were expected to dress nice when going places.
...a standard both ~A~ and I happily sloughed off come our teen years. ~A~ consistently sported a pair of patent leather, 20 eye Doc's while I tromped around in my skate punk regalia.
Even then, we both cleaned up pretty good when it came down to it.
Yeah...sexy pre-teens make me nauseous. I much prefer the sexy toddlers. Speaking of which, you got some nice lookin' boys. Do they like vans?
(jibblies)
Alright...I just grossed myself out. Time to cut my losses.
peas...
r
fin...
I'm still pissed about nobody wearing ties and straw hats to ball games anymore.
What HAPPENED to this country!!
Everything has gotten too damned casual. The pajama thing really bugs me, but I try to tell myself, "Be happy with this, because it's only going to get worse!"
That is, unless there's a complete rebellion against uber-casualism lolling around the corner.
comment from a visiting relative a while ago (from a suburban city that shall remain nameless):
"People look so nice here... I'm used to seeing everyone in sweatpants everywhere I go..."
Ah yes. The Terrors are in for a shocking time, because I refuse to let them dress like a pimp and his ho.
In the last school I worked in, we actually had a dress code. "No breasts, bras, butts, or bellybuttons" we called it the 4-B rule. PARENTS were the worst complainers.
I think young men are wearing their pants below their ass as a rebellion against old men who wear their pants around their nipples. Not that they know that's why they're doing it, of course.
I do have to say I'm glad we don't have to get so dressed up to go on an airplane anymore. What's the point? As long as the people next to me don't smell bad, I'm fine.
Yeah, the DemiGoddesses had a small and mercifully short obsession with Britney Spears back in the day. One of them asked for a Britney doll for her birthday, but the thing was dressed in a mini skirt and thigh-high stockings (her costume from the "Oops, I Did it Again" video, I think).
So. Not. Happenin'.
I am pleased to report that we are well into the junior high years, and yet, to date, there are no hoochies in the Goddess household.
Mr. X is my Propriety Guru. I ask him, "Does this show too much boob?" He always says "No." Next time I'm going to try a little experiment... (I'll be back with the results!)
I don't wear ultra-low rise pants. I think the style is ugly.
People should try to dress decently in public. I'd rather see someone out in their nice clean pajamas than in stained or torn clothes. Children should not dress provocatively.
And leave your muffin tops at the bakery. The overhang is a disgusting sight.
I thought I'd offer some of my extensive Britney expertise here... (somebody's got to do it... and it's always me for some reason...)
Everydaysupergoddess... the short skirt/thigh high stockings schoolgirl look was Britney circa the "...Baby One More Time" video, I believe.
"Oops, I Did It Again," on the other hand, was the skin-tight full-body red vinyl jumpsuit Britney look, which came a little later...
Just be glad your DemiGoddesses weren't wanting to dress like that...! If you see them wearing skimpy flight attendant outfits all of the sudden, though, you can probably blame Britney for that too...
Thank you for the clarificaiton, SVF.
And I am not one bit sorry I got that wrong.
I am with you on this one Prego. I don't know why Americans feel the need to look like slobs. In addition, I do not know why girls under the age of 14 need to wear remotely provacative clothing.
And it's hard to find a pair of pants that don't expose my 33 year old butt crack to the world these days. I think that's just strange. I mean high waisted pants look good on no one, but niether does exposed ass. there has got to be a happy medium.
I work with NYC public school kids and a few months back one told me about "Whale Tail"... think about it.... more... think women.... think thong.... no?
"Whale Tail" is when a woman's thong is hanging abover her jean line in the back and the underwear creates a "whale tail".
Now it's fun to walk down the street and say, "man, did you see that whale tail?" Even expanded to Sperm Whale Tale... figure that out, but it just doesn't have the same zing.
Rob said"...a standard both ~A~ and I happily sloughed off come our teen years. ~A~ consistently sported a pair of patent leather, 20 eye Doc's while I tromped around in my skate punk regalia."
Yeah, but this was between school uniforms and strict dress codes, although pushed to the limit were followed.
Plus, I think we get some slack for the fact that our teen years, at least for me, was the late 80s slash early 90s and we lived in Seattle. Not some city trying to be annexed but Seattle proper. I mean, if you didn't wear docs you were a freak. It was survival dude. Just trying to survive.
yeah - those track suits gotta go --- cheese city.
good laugh
michele sent me
How do some get away with wearing what they do? I've seen some girls in the office happily displaying their thongs with the low-slung jeans they have.
Michele sent me here.
I don't have any problem with casual dress but what used to be considered causal is now "dressy" and what is now considered casual used to be worn only by whores and the homeless. I'm forty-something and I can't keep up. Heck I don't want to keep up!
Got here via The Incurable Insomniac
I get quite scared at what some girls wear. The tiny, belt-like, skirts on 15-16 year olds...Quite frankly they look awful on anybody but it just scares me when girls so young are wearing them...it just takes the wrong guy spotting them for it all to go wrong!
One thing I learned about traveling by air is that you should always dress well because if they need to bump someone up to First Class, they're going to look for someone who looks like they belong there.
Of course, I fly Southwest most of the time so my wearing a tie for that purpose is gone. Still, it's nice to look nice and that's all the reason one needs!
I love my PJ pants at home....but you're right, I've seen people wearing them out in public on more than one occasion. I went back to college 2 years ago and there was one kid that wore them to EVERY class.
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