So what is it with men’s suits these days? Lately every news sports weather announcer to game show host to late show jabberer is jammed into a ridiculously tight fitting suit. Is there a shortage of gray rayon out there of which the public is not yet aware ? Is this why every other Wall Street broker- banker tool- bag looks like a juiced-up weight lifter in spandex ?
Yeah, yeah. I get it. It’s the style. And if all your friends jumped off a bridge would you do it too?
There were many things that made the greatest decade in American history. But one of the merely incidental, and yet in comparison with the cultural desert of today, monumental- was the individuality in everyday dress. In the sixties- God bless them- no one gave a shit what you were wearing.
What mattered was if you had something real to say. Or feel. Or express.
But such individuality, nonconformity, freedom and spirit scared the fuck out of the System.
We must follow, follow, follow…consumeconformconsumeconform….buybuybuy
And if the System says You must Obey and dress in a suit that makes you look like in the immortal words of Alice to Ralph Kramden “ two pounds of bologna in a one pound bag,” than that is what you will do. And if next Monday the System says You Must Now Wear A Pinwheel Hat I’m sure by Tuesday every late night to late late late night host to network anchor will be spinning the most stylish in town.
I don’t know why it bothers me but it does. Normally I don’t even notice how people dress. A product of the sixties myself, and as such not exactly a slave to fashion ( or overall consumption for that matter) I simply always dressed for comfort. But this is just one of those blatant examples of following the leader . Or maybe it’s because it’s just so visible. Unlike the rarely shown terrible results of conformity .
Most of the many devastating effects of mass conformity and consumption have been so well hidden , they never really happened, did they. “ You’re kidding, there was an oil spill in the Gulf ? I don’t remember that.” Or. “ What wars in the Middle East? “