Yesterday, Feminist Law Professors drew my attention to the Miami Daily Business Review’s “Rodent” column, a weekly anonymous rant written by various members of the legal community. The latest missive, “Lady Lawyers Should Dress the Part,” warns female attorneys that they may be sabotaging their careers with overly sexy business attire. Actually, I think it’s more likely that the conveniently anonymous Rodent, who spouts off platitudes like “women who dress like Barbie dolls get treated like Barbie dolls,” is the force that’s keeping women down in the workplace.

Read More “Dressing “Too Sexy”: Career Suicide Or Sexist Excuse?” »

Shorts Circuit: Tosin Abasi’s fashion sense tests metal.

Tosin Abasi was walking down the street in the East Village when he ran into New York magazine. Abasi’s outfit had caught the eye of a reporter looking for a subject for the mag’s fashion blog, the Cut. Abasi obliged, and proceeded to detail his street style for the camera: a pink paisley scarf, a Schiaparelli fedora, and khaki linen women’s shorts he scored as a hand-me-down from his girlfriend.

Such an outfit wouldn’t prompt a second thought if Abasi worked as a writer, artist, butcher, salesman, or in any number of other professions.

But Abasi is a metal guitarist, and women’s shorts don’t sit too well with that crowd.
Read More “Metal Guitarist Wears Women’s Shorts, Hell Breaks Loose” »

Take a look at this man. He is sculpted. Sophisticated. Discriminating. Confident, as if in possession of a heightened sense of core consciousness. Ripped. But no—this man is more than ripped. This man is RIPT.

“ ?” you may be wondering. RIPT, according to RIPT, is “a body-sculpting undershirt designed to support your core, shave inches off your belly and enhance your posture. Immediately, you will look and feel better in your clothes with a heightened sense of core consciousness.” It’s also a product on the cutting edge of achieving equality for women via regression.

Read More “RIPT Body-Sculpting T-Shirt Achieves Gender Equality Via Regression” »

In a blog post entitled Sigh . . ., El Guapo in DC makes his triumphant return by lamenting the mass exodus of high-heel wearing ladies from the district. “Ballerina flats,” he writes. “Si, ballerina shoes. The women of DC have for some reason turned to wearing ballerina shoes. Have they done this to spite me? I think so. Is this their way of telling me that I’ve mistreated women in the past? Lo siento. En serio, I’m sorry. Please, por favor, put the heels back on. I cannot take this anymore.”

El Guapo shies from outright blaming the return of “the footwear equivalent of sweatpants” on “that Latino president that is in the White House (Yes, he’s part Guatemalan. No black man is that smooth).”

“I don’t want to point fingers,” he writes. “No fingers pointing at Obama. But there were no ugly ballerina shoes when Bush was in town. All heels. All the time. . . . Please bring the heels back. You look horrible. Seriously.”

Okay. I’ll bite. Are Democratic women more likely to wear flat shoes? I voted for Obama, and have never worn any shoe north of a half-inch heel for more than a very uncomfortable afternoon. Coincidence? Probably.

But aren’t Democratic women more likely to be hippies, who are more likely to ride bikes, which are more likely to require flat feet [Fig. 1]?

FIGURE 1:

OBAMA —> HIPPIES —> BICYCLES —> BALLERINA SHOES

Bushies, on the other hand, were rich enough to not have to care about the environment, OR to display their token hippiedom by using special lightbulbs and staging charity balls for trees, to which they traveled in taxis, which are far more accomodating of the high heel [Fig. 2].

FIGURE 2:

BUSH —> $$$ —> LIGHTBULBS/ CHARITY BALLS —> TAXIS —> HIGH HEELS

Proof.

Photo by Kekka

So, George F. Will wrote 700 words in the Washington Post yesterday on why he hates jeans. The column, “America’s Bad Jeans,” was largely inspired by last month’s Wall Street Journal piece by Daniel Akst on why he hates jeans. Apparently, Will felt that just one rich white guy opining on his distaste for plebeian fashion was not enough, in this economy.

I’m tempted to sympathize with Will here: Some weeks, you’re just really hard up for a column. In this case, however, Will’s misuse of his cushy WaPo spot is too egregious not to mention. Will spends half his jeans essay rehashing Akst’s jeans essay, chortling along as he relives Ackst’s every turn. Will co-opts Akst’s argument that the blue jean, once decidedly working-class, has now become an expensive, obnoxious, and hypocritical mark of the American elite, who take pains to “slum it” in their unwashable designer jeans. Will then rehashes Akst’s SUV-to-the-Whole Foods joke, his McMansions joke, and his Steve Jobs joke.

Read More “George F. Will Hates Jeans” »