Why is it OK to be wearing ill-fitting jeans and an oversized stained t-shirt from a tech conference? Is it thought that if someone is in to dressing well that they've taken time away from learning a new technology or focusing on their product?
Disclaimer: I dress in a somewhat dandyish manner.
This is the costume which indicates you belong to our group.
That is the costume which indicates you belong to their group.
Not necessarily rational, but certainly one aspect of how people work.
looks around the office at a sea of jeans and t-shirts
The issue with this argument is that almost anything you can say about suits applies to all clothing.
It's no co-incidence that during the dot com boom managers started dressing down. Did that make them better managers than when they wore suits? Or were the good ones still good and the bad ones still bad, they'd just adopted a different uniform?
If you pick on a particular uniform (in this case suits) rather than the concept that uniform matters then you don't solve the problem you just move or hide it.
Clothing is one of those odd and weird things that humanity might just shake out of the culture eventually. It is only of meaning to small minds.
It's like the priest who wears dignified religious clothing while hiding a darker side. Or the executive sporting $3,000 suits while causing financial damage to a nation. Or the clean-cut white kid wearing nice jeans and t-shirts while selling drugs around the corner. Or the cop wearing his uniform while committing a crime. Be careful about using clothing to judge and form opinion.
Now, I happen to think that a nice (not too expensive) suit can look really good. So can a nice pair of jeans and a t-shirt (particularly on a woman that can, shall we say, enhance the garments --call me a pig). I had to wear a suit my entire young life because I was sent to private schools. What this means is that I am just as comfortable in a suit as I am in jeans. I like wearing a suit for the right occasion. But if I have to code for 16 hours straight you are going to find me in sweatpants, and old t-shirt and sandals.
I still think digital "clothing" would be cool, and I get that there's a lot wrong with the way we use clothes to signal today, but anything that adds so much bandwidth to communication between people can't be all bad.
Indeed... Including programmers who wear suits.
Let's break a suit down:
jacket: why? are you cold? there are better garments, made of better material that can keep you warm in a variety of colder than comfortable climates.
vest (optional): why? it makes you look like a poker dealer, but you forgot your green rimmed sunshade.
tie: supposedly to add some color, but looks like a noose, or a lead rope used to guide livestock around (the signal I always get from a tie), may as well just wear a shirt with some color. Predecessors to the tie are generally regarded as silly looking today. Nobody takes an ascot seriously today, bolos look ridiculous, bow ties instantly turn somebody into a fussy professor, and nobody would be caught dead these days in a cravat http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/71/Louis1667...
oxford or similar shirt: oh where to start....buttons, from a time when fabrics couldn't be manufactured with the properties of jersey. Collar, to catch sweat from...all the sweating you're doing from the 3 layers of unnecessary clothing you're wearing. Sleeves, long to be proper, even if it's hot, buttons on the end, because again another vestigial holdover from primitive fabrics, or french cuffs, because who doesn't like to assemble their sleeves when they get dressed? Oh, and it has to be tucked in, leading to constant retucks throughout the day, or embarrassing shirt stays clipped to your socks or looped under your feet looking like some kind of lingerie reject.
Toss out that mess and we're left with ridiculous, overly expensive uncomfortable shoes that need constant maintenance, black socks and what are essentially just expensive slacks.
(edit: I'm frequently caught wearing suits for various work reasons, and I feel like an idiot every time I "suit up")
As a more accessible example: Why do you think more people wear shoes with shoe laces instead of Velcro straps?
For starters, shoe laces need to be tied, and they come undone. To use Velcro straps you simply have to press them firmly into place, and they take quite a lot of force to undo improperly.
The fact of the matter is the primary reason most people, by a huge margin, chose laces over Velcro is aesthetics (which Velcro sorely lacks).
I think part of the problem with hackers wearing suits is that they tend not to be comfortable in them, and they tend not to fit well, so they don't look quite right in them.
Personally, I like to wear nice jeans with nice shoes and a nice dress shirt, all which fit me well. It's somewhere between casual and dressy that's not the standard "business casual," and it's a style of dress I am comfortable in.
Or just wear cargo pants.
We know that cargo pants exist, but maybe they prefer a suit?
I've acknowledged your point no need to berate everyone down the line as well =/
(Not to mention they make you look like some sort of ex-marine wilderness survival nut or something)
It's lazy thinking. The whole ethos of casual dress at work was that it didn't matter what you wore, it was about what you did and thought and that we shouldn't make assumptions based on something so superficial.
That's now flipped and become some form of inverted snobbery where the people who objected to being judged on what they were wearing (or not wearing) are now doing exactly the same.
The point isn't that wearing a suit or jeans or whatever is good, bad or indifferent. It's that it doesn't matter.
I've got suits that aren't uncomfortable and weren't incredibly expensive. As for impractical that depends entirely on your life. I certainly wear them less now I have small children but when I was younger I never found it an issue.
In terms of social pressure, well yes, but that's true of a many many things that we do. If you've ever pulled on a clean pair of jeans to go out and meet a friend rather than the dirty (but still hygienic) pair you'd worn the day before, that's social pressure, when you don't just fart in front of people, that's social pressure.
Are those worse than my occasionally wearing a suit to go out with my wife because it makes her happy because she likes the way I look in it? Or because I've just been feeling a bit schlubby lately and fancy looking smart for the day? Or simply fancy a change?
I say this all as someone who typically wears jeans seven days a week and has casual dress as a significant factor when I choose a job.
You say that as if it is an absolute truth. This might be true for you, but it certainly doesn't hold for everyone.
Your argument isn't an argument against suits, it applies to any item of clothing other than the absolutely most basic, utilitarian items. It's an argument against fashion and self expression through clothing of all sorts.
Now if this is what you genuinely believe then that's fine but I hope you're applying the same standards you apply to those wearing suits to people wearing band t-shirts, anything branded where an equivalent non-branded item is available, or frankly anything that has been chosen for any reason at all other than it's absolute functional value.
Or my other clothes were in the wash. Happy now?
Is that not a clear enough example of why your argument isn't just about suits when I can just reuse your answer an it works?
In this sense it's a far better reason for a suit than for a band t-shirt. A suit is the primary output of a tailor, a band t-shirt is a commercial by-product of a band. There are better ways to support a band than buying a t-shirt - buying their records or seeing them live for instance. There is no better way to support a tailor.
As for the circular reasoning on its dirty - I agree but it's the same for both suit and band t-shirt. You have to have a reason to own it which I've given you.
Regardless of that owning and wearing a suit because I think it is a beautiful example of clothes design, regardless of whether it supports the creator or not, is a valid thing to do in itself that is neither narcissistic nor an example of social pressure.
And in case you think I'm desperately trying to come up with reasons but that they're not actually things any real person would do, I own only two suits, one of which (by Oswald Boateng) I own precisely for this reason - because I believe it to be a beautiful item (or more precisely two beautiful items) of clothing.
But the problem is still that your argument applies to lost of clothes, not just suits. Shirts are less practical than t-shirts. Buttons are fiddly and unnecessary, collars a pointless throw back to necktie and don't get me started on the practicality of cuffs. Most shoes are sub-optimal from a pure practicality point of view. Ironically many trainers aren't actually good for running because of the way they're balanced.
But I only wear it to interviews.