Great Male Renunciation
en.wikipedia.org
en.wikipedia.org
In fact, I'm certain that one of the French revolution trigger was notables who saw those productivity increase improve their life, then being taken away to found wars or whatever.
In essence, if we want some sweeping generalizations and be generous, then assuming 1%/9%/90% for upper/middle/lower class is roughly in the ballpark for most societies until the 20th century.
So while the noble families are nowhere near 10%, it's not entirely wrong to assert that the top 10% including all the non-noble bourgeoisie, the merchants, doctors, lawyers, officers, etc, would have the means and desire to care about fashion.
In France it was down to less than 1% at the time of Revolution, but some countries like Spain that had centuries long wars, was closer to 6-8% range.
But now that we're at it, would you prefer to compare yourself to the bottom 1%?
Wigs, stockings and heels were associated with being of the aristocrat class. Which, as the article states, could make one wearing such things a target.
> During the French Revolution, wearing dress associated with the royalist Ancien Régime made the wearer a target for the Jacobins. Working-class men of the era, many of whom were Revolutionaries, came to be known as sans-culottes because they could not afford silk breeches and wore less expensive pantaloons instead
_Prior_ to the revolution, the Jacobins (who were largely bourgeoisie) would have been wearing that dress, distinguishing themselves from the working class (who _didn't_ wear the stockings). The revolutionary period is being used to illustrate a change here, not the norm.
The point would be that a mainstream man in 1750 wanted to be wearing colorful frilly things with high heels, even if he couldn't afford any of it because he was just a servant. Whereas starting in the 1800's, that stopped being an aspiration, whether you had money or not.
Also, while this clothing wasn't accessible to servants and laborers, some of it would have been to the growing middle class that consisted of merchants, professors, lawyers, and so forth. Just look at paintings depicting coffeeshop culture in the 1700's:
https://www.sylviaprincebooks.com/blog-list/2021/coffee-hous...
And coffeehouses were not reserved for the 0.1%, not at all.
Current court dress guidance from the BSB: https://www.barcouncilethics.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/1...
In the case of wigs, there were holdouts; barristers and judges in the former British empire have in many cases only really started abandoning them over the last two decades.
Though, if he was a _senior_ servant, he probably would be wearing some variant of it. There was a tendency for a while for high-ranking domestic servants in large houses to wear what was in effect a _previous version_ of what the upper class wore; AIUI this did indeed lead to a period where the upper class were wearing prototype modern suits while the butler was still wearing colours and frills.
> In England, which in this respect was typical of Europe, from the reign of Edward III in the Middle Ages until well into the 17th century, sumptuary laws dictated what colour and type of clothing, furs, fabrics, and trims were allowed to persons of various ranks or incomes.
That said, I would wonder how strictly these were enforced. Samuel Pepys' Diary would imply not very, at least towards the end; Sam's a rich commoner, but doesn't seem to hold back when it comes to fancy clothes (anyone who doubts that men were into fashion back then should give it a read...)
If you read Samuel Pepys' Diary, from the mid-17th century (highly recommended; it's a fascinating view into the surprisingly familiar/alien world of the past), you'll notice that as Sam goes from a middle-class civil servant to the upper-middle-class (largely through taking bribes, as was the fashion at the time), he starts going on more and more about fabrics.
So it makes sense that people who care about quality moved away from colorful things.
(At some point, popular culture seems to have decided that the Industrial Revolution was personally invented by Queen Victoria or something, and it gets moved about 50 years later, but in reality by the late 18th century it was well underway).
This was well before the invention of rip-proof or stain-proof fabrics.
Also the royal courts of Europe started becoming much less active, as the professional bureaucracy started forming which took care of routine decision making.
So the young noble man just back from his travels would have had far less opportunity to show off in formal settings to boot.
Quality, perhaps. Utility ? I don't know. Has a dress shirt more utility than a t-shirt, or a business suit more utility than a knitted cardigan ?
I think men still primarily aiming at looks and there's a lot of thoughts in the details, but not in the flamboyant and ultra expressive direction. I'd argue a lot of attention is paid to express restrain and non gay (in both the traditional and modern meaning) in so many ways, even at the cost of utility and comfort.
Women doesn't seem to want uniforms, they want to look different from each other, so you see a wide range of dress styles for women.
But most men don't wear suits anymore, or any sort of uniform. You seem to be trying to read this as something _innate_, but it is clearly fashion.
Eh, no. They choose them based on fashion; it's just that the fashion has changed (and continues to change; suits are generally in decline, say, and I suspect covid has dealt a mortal blow to the tie).
It could also just be that color attracts attention. With birds, it's often the male that's more colorful. See peafowl.
And both men and women changed their styles, Im not sure why they don’t mention that. No one wanted to be mistaken by a jacobin and have a bomb thrown at your lap. Women stopped imitating Marie Antoinette way before she was beheaded in the pangs of birth of the reign of terror
The obvious historical parallels are obvious because what generally happens is that chaos can only build up so much until the people rebel and kill everyone in power. That’s why the Egyptians mentioned “maat” (order) all the time, but there are some very good movies on this time period even on netflix
> And both men and women changed their styles
Maybe in France right after the revolution, but if I look at dresses today I see all that gaudiness in female dresses but not in male.
Since the ruling classes have been hammering the message that men are useless it's a normal cultural reaction for men to become more manly. Women instead have been told that sex sells and it does, so that's their cultural reaction to the problems of today.
At least for now; but as disorder keeps mounting, inflation rises, and so on, patience for the regimes falls, and more conservative fashions come back, which means the times for the ruling classes are frail and volatile.
the German revolutions of 1848–1849 for example came out of sparks that the French (and US) revolutions brought (as well as a good dose of Karl M).
Women’s clothing is more colorful today. I don’t think it is because women care less about quality than men.
Fast fashion isn't women exclusive, but the fashion cycle is so much shorter for women that the very notion of fashion being "fast" almost only makes sense for them *.
I actually wonder what fashion style a woman could get away with wearing for 10 years. It would probably need to be almost monotone, covering, and with little to no affordance. A white long straight skirt with a black or cream T shaped top ?
* There will be a non negligeable number of men also caring about fashion and follow a shorter cycle, but that's far from the norm.
So yeah, I'd argue that women and men do look at significantly different things when they make purchases.
Apparently not enough women actually want pockets to make that fashion financially worthwhile at scale?
Re Iran - you don’t think a man dressed out of line (eg drag) would be killed?
Also ...
> After Maryam Khatoon’s inquiry, Ayatollah Khomeini issued a legal opinion, known as a fatwa under Shi’a Islamic jurisprudence, asserting the permissibility of GAS [gender affirmation surgery] upon medical approval.
Trans women’s status in contemporary Iran: Misrecognition and the cultural politics of aberu
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/13634607231200552?i...
From the article:
> Shadi Amin, an Iranian-born activist, told The Sun that this homophobic Iranian regime is controlled by religious extremists who view being gay as an "illness". They believe that the only way it can be cured is by changing gender.
> "The government believes that if you are a gay man, your soul is that of a woman and you should change your body," Amin said.
> "We think this is a way [for them] to fight the existence of homosexual people because you change their body and you solve the problem.
> "The regime gives gay people two choices – to be arrested as a homosexual and risk punishment or even execution, or change your body."
> Government data shows that around 4000 gender reassignment surgeries are performed in Iran each year.
> Amin, however, claims that those numbers are actually much higher in reality.
> "They are trying to cleanse the country of homosexuals," she added.
> "They would rather carry out mass surgeries than executions because they know the world is watching them."
I find it so sad though, that gay men are forced to undergo reassignment in order to survive there, rather than be able to celebrate both being gay and their own masculinity - it's taking "being gay, a man who likes men" away from gay men, there.
If they really wanted there is nothing preventing them to wear men pants that are gender neutral. But they don't because they would lose much more than a few pockets. They do not really need them anyway because even the most rugged women will have some sort of handbag. Because it is one more fashion accessory to show off, because you can carry even more stuff than any pocket would allow and because this way, they don't have to choose between looking beautiful and being able to carry stuff. If anything, women carry around way more stuff than any man could in his pockets. On the other hand, men handbags are not a thing and not just because of fashion or social pressure, but because they are very likely to be asked to do things that require them to have mostly free movement (like carry stuff, hold doors, fix broken things, etc...). A friend once joked to me that he mostly wore strong jeans because he is highly likely to be asked to go down on his knees to fix whatever his wife (and other women) point at him.
If you look at one subset of men who derive power from looking beautiful/successful like salesmen, they also dress in a way that is not very practical for most daily activities. A suit has pockets, but mostly in name, they are very weak and shallow and leave disgracious bulges from whatever you are carrying that is not a small item like a simple key, forget about putting a modern smartphone in those pockets, it will not last long (in fact I have been scolded by women about how the stuff I was carrying in my suit pockets made me look bad and how I was ruining the suit). They do it, because just like women, they derive a good amount of power from dressing this way. The major difference is that this power exists only during their work so they very rarely dress this way outside of work, the little power advantage they would get in day-to-day life is not worth the trouble (and added cost). Women on the other hand benefit from this power throughout daily life even in their own home in some cases.
It is tiring to always hear about how women are victims of many choices they make themselves; precisely because they are capable of rationality just as well as men (the difference is mostly in usage), and those choices are generally about maximizing their profits.
Men tends to have less clothes but higher quality (and they wear a lot) while women tend to have thousands of clothes they wear once.
I can survive with 2-3 suits (in the 300-500 range, decent quality, but nothing crazy) in any major city in Europe and some shirts - which is what I did for years. Now, times are changing security wise and, while I would still wear a suit in London (it seems pretty common), I wouldn't in Paris - mainly because I've been attacked twice over 2 days of walking in Paris with a suit and I think wearing some baggy jumper would have meade me less of a target.
I have no clue about the states, but I'm sure there are no go area for suits there as well.
I think muggers just smell the money and vulnerability. Local people also get mugged /pickpocketed in some circumstances, but in general they have a distinctly different way of moving through the city that makes strangers stand out.
Yeah, on a bycicle moving at 50 km/h across lanes.
One the factor that made it easier to accept Paris closing a bunch of streets to cars was that it was already an utter chaos and cars where crawling at peak hours. Biking was an actual fast option, and people sure did get the message.
Much less that it was wrapped up in the proliferation of democracy in the US and France.
https://www.esquire.com/style/mens-fashion/advice/a33367/how...
Sorry, why put two buttons on the jacket then?
LilNasX has confidently picked up the baton for the current generation
I'd rather kill myself than wear those all day!
// that men "abandoned their claim to be considered beautiful" and "henceforth aimed at being only useful".
This resonates. I am around 40 and was born in Eastern Europe and the environment I grew up in was all about “man is valued as a good provider / defender “ and looks matter less for us.
Obviously it’s better to be handsome than gross, but it’s better to be useful but gross vs pretty but useless.
So to this day, it rubs me the wrong way when a man puts too much effort into looks vs “quality.” So this theory resonates as a historical thing
So I went to the Wikipedia article, and from there ended up at
> The Men's Dress Reform Party (MDRP) was a reform movement in interwar Britain.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Men%27s_Dress_Reform_Party
which
> saw [the everyday man's] clothes as "depressing"[2] and lacking in creativity
and which was affiliated with the Sunlight Leage. But:
> Then, in 1940, the Sunlight League also dissipated after a bomb destroyed their offices and the death of its founder, Dr. Saleeby.
Emphasis: "a bomb destroyed their offices". What?
This just raises more questions.
...
Also, I wonder if this has any relation to a story by D. H. Lawrence called Sun. Hm.
Given it was toned down military dress, it was literally the tactical cavalry wear of the time. The analogy or equivalent to Brummel's style today would be something closer to a luxury brand with technical cred from their tactical lines like Arc'teryx, Prada, Beretta's clothing line, and perhaps Fjallraven. I have an opinion about this because I looked at a business re-designing men's riding clothing, as over a couple decades I found the now-unisex attire discourages men from riding horses in any non-western disciplines. I gave up the idea because I could just buy clothes from some of those makers above and ride in them instead. The silhouette looks a lot more more "Horse Soldiers," than "Downton Abbey," but building a new retail brand for a market I was inventing wasn't a startup play. But that's what I was able to interpret about menswear along the way.
I don't know where I heard it, but, 'men's fashion marches with the army'. That's something I've always seen as a truism, and maybe one born from the time period in question. The explanation I heard was that this was due to the inherent value that society places upon men to do the dangerous work of war fighting. So, in peacetime, men whose dress imitates and looks akin to the dress in the military are then seen as more masculine. Crucially, you can't just dress like a solider when out and about unless there is a war on or if you are required to dress as such by being on duty. Stolen valor and all that jazz. You can only imitate.
Male fashion is just such a deliciously complex topic, especially since this renunciation, as it's all about the very tiny details and very subtle changes. So very military these things are!
American was looked to as the place of modernity.
I would just like to say that it is my conviction
That longer hair and other flamboyant affectations
Of appearance are nothing more than the male's emergence
From his drab camouflage into the gaudy plumage
Which is the birthright of his sex
There is a peculiar notion that elegant plumage
And fine feathers are not proper for the man
When actually that is the way things are in most speciesNow I'm older and don't care about fashion, so just wear carpenter jeans. But it seems like skinny pants are still in style, apparently in sweatpants form?
That's where it's at. I almost always wear Duluth Trading Company canvas(?) work shorts / work pants.
I'm happy as a clam, but my poor wife...
Today's culture, is broad and spiritually hollow by comparison.
I sure as heck can't afford to pay a staff of servants.
With respect to material culture - so also with respect to what clothing styles and fashions are possible - anybody who can afford a car is far richer than people who had servants a hundred years ago.
The more fundamental question should be something like, do you need to work to put food on your table.
If yes, then you are not wealthy.
For the larger bottles, just four per day would equal the income of a pre-industrial farmhand.
If I ignored inflation (and hand-waved at least three major currency replacements) it would be eight month's wages.
Adjusting for inflation also gets messier the further you go back. After the repeal of the Corn Laws the average person's day to day obligatory expenses went down dramatically, but it's barely a blip on the inflation charts.
... But you can stay at a Holiday Inn tonight.
Also can't be stressed enough how large the servant staff could be. It often has a management hierarcy of sorts.
Quite a lot of us have robot vacuum cleaners, dishwashers, washing machines, and all of us now have zero marginal cost (to ourselves) voice-controlled AI assistants free with our radio-video-telephone-dictaphone-gramophone-calendar-notepads.
Some of the aforementioned are also powerful enough to be able to locally, for an energy cost so small that it's less than the cost of the food calories you burned reading this sentence, create a new artwork in any arbitrary artistic style.
... Eh? I mean, it is clearly better by any reasonable measure. Bear in mind that most people in the 18th century didn't have a staff of servants.
besides 'if you were rich' is same trade-off as today's world...
This is a particularly severe case of "the grass is always greener", I think.