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Levi’s and the Cult of Ugliness

To comprehend the reality of illusion consider this: Fashion is mass hypnosis recycled endlessly. Subliminal social scripts cloth us as uniformly as the guards before the British Palace are clothed, but we just have perpetually shitty taste.

Our century-old addiction to Levi’s is a vivid example.

We all know the humble beginnings of the Levis Strauss story. Levi came from Europe to the gold fields of California in the 1840’s in search of wealth. Soon after, he stumbled upon the idea of using sailing canvas to fashion sturdy, long-wearing pants for the miners and cowboys. Soon, Levis became famous and the man who fashioned them because obscenely wealthy.

In the 1950’s Levis because associated with the teenage rebel-without-a-clue phenomena that started to plague western societies. To be James Dean cool, Marlon Brando cool, Elvis Prestley cool, you had to wear Levis. Men, of course, being permanent boys, will wear anything. They have as much flair for fashion as George of the Jungle has, but lack his physique; otherwise, they would likely just wear loin cloths.

Like all social scripts, we blindly became dedicated followers of fashion, ignoring the fact that Levis were stiff, smelly, chaffing, binding, and uncomfortable. They also stained your underwear blue for the first month or so. On top of that, you had to buy them at least one size too large, or you wouldn't be able to wear them after washing them the first time because they shrank so much. Such was the price of being part of the moronic ill-dressed mob.

Let’s face it, if we really had any individualism at all, at least five percent of the population would insist on wearing no clothes at all, for that is when we are truly comfortable, but I digress.

The traditional blue denim pants that Levis produces today are a far cry from the originals, but they differ from the originals only in even more negative ways.

For example, they are ten times more expensive, they don’t wear as well, for the quality and weight of the canvas has dwindled over the years, and you don’t even get a “real” leather tag above the rear pocket anymore. But Levis are still binding and uncomfortable, and let’s be honest, they look like hell, because they are unbecoming to the mass of individuals who choose to wear them. They wrinkle, fade, and basically make most of us look like refugee farmers. Few of us are narrow of waist and long legged enough to look good in Levis. The mass of us who are pudgy, squatty or borderline obese would look just as good if we covered our rotund bodies with indigo-colored foil.

Contrary to all the hype, Levis are not economical either. They shrink, fade and wrinkle horribly, so you’re stuck ironing them, because if you don’t, then you have crossed that fashion line that says, “I don’t own a comb, I have never shined a shoe, but I know that one must iron Levis at least a little before going out in public.”

Truly, Levis look so bad so quickly that it took a hypnotic mastermind sales campaign to convince the lame public that Levis look good faded and torn and wrinkled. We bought that concept hook, line and rivet.

Remember a few years ago, when people were actually buying used Levis and other "designer" jeans that were shredded at the knees? This was the sexy, penniless, homeless look. I do believe that you could sell this nation on rotten, insect-infested food if you hired the Levis sales team. Oh, perhaps that’s who McDonald’s hired. Anyway, once again, I digress.

Of course, you can only fool some of the people some of the times, so now we have seen the sales of Levi’s blue denim pants decrease dramatically. Also, the Levi Corporation lost some of its smugness when other "designers" began taking a chunk of the market and cutting into Levi's profits.

So they had to go back to the ironing board and those geniuses fashioned pants to replace their old standby blue denims. Now we have "Dockers for Dorks," which are equally ill fitting, faded, and wrinkled in their own right, and every American man marches in step like so many identical clones and buys virtually nothing else. At least, with Dockers it is much harder to let your gut and butt hang out, so perhaps I am mistaken and we are making progress. Now if we can just get men to use a comb, shine their shoes, and trim their beards.

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