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loki-zen · 7 years

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The Impracticality of Feminine Attire

@osberend I’m splitting this off so it’s more readable and we’re not reposting @ silver-and-ivory’s face and half a dozen pictures of Gackt every time we make a reply. The chain so far is [here].

also I’m adding a cut because this turned out to be loooong

Thanks for the info, and I have no objections to tangenting at all. My thoughts, some in agreement, some in tentative disagreement or confusion (and some perhaps simply reflecting different priorities or personality) follow. Feel more than free to point out anything incorrect.

The lack of pockets is definitely a thing. I think my mental model of a “typical” black tie event tends to have flat surfaces that one could readily set a handbag on, but this may be factually incorrect.

I mean, depends on the event, but unless it’s a closed one and I know everyone there, I’m unlikely to be okay leaving my valuables lying around.

(My own typical solution to the no-pockets problem, when wearing a skirt (which I’ve never done in a remotely formal setting) without a jacket is to wear around my neck a lanyard with my keys, ID, credit cards, and sometimes one or more of pocket-knife, cell-phone, and and mini-flashlight all dangling off of it on rings. But that’s obviously not compatible with dressing at all formally.)

My solution is usually a trade-off with my partner and usual date: in casual settings, where I am invariably carrying a (small backpack or messenger-style) bag and he isn’t, I will carry things too big to fit in his pockets, within reason. In return, when we’re dressed formally and my practical hands-free bags are not appropriate, he will put my wallet/keys etc in his pockets. Obviously, this is not ideal as it requires a date, and means anything I need to take into the bathroom with me (period supplies, makeup for retouching) I need to get off him and carry there in my hands. (That doesn’t sound like I big deal until you consider that many women are embarrassed to be seen with period supplies, and tangent 1 below.)

Regarding jackets vs. wraps, I suspect that my (possibly autistic?) aversion to restrictive clothing is a factor here. I’m inclined to to view greater freedom of movement for my arms at the expense of having to make greater use of my hands as a net win, unless I’m doing something highly active (in which case, why would I be wearing semi-formal attire at all?).

Try wearing one? The trade-off could be positive for you. It’s not for me. You don’t need to be doing anything active - basic black-tie event activities like ‘moving your arms at all in any way’ can cause wraps to slip, often while simultaneously requiring the use of your hands so you can’t use one to hold the wrap on. E.g.:

Reaching out to take a canape or buffet food with a plate in the other hand

Sipping from your drink while holding your clutch/wrist chain bag

Shaking someone’s hand while holding your drink or clutch/wrist chain bag

Using the bathroom (which can also be an operation due to manoeuvring awkwardly tight or voluminous skirts and shapewear or tights)

Fixing your hair/makeup

The actual result for me/women with whom I have discussed this is the opposite of freedom of movement - you end up keeping your arms and shoulders as still as you possibly can, to keep it on. Also, I feel like it bears repeating, where I’m from (UK) you will do all of this to keep your outer layer on and probably still be cold.

I have had some success on the holding it on problems by securing the wrap with a brooch of some kind. This reduces but does not eliminate slippage. I do always wonder if I look wrong because most people don’t do this, but it feels elegant enough and being able to move is worth the worry. The problem here, and possibly the reason more people don’t do it, is that wraps are frequently made of a fabric that can’t take a brooch without developing permanent holes.

Heels are certainly a thing. My admittedly vague and possibly baseless impression was that the range of acceptable shoes for semi-formal wear included some flat or at least low-heeled options. Is this incorrect?

Like, sort of. Flats are just inherently not as Fancy, so unless you’re super style-confident or otherwise uncaring of what people think, you’re probably trading foot comfort for a nagging feeling of being under-dressed all night. I’ll admit this is more one where on average the women’s option is much more uncomfortable, but if you’re willing to throw time and money after finding the comfiest formality-compliant shoe imaginable, you’ll only come in a bit more awkward and less comfortable than the male default. (Also, unlike the men, you may have to seek out this rare shoe more than once, because of the thing I mentioned in the last post where women can’t get away with wearing the same outfit to every black-tie event they go to. And the shoes have to go with your outfit, of course.)

Low heels (and wedges) are better than high ones, but still uncomfortable. Fancy/evening attire has the added bonus that the dressiest, most formal styles are usually the ones lacking in the support that makes a heel more wearable - which can make as much difference as the height of the heel.

For instance, a boot - the maximum amount of support for a heel - is not really black tie appropriate, depending on how formal of a black tie event it is. Oxfords, Mary Janes, mules and shoes with lots of big wide straps are considered less formal - more business or casual wear than black tie.

Perhaps not coincidentally (see Tangent 2), these are also the styles most women find more comfortable, and the styles that are the least damaging to the feet and legs. A lot of fancy, black tie-appropriate shoes - inho, especially, the less high ones - will be more like this:

The lack of any straps or top to the shoe make it more uncomfortable to wear, because your foot is not supported in controlling the heel. This tends to lead to subconscious ‘scrunching’ as my physiotherapist mother calls it - bending the toes inward to help keep the shoe on - which can result in pain following a few hours of wear, and repetitive strain type injuries from long term wear.

Flats won’t save you from this, as the most common style of formal flats is the ballet pump, which is not beloved of physios - it has the same problems with scrunching, and zero arch support.

Now, this shoe is so ubiquitous that if you want flats, it’s too cold or formal for sandals, and you’re under 40 and want to dress in a way that isn’t butch or really old for you, it can take a lot of shopping to find an alternative. (For a demonstration, google image search ‘comfortable formal flats’ and take note of every shoe on that page that’s a) actually flat and b) not a ballet pump.)

So in conclusion on the heels section; yes, there are alternatives, but they’re either pretty bad too but not as bad (ballet pumps) or incredibly hard to find. I tried to find the one example I own - a pair of flat Mary-Janes that have both a decent sole and an evening-appropriate look (where most flat Mary-Janes have one or the other) - online so I could show you a picture, and I literally can’t find them even knowing exactly what I’m looking for. Tangent number 3 at the bottom is on heels.

You have a good point regarding breast management, although my impression was that there were at least some evening gowns for which this was not an issue? Again, I recognize that I could be incorrect. Similarly, slinkiness is standard, not universal, right? Wikipedia includes Empire Silhouette in its list of evening gown styles, and the illustrations in the linked article seem unlikely to require shapewear; is this wrong, or misleading?

Yes, you’re correct here, and I think I remembered to use words like ‘many’ and ‘most’ in my post. If you set your mind to it, you can find an evening dress you can wear a normal bra with, though you’ll probably have to ditch your mentioned specification of ‘sleeveless’. However slinky the dress, nobody’s making you wear shapewear, and there are definitely styles that are more forgiving. So this one is actually a little better than the shoes; this is a case where if you try really hard and your only criterea is comfort, you might actually be as comfy as you would be in the menswear. Provided it isn’t cold.

A few caveats though:

1: This requires you to prioritise comfort over all else. A full-coverage top on an evening dress is unusual, and selecting your dress on this basis will probably make you stand out and might have unintended style implications. Unless this style happens to be in when you go dress-shopping, you’ll probably end up with something quite ‘Mother of the Bride’ (i.e. an older woman’s style) and/or (based on the thing where every outfit is read as advertising your sexual mores) prudish-seeming. Men can be this comfortable and not feel at all self-concious because they’re dressed like everybody else. 2: I mentioned before about how tough it can be to find clothes that fit properly. Depending on your location and shopping tolerance ‘I like it okay and it fits me’ might be tough enough to find, never mind ‘I like it okay and it fits me and I can wear a normal bra with it and it’s Empire-waist and cut high enough that I don’t have to wear heels*). ‘It fits but the neckline is a bit off and a normal bra would show’ is a common way for a dress to be ‘good enough’, especially when you’re an unusual size, tired of shopping, and the dress is quite cheap. 3: The standard thing everybody wears is so much cheaper.

*yes, that’s a thing. If a dress is supposed to be floor-length, it might be designed on the assumption that you’ve got three or so inches of heel going on.

The above questions probably reflect an unusual (autistic?) way of looking at things: I tend to make a strong distinction between rules and expectations. So that, for example, a man attending a “black tie” event while wearing neither a waistcoat nor a cummerbund is Objectively Wrong, while a woman who attends in suitable clothing, wearing no makeup and with unshaven legs and armpits, is Objectively Correct, even if most likely Socially Disapproved. This applies to most of the “unspoken but expected” items you mention, although jewelry is sort of an edge case. But that’s generally not awkward or time-consuming, as opposed to just expensive, right? Or wrong?

So given that I tend to view Social Disapproval — or, at least, the kinds of Social Disapproval that my mental model suggests (perhaps incorrectly) are meaningful risks in this sort of context — with less concern and more contempt than most people, I suspect that my sense of “how comfortable (or expensive, or any number of other things) is dress code X” is defined a good deal more by “how comfortable (or whatever) an outfit could I construct that fits the technical requirements of dress code X and that looks good by my standards” (given, when considering female dress codes, a more suitable anatomy; finding an evening gown that looks good by my standards despite my complete lack of tits would probably be fairly difficult) and less by “how comfortable of an outfit could I construct that most people would view approvingly in the context of an event for which dress code X was specified” than is typical.

I think that also applies heavily to the “sexual scrutiny” issue, the “multiple outfits” issue (unless you go to black tie events all the damn time, at least), and possibly also to the “casual date“ question.

I think that given the premise of this attitude, your conclusion can make sense. There are more items of clothing that are explicitly listed as Necessary For Dress Code in the men’s list, and one could technically fulfil the letter of the women’s code in comfortable clothing and without hair, makeup, hair removal, jewellery etc.

(And yeah, not generally time-consuming, awkward or expensive - just another item that’s not listed but is typically expected. Dangly earrings can be awkward to wear, but non-dangly ones that are every bit as black-tie appropriate are not at all uncommon.)

I just think... so what? Most of the time an invitation won’t list items of clothing for either gender, just ‘black tie’. All the expectations I’ve gone into will still be in place, and it is expected that you know the rules, and that 'bra showing’ or ‘visible armpit hair’ is every bit as unacceptable as not wearing a cummerbund, and more likely to be noticed and disapproved of.

The way that these things work is not about strict adherence to stated rules, it’s about looking appropriate and fitting in. If you break the rules a little - no waistcoat or cummerbund, different coloured tie or shirt, different style of dressy shoes - but succeed at fitting in and being judged smart and appropriate, at worst you may face slight social disapproval, and at best you will be praised for your original style. If you adhere to the letter of the rules but stand out and are judged not to be smart and appropriate - to follow your example, visible armpit and leg hair, unstyled hair, no makeup etc - you will have followed the rules but the consequences of social disapproval* will still follow. The only logical conclusion here is that the important thing regarding consequences (which to me is really all that can matter) is not whether or not you follow the stated rules.

* and possibly more. If social disapproval doesn’t bother you (tangent 4), remember it can have tangible consequences. If you are socialising with people in your workplace or field of work, as people often do, social disapproval can hurt your job prospects - people who are judged to be incompetent at fitting in and following unspoken social rules can be judged as less competent generally. Plus, if you’re judged not to fit in in the social scene, you may not be invited again, which is dangerous for any profession where advancement can rely on networking. Becoming regarded as a social misfit is also unlikely to help a person’s romantic prospects.

* additional note: there are particularly strict venues or events where a significant deviation from the stated formality rules - trainers, for instance, or no tie - can result in being refused entry. This is the consequence that I think would probably be applied to stated-rule deviation and not unspoken-expectation deviation. But even in this case, I would maintain that adherence to the stated rules is necessary but not sufficient to avoid consequences - unspoken-expectation deviation will still result in the consequences above.

Of course, to me - I’m also autistic - part of why our current set up is such a good deal for men is that we both have stated rules and unspoken expectations, but so much more of what is expected from women falls under unspoken expectations.

As a man, you need to wear what it says on the list, and figure out that you’re probably also supposed to wear trousers and underwear and whatnot. You need to make sure those clothes aren’t dirty or visibly damaged, then shave and probably run a comb through your hair. Boom, you’re black-tie-ready.

Women don’t just have all these other things to do - they also have to intuit that they are expected of them. Plus, as I said before, they need to correctly choose a black-tie-appropriate outfit, in colours that match, with no option to instead just wear the exact items and colours that are listed under ‘black tie’.

You’re 100% right about the weird lack of sane pockets on women’s pants. Also about the greater difficulty of finding clothes that fit, which I think is partly a result of the factors you mention, but is also clearly greatly exacerbated by the “one dress” vs. “pants + shirt” issue, at levels of formality where wearing a separate skirt and top is not acceptable, since that means trying to find a single garment that fits all of one’s (ankle-to-neck) measurements, rather than two that each fit half of them.

That’s definitely part of it, though for me the major problems are bust size versus back size, bust size versus waist size, and a short shoulder-to-bust measurement, which makes anything cut for an average height woman very low cut. But then, I wear fit and flare dresses because they flatter my figure, so I don’t have to worry about any below-the-waist measurement beyond overall length. So some of these problems can be routed around via choice of dress shape. You can also buy a tiny selection of very expensive dresses that are designed for people with large breasts relative to the rest of them, and many stores have a small selection of their clothes available in ‘petite’ (for shorter women). This includes the UK store that does big boob dresses, so there’s like, three whole dresses out there that ought to solve both my bust size and short torso issues! I’m going into this to illustrate just how difficult it can be to avoid the bra/shapewear issues - what are the chances one of those is an evening gown in an empire or fit and flare cut with enough coverage at the top to allow for a normal bra? What are the chances I even like any of them? (update: for funzies, I checked their current selection. Their online shop, at least, no longer seems to have petites.)

I feel like I should tag @funereal-disease into this conversation, as she probably has some interesting things to add. (I have difficulty predicting what things, but that’s part of what makes me anticipate that they’ll be interesting.)

Approved!

So in conclusion, the original question that prompted this text mountain was:

Are girl clothes really consistently more awkward, time consuming, and uncomfortable than boy clothes, at a consistent level of formality? (Like, the median item on the racks at a store probably is, but I’m thinking more of the easy and comfortable end of what one can reasonably easily find at a given level, if one cares to do so.)

I would say yes, given the assumption that 'level of formality’ involves fulfilling the social function of formality levels* and thereby avoiding negative social consequences, rather than just meeting the technical demands.

* it’s a bit more complicated, but basically signalling belonging in a given social set via the ability to afford and select appropriate clothing, and willingness to wear it when asked.

The second half of the question depends on what your definition of ‘reasonably’ is. The median item is much more awkward, time consuming, and uncomfortable. The most comfortable and easy possible outfit that meets requirements probably approaches average male levels of comfort, but is still inescapably more awkward (pockets if nothing else) and can’t possibly compete on ‘time consuming’ because the components are so difficult to find.

This level of comfort also requires a number of compromises the man doesn’t have to make: foremost, a willingness to stand out because of your non-standard choices, which can in themselves have social consequences: being read as making some kind of feminist statement, or as being a lesbian, or as just generally being a bit weird and not quite fitting in with the other girls.

Tangent 1: It bothers me particularly because I have OCD-like twitches concerning the cleanliness of public spaces, particularly bathrooms, but using the facilities will probably necessitate leaving my makeup on the wet counter by the sinks - especially if I’m also trying to hold a goddamn wrap on. I once had a corner of the wrap slip off my shoulder as I moved my arm to get toilet paper, and fall into the used toilet water. Given my twitches, plus the fact that the wrap cost less than £15 and was dry-clean only, my solution was to abandon it on the toilet floor.

Tangent 2: There’s a theory that suggests women’s formal/fancy/high-status looks are impractical and leave the wearer requiring assistance with basic tasks by design. Basically, like a low-key version of footbinding, things like stupid long manicured nails, high heels and hobble skirts are all supposed to be ostentatiously incompatible with doing any real work, and thus serve as an advert that says ‘I’m so rich my wife/daughter doesn’t have to work.’

It could plausibly serve as wealth signalling even today. The girl who can afford a cab to and from the party can wear less practical shoes than the woman who has to get the bus.

Tangent 3: You may have met women who seem to have no problem whatsoever with heels and perhaps even say that they prefer them. That’s because there are two main ways of wearing high heels:

wear them all the time, which means you’re super agile in them and don’t find them that uncomfortable, but are causing permanent damage to your ligaments

wear them occasionally, which spares your ligaments, but you walk like a baby deer and it hurts like hell after a couple hours

Tangent 4: It’s possible that some kinds of autistic people feel less strong emotions in response to social disapproval, and feel less anxiety over whether they are approved of. I also think that women as a rule feel social disapproval more keenly, worry about it more, and are more likely to be aware of it. I have no position at this time on how much of the latter is the result of social conditioning.

Personally, I think I started out not caring, learned how social disapproval works and how it has consequences beyond ‘feeling bad/embarrassed’, and this somehow led to me not only rationally avoiding social disapproval where possible/not overly incompatible with my other goals, but has actually led to me having the ‘feeling bad/embarrassed’ response to it that I used to lack.

Incidentally do you mind if at some point I turn this into a proper blog post? I just did so much typing it seems a waste otherwise.

#social mores #gender roles #clothing #long post

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