Faux Irony Dept.:
Extreme makeover: protest edition
Patchouli has never been attractive. Never.
Just because you can’t wear that fur, ladies (and fashionable gents), doesn’t mean you have to sacrifice style for substance at the picket line. Sayeth the Times Online:
Ever since the sans culottes inadvertently launched a fashion movement of sorts (they had some help from Rousseau, whose treatises on nature and the desirability of muslin helped to crystallise the hot looks for autumn 1792), the pressure has been on revolutionaries to look at least a bit hip while they’re smashing the barricades – as student protesters proved this week when brandishing high street chic and banners in the face of the BNP at the Oxford Union.
Honestly, anyone who can refer to culottes and Rosseuau is worthy of my respect. Anyway. The piece is in obvious reference to the Writers Guild of America strike and the glitterati who manage to make both the issues and their clothes fashionably in. The article goes on to make the somewhat brilliant point that aesthetics have always played a part in fighting the Man:
Wait, you wanted to read the rest? Check after the jump.
All the really successful anti-Establishment movements have had what fashionistas like to call A Look, whether it’s Boadicea’s striking face paint, the Roundheads’ distinctive hairdos, Eva Perón’s descamisados (shirtless ones) or those cute Bolshevik caps. Some of the lesser anti-Establishment groups – Mods, skins, Teddies – were so busy working their look that they forgot to think up a manifesto.
It’s amazing how accurate that claim actually is. At the same time, I can’t help but feel like it has debased all of my substantive knowledge from my sixth grade world history class. By the way, what the hell are Teddies? I must have been sick that day.
So what’s the key to a successful protest?
Posties, take note: what’s needed is something eye-catching and a bit left of field, in a vaguely back-against-the-wall-mate sort of way, with utility-chic thrown in for good measure. Come the revolution, comrades, make mine a jaunty hat worn at a rakish angle.
Can’t help but point out that it’d be extremely trying to hold onto a hat, jaunty or not, while waving your ass in the main presidential advisor’s general direction.
Featured Song: “Dedicated Follower of Fashion” by The Kinks
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Source:
Agit-props Times Online
