I love the ANDROGYNOUS look.
Seen across the decades in music, fashion, culture and night life (think Madonna, David Bowie, Prince and Michael Jackson) blurring the lines between “boy” and “girl” has always been an attractive, almost hyper-sexual thing to do for both genders.
Except for one thing. It is only the male entertainers who blur the gender lines. You never see male politicans and businessmen wearing foundation or growing out their hair.
But for women in politics, the dressing game is different. They are expected to dress more masculine not because they are rock stars, but because they are competing in a field of suit-and-tie-clad men. And to beat ‘em, you gotta join ‘em.
The belief is that dressing more masculine is empowering. This woman has shunned her “lesser” style of feminine cuts and design to embrace the versatile fashion of practical men. She has more time to focus on the projects before her; and not on that fabulous sample sale from 6-9PM tonight in Soho.
Society mistakenly believes that women who enjoy fashion should not be in professions of conservative business or political power. A woman who cares about the cut of her blouse won’t care about the implications of tax cuts, they assume.
Democratic Presidential candidate hopeful Hillary Clinton turned down a photoshoot with Anna Wintour’s VOGUE last fall because her expert team of advisers were afraid she’d look “too feminine.”
They were worried she’d lose the masculine ground she had gained in the 2008 election.
Anna’s reaction: “Imagine my amazement, then, when I learned that Hillary Clinton, our only female president hopeful, had decided to steer clear of our pages at this point in her campaign for fear of looking too feminine.The notion that a contemporary woman must look mannish in order to be taken seriously as a seeker of power is frankly dismaying.”
Wintour continues: “This is America, not Saudi Arabia. It’s also 2008: Margaret Thatcher may have looked terrific in a blue power suit, but that was 20 years ago. I do think Americans have moved on from the power-suit mentality, which served as a bridge for a generation of women to reach boardrooms filled with men. Political campaigns that do not recognize this are making a serious misjudgment.”
I love having short hair, wearing vests and skinny jeans and searching online for the perfect pair of Nike sneaks.
But empowerment is only in perception. What I thought was empowering for women has also belittled who they are at the core.
By dressing like men to get ahead, we are creating more barriers for our gender.
*Posted by Sammy D
