Quote Originally Posted by hospitaller View Post
I wonder if women have also to go thru channels when they decide to go to work wearing pants.
Interesting point. I lived through the period during which the wearing of pants by women in the workplace gradually became acceptable and, in retrospect, it was interesting. Don't forget that one of the "tipping points" in that transition was the employment of women in the production of ships and planes as part of the war effort in the 1940's. I think that that sort of took the edge off the image of "wimmens in pants" as crossdressers.

Looking at the sitcoms of the 1950's and you'll see women in pants in a casual setting...in the home, for example...but the rare woman in the workplace is always in a skirt or dress. There were a couple of great photo journalist type articles in magazines like Life and Look about "the working girl in the modern world"...to our eyes these now seem pretty funny but they were news back then. Needless to say, the working girl was always dressed "appropriately" for the time: pants only in a casual non-work setting if at all.

I well remember the emergence of the womens' pants suit...Hillary Clinton did not invent them (she has just raised them to an art form). The popularity of synthetic fibers helped make these affordable but don't forget the women who just have a suit made from the same business-appropriate fabrics that mens' suits are made of but with a skirt rather than pants. But it was controversial and there were comments about trousered women "wanting to be men" and it "not projecting a businesslike image" and such like.

Obviously, though, we are way beyond that and now absolutely anything goes and everything has, imho, gone to hell. What was once beach wear is now business wear...just yesterday I saw huge shoals of people going to work in downtown Chicago looking like they were going to a beach party. I guess that the prevailing attitude is that it doesn't matter how you look as long as you're doing your job. Looks like most of these folks are employed as clam diggers but there ya' go.

So I continue to find the threads on Xmarksers being hassled about wearing the kilt to work bothersome. With all of the fashion crimes being committed nowadays, how disruptive is a man in a kilt...perhaps one of the most conservative garments in the world? I still think that it stems from the fear that the kiltie in question is going regimental and that an "accident" is going to happen. One of my stock answers to that (and it seems that no one ever comes right out and says that that is what they are worried about but that they hem and haw around the topic) has been, "I assure you that if I were to do a handstand right now, modesty would be preserved...okay?" That usually shuts them down. But that's me and the way that I dress and not necessarily anybody else...

Best of luck to all who have to slug it out to get to wear the kilt in the workplace.

Best

AA