Have you ever
woken up, wondered what to wear, and thought, “Gosh, I wish I were a cave
woman?”
No?
Really? Come on, think of how easy that would be. Get up, let the
ol’ Sabertooth out of the cave, and just throw on a wooly mammoth carcass.[1]
Over the years,
fashion has evolved. From corsets and petticoats to furry boots and pants
with “Pink” written on the ass, fashion has endured the good, the bad, and the
utterly ridiculous.[2]
So enjoy some fun
historical fashion facts:
1. Louis Reard’s original bikini consisted of
only 30 square inches of fabric.
Now, I broke out the TI-84 and did the math
for you. It would look something like this:
(Imagine that on
the average woman, and you have an image that is not only NSFW, but also not safe
for healthy vision.)
2. Napoleon Bonaparte introduced buttons
on sleeves. He did this so that soldiers didn’t mop
their running noses using their sleeves.
(If he really
wanted to stop them, he’d have used spikes. You don’t see anyone wiping
their nose on Janet Jackson’s boobies, do you?)
3. Speaking of body jewelry, society today
thinks of jewelry as a woman’s item, but in the past it was men who wore it to
demonstrate their social status.
Lil
Wayne’s “status update”
4. During the Rennaissance, it was only
considered stylish to have silvery-blonde hair.
(Guess Joan
Rivers was born just 15 years too late.)
5. Ancient Egyptians were way ahead of the
Kardashian sisters when it came to leopard print. The Egyptian priests
used to wear leopard skin loincloth.
 |
| Who wore it better??? |
(I think God is
going to strike me down for using “Kardashian” and “priest” in the same
sentence.)
6. According to Mark Carlson at the
University of Tulsa, the earliest shoes appear in cave drawings and are assumed
to be made out of a bearskin sole and plant fibers woven together in a “foot
bag."
You think it’s
annoying to have to drive to the mall to get shoes? These people had to HUNT A
BEAR, KILL THE BEAR, and SKIN SAID BEAR. Then, they had to go pull up
some plants and weave their shoe together.
Think about that the next time you complain that your kitten heels are killing
you.
7. Thongs were
invented to placate New York City mayor Fiorella LaGuardia in 1939, who
believed that the city’s nude dancer’s were showing too much skin.
Should Anthony
Weiner become mayor of NYC, he has promised to overturn any laws requiring
women to wear underwear.
That’s just a few
to start out with. If anyone knows who invented guy-liner and skinny
jeans for men, please let me know so that I might publicly mock them on the
Internet.
[1]
Or, depending on the year, elephant skin. Wooly mammoths were SO ice age.
[2]
Did I mention furry boots? Yes, yes, I did.
.
Just wanted to say--I read your article on CNN (congrats on the publication, by the way!). THANK YOU. I am 32, do not have kids, do not want kids, and am regularly told by my grandmother and others that I will 'grow out of it' and want kids of my own 'someday.' The last time she said that, I shot back, 'I haven't grown out of it in the last 16 years you've been telling me that, what makes you think I'll grow out of it in the next 16?'
ReplyDeleteI get tired of buying items at grocery stores and getting asked if they're for my kids. I get tired of being called 'Miss' or 'Mrs.' when in fact the proper title is 'Dr.' It sounds, however, like you've been through a whole lot more of this than I have. I'm sorry. It is not our 'duty' as women to reproduce. Or to do anything else, for that matter.
I wholeheartedly support your decision, I hope you support mine, and in the meantime, let's not grow out of this phase together.