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Was Gourmet's Death the Magazine Bottom?
George Will Swathed in Polyester
Obama's Cozy Dinner With Times Conservatives
Previewing the 2008 Presidential Subway Series
Person of the Year: Behold Your Inner Turmoils

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se7a7n7
10/09/09

In reply to Was Gourmet's Death the Magazine Bottom?
I'm sorry but Gormet closing down isn't the bottom or end of the the hard times for the publishing industry. It's just getting started.

The article is wishful thinking. People are not going to start buying more print. Advertisers are not going to change their mind about spending money on print. Quite the contrary on both points.
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Scribblenerd
10/09/09

@se7a7n7: I agree. These are grim days for print media. However, Gourmet and other high-quality, special-interest magazines might want to come back as high-priced, subscription-only quarterlies. The newspapers don't have that option.
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se7a7n7
10/09/09

@Scribblenerd: Quarterlies are a great idea. To make that feasible, they would need to have 1 staff working at least 4 titles. Of course each title would have their own writers & editors.

Newspapers should reshape themselves as local news websites. They need to expand what they offer on their site to make it more valuable to readers and advertisers. Local papers should make their sites on par with what you could find on CNN.com but with an obvious local slant.
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Dickdogfood
04/16/09

In reply to George Will Swathed in Polyester
Also, anybody who says "For men, sartorial good taste can be reduced to one rule: If Fred Astaire would not have worn it, don't wear it" has never actually seen The Band Wagon, specifically the scene where they sing "Triplets":

[www.broadwaytovegas.com]

I can think of one very practical reason why Astaire may not have worn denim: he was a dancer. I'd imagine it'd be hard for him to strut his stuff in tight denim pants. The fact that Will wants to reduce male fashion (non-work clothes div.) to what was appropriate for an actor and dancer decades upon decades ago is ample evidence of his disconnect from reality.
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gawkimo
04/16/09

In reply to George Will Swathed in Polyester
In his next column Mr. Will will tackle the growing scourge of Communism in Asia and lament Bakelite's loss of market share to "the plastic."
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Tom Jordache died for your sins
04/16/09

In reply to George Will Swathed in Polyester
Hamilton, please correct the title. George Will does not wear polyester. He wears gabardine, the rich man's polyester.
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SaraRueful
04/16/09

@Tom Jordache died for your sins: It'll be June soon -- seersucker!
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Hydroceph
04/16/09

In reply to George Will Swathed in Polyester
I read Will's column. What a self-righteous, classist bastard. This is just more tiresome nostalgia for a past that may not have existed, but the closest incarnation of which was quite repressive to women and people of color, among others.

Sure, the bourgeoises got all gussied up when they appeared in public--images of suit-wearing people flying on PanAm back in the day are iconic. And yes, it might be nice not to be visually assaulted by Juicy-wearing dowagers on airplanes, but it's not the end of the world. It does, however, betoken the end of the world where African-Americans were restricted in which drinking fountains they could use and where they could sit on the bus, and a world in which even well-off women were more or less restricted to certain social roles, because they were not to work outside the home.

"The hoaried and social course

Gets hoarier and hoarier

And stinks a trifle worse

Thank in the days of Queen Victoria

When they married and gave in marriage

And went to the county ball

And some of them kept a carriage

And the Flood destroyed them all."

--Hilaire Belloc

Yawn. It's gone, get over it.
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phlox✔
04/16/09

In reply to George Will Swathed in Polyester
Speaking of Horny-handed sons...

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Hydroceph
04/16/09

@phlox✔: if only his chest weren't waxed...
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WindowSeat
04/16/09

@Hydroceph: and he wasn't wearing my Mom's jewelry and jeans from her Santa Fe Phase.
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propertius
04/16/09

@WindowSeat: Yes, but that comes off quickly.
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Hydroceph
04/16/09

@WindowSeat: there is a bit too much turquoise (like, any), now that you mention it. I was just blinded by the sheen of his hairless skin.
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WindowSeat
04/16/09

@propertius: @Hydroceph: Let's just call a spade a spade here. His jeans are BEDAZZLED.
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Hydroceph
04/16/09

@WindowSeat: At least he won't be wearing them for long, will he?
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Botswana Meat Commission FC
04/16/09

In reply to George Will Swathed in Polyester
(Shakes fist)

George Will, you can willfully mislead your readers with fraudulent statements about global warming, but dammit you crossed the line when you insulted "Seinfeld"....
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allyzay
04/16/09

In reply to George Will Swathed in Polyester
this is, i swear to god, the second piece i've read so far this year on how denim needs to be abolished and is only for farm-hands.

what the hell is going on in the media?!
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freedc
04/16/09

@allyzay: It's people with PhDs trying to make themselves feel better in these last few days and weeks of civilization as we know it. "Jeans are for farm hands! Put on your bow-ties, people of the bourgeois!" Really, it's just people with no real skills being jealous of others' actual skills that are going to help them survive the next stage of humanity.

This whole column and conversation reminds me of a point I've driven home to my family. I've been dating someone in agriculture/lumber for two years now. My parents kept harping on me about why can't I just date someone in finance or something? A fight, you can imagine, that miraculously ceased on or about Sept. 16, 2008, and has not been brought up since. My point? I kept telling my parents that really, my choice in this partner would end up being a smart one, just mark my words.

So George Will can hate jeans all he wants. But he better watch it with his uppity, bitchy, better-than-thou dirty farmers this, and toil and dirt that. When the appocolypse comes, I will enjoy watching people like George Will try to get by on their poli-sci PhDs. That is going to be fun. I'll be living off the land with my farmer husband, in our mother-fucking jeans. We might share our food with him, because we're nice like that, but I'm not going to say I'm not also going to make him dance around for his food or something similarly entertaining though not in violation of human rights.

* Not hating on higher ed. I just don't think I'm better than someone else because I have a degree.
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SaraRueful
04/16/09

@freedc: Could you please put the footage of him dancing around for potatoes on YouTube? Pretty please?
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Lizawithazee
04/16/09

@freedc: My takeaway was that he was commenting on people who are NOT farmers affecting the look, posing as working class and thus trying to recapture some notion of agrarian innocence or moral authenticity, that sort of thing. Of course, this was buried in a lot of pedantic BS. And, let's not forget this particular insight was probably put forth when the first city slicker donned a pair of Levi's oh, may 100 years or so ago.
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Lizawithazee
04/16/09

@Lizawithazee: And now I must check myself in for a psychological evaluation due to a high level of anxiety brought on by agreeing, however tangentially, with or even being interested in something George Will wrote.
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freedc
04/16/09

@Lizawithazee: I totally agree that's maybe how he meant it, but that's not how it came off. Even if you don't think he insulted the farmers, which I think he did, he at least tried to blame McMansions on agrarian society, and that's so not fair.
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Hydroceph
04/16/09

@Lizawithazee: Don't worry, dear, there's a pill for that.
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freedc
04/16/09

@SaraRueful: Yes, if YouTube still exists, I will totally post videos of the fun.

Maybe in our post-Apocalyptic world, where there's no more TV, we will return to the Beowulf and Everyman days, having people travel from town to town telling stories. I would totally pay money, I mean potatoes, to have Richard come through town, acting out original Gossip Girl episodes. Really, when you think of it this way, Armageddon sounds kindof fun.
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Hydroceph
04/16/09

In reply to George Will Swathed in Polyester
I'm doing my part. I wore jeans to the office today. Let Gotterdammerung commence!
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WindowSeat
04/16/09

@Hydroceph: I wore jeans to the office today as well. Of course my office is my dining room table.
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Hydroceph
04/16/09

@WindowSeat: I work at a public university. Compared to what most of the professors wear, i look like i'm in formalwear, if only because my shirt has actual buttons on it.
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JacquesPaysan
04/16/09

In reply to George Will Swathed in Polyester
What, pray tell, are Mr. Will's thoughts on sweatpants?
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Almostbanned
04/16/09

In reply to George Will Swathed in Polyester
After actually reading the article, it really wasn't as snobby or patrician as Gawker is making it out to be, and the quote used is taken completely out of context. It's more of a meditation on our longing as a society to feel a connection to our hard working roots, particularly as we become more decadent and sedentary. Not a bad article actually.

Oh and I believe that Giorgio Armani had similarly harsh things to say about blue jeans back in the '80s as well.
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freedc
04/16/09

@Almostbanned: It is totally that snotty. His comment about the farmers wouldn't have been bad except he is distinguishing his wonderful self from the toiling, dirt-digging folks. AND, he's saying McMansions are the result of wanting to be more agrarian? Oversized cookie-cutter McMansions are the antithesis of agrarian culture. What is his fucking point? I can't quite figure it out.
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Hydroceph
04/16/09

@Almostbanned: No, it's worse.
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Lizawithazee
04/16/09

In reply to George Will Swathed in Polyester
Read the article-- it's worth it. Bringing on the crazy, of course, but there is a kernel of truth behind his thesis. The semiotics of fashion as seen through the eyes of one of our preeminent curmudgeonly old WASPs.

Pardon me now while I adjust my slip and girdle and straighten my hat, gloves and stockings.
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persimmon
04/16/09

In reply to George Will Swathed in Polyester
On the other hand, painfully fake-looking man wigs will never go out of style.
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Hydroceph
04/16/09

@zizekian: but what if that's his real hair?
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El Matardillo
04/16/09

In reply to George Will Swathed in Polyester
You shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of denim. It just isn't done.
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Smitros
04/16/09

@El Matardillo:

That's what corduroy is for.
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Hydroceph
04/16/09

@Smitros: Double-knit polyester.
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Smitros
04/16/09

@Hydroceph:

The horror. The horror.
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propertius
04/16/09

@Hydroceph: I had a pair of toxic-waste yellow polyester pants. Went great with blue saddle shoes and a brown sport jacket. It's called the "roving eyesore" look.

Now I kind of miss those pants ...
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Hydroceph
04/16/09

@propertius: Memo to self: Don't read Propertius's replies while eating.
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Perhaps Not
04/16/09

In reply to George Will Swathed in Polyester
I, for one, think that pants in general should be abolished in the name of good taste.
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