Women, girls, ladies, transgenders, your life is about to change. The fashionistas amongst you are going to really suffer for the next decade. For those of you old enough who were fashionable in the 1950’s and 1960’s this will be a historical return to a very unhappy and uncomfortable time. For those of you young enough to look at this as an adventure, you are in for a rude awakening.
The young Hadid followers are looking at getting you back into those horrible girdles. There are comments and rumors that the girdles and corsets and other things that push your innards together making them scream for air and relief are making a return. All during the time you were so constrained and constricted and felt this breath of fresh air when that all went away, that relief is going away and those straight jackets, stomach pinchers, breast-shape changers are returning. Some of the neglige’s and other night wear is also coming with constraints so look at this as a possible 24/7 phenomena.
It was nice being able to go out and about without all of those underpinnings. Look at the work women have been able to do without waistlines pinched in and stomach almost touching one’s back. Well, that scared a lot of menfolk and after a little conference – the higher up machismos decided it was time to bring back one of the little mores that led to inequality and men performing their jobs better than women – men didn’t have those corseted constraints.
There have been periods in history of constraint and freedom. Look at the flowing robes of the Greeks and the tightly laced up underclothes of the Victorians. The freedom side of fashion only lasted a fraction of the time the constraints were in place. Freedom had to come or all women would have the diseases and struggles and depressions and staying home all the time attitudes that used to exist when they had to stay in those body reshaping undergarments for such long periods of time.
I was one of those and know how painful and full of stress it was to walk around smiling with your kidneys, lungs, stomach and other assorted organs in the body being pushed into one another. How I survived is nothing short of a miracle. I think it was the feminist revolution that was my salvation and is the reason for any achievements I have been able to make since then. Burning the bra – with some of us burning the girdles at the same time was no cutesy thing, it was crucial to the success of the movement. I remember being at work wondering how I was going to get to the end of the day without keeling over and feeling a great sympathy and simpatico with Japanese women who had heavy constraints and the Chinese women who had their feet bound. My feet weren’t bound, but they were as constricted as they were when I used to dance in toe shoes. Toe shoes are those dance shoes that make a ballerina, when she walks around with no shoes on, look great from her ankles up and like a candidate for surgery from her ankles to the tips of her toes.
Panti-hose were a god send. But even those began to be made as girdle tops and stocking legs. I even complained about those because my freedom made those feel like a constraining garment. Some women – but not me – ran around with a beautifully made shift and nothing else. They were free of bras, girdles, pantyhose and it was an enslaved persons dream. Well, women made great strides under those circumstances. You looked great – and men drooled – but now, those who regulate such things have been constantly appalled that the strides women made were too great and it is time to move you back into the dark age of girdleship.
I remember feeling so sorry for those Victorian women who needed help to get dressed because first they had to be laced up in that girdle to give them an owl glass shape. I don’t know what these new girdles will produce because the fashionistas don’t have any meat on their bones to push in and their organs are crying out for food. Maybe constraining them through these new girdles will make them so pushed together their organs will start yelling for more space; for some freedom; and will forget about food. That will help those of us who couldn’t pull off the starvation diets to wear those size o clothes. Girdles certainly do control weight, but they demand a heavy price.
Maybe its time for women to demand constant ongoing freedom. Don’t spend your money on your own oppression. Opt for freedom of body, mind and spirit. It is the only way to go and those underpinnings coming down the road deliver slavery, not freedom.
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Tags: bed & breakfast, Bettina Homes, breakfast table talk, Clothes, fashion, health, health and beauty, Sexism
