The Official Dieworkwear Appreciation Thread

[A Y]

mr. peanut doesn't wear pents tho. i find that appallingly vulgar.

 

[CBrown85]

Malcom Gladwell's new book Talking to Strangers is a fantastic resource for this conversation. He basically says that people are really good at judging others when their intentions and their body language or appearance sync, but **** when they don't. That's why many people are so judgey at those who dress like slobs and cuss but are generally intelligent and caring people- their outward appearance and their intentional behaviour are necessarily out of synch. Bernie Madoff got away with what he did for so long because he was able to convince others that he was beyond reproach because he looked and acted the part.

It's almost impossible not to judge, but dammit we'll make the effort.

 

[yungchomsky]

Malcom Gladwell's new book Talking to Strangers

Damn he should’ve called it Talking to Pedophiles lmao

 

[Waldo Jeffers]

Malcom Gladwell's new book Talking to Strangers is a fantastic resource for this conversation. He basically says that people are really good at judging others when their intentions and their body language or appearance sync, but **** when they don't. That's why many people are so judgey at those who dress like slobs and cuss but are generally intelligent and caring people- their outward appearance and their intentional behaviour are necessarily out of synch. Bernie Madoff got away with what he did for so long because he was able to convince others that he was beyond reproach because he looked and acted the part.

It's almost impossible not to judge, but dammit we'll make the effort.

this is my point

the simplest approach is to assess expectations and give the people what they expect to see

so you are a doctor— wear a white coat, etc

 

[dieworkwear]

the simplest approach is to assess expectations and give the people what they expect to see

so you are a doctor— wear a white coat, etc

This is exactly why I show up on dates dressed as Mr. Peanut.

 

[comrade]

Bernie Madoff got away with what he did for so long because he was able to convince others that he was beyond reproach because he looked and acted the part.

He also ran a very successful legitimate financial business which predated his money management
pyramid scheme. Based, in part on these established bona fides, he marketed the fraudulent operation
as an exclusive"club" for which potential clients would have to qualify through recommendations from
other financial professionals, etc. The recommenders were "feeders"who more often the not had no idea
what Madoff was up to. One of his leading "feeders" committed suicide within days of Madoff's unmasking.*

Thierry Magon de La Villehuchet - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[SpooPoker]

this is going to be a short lived thread, but thank you.

welcome

 

[dieworkwear]

Something amusing that I learned today: it was once considered coarse to openly smile. An excerpt from Colin Jones' book "The Smile Revolution: In Eighteenth-Century Paris." Not putting it behind a quote tag because of the layout. But below is the excerpt:

==

Taken overall, the upshot of Le Brun's work was to endorse the convention that, in Western art, if one wanted to be portrayed pleasantly smiling (as opposed to laughing), then it was best to smile like Leonard da Vinci's Mona Lisa. Her smile -- which, though admired was not in fact a great favorite in Enlightenment France -- had been gracious, genteel, controlled, and mild. The same was true of Nattier's blue-blooded sitters. Had she, or they, opened their mouths to smile, they would have infringed implicit, rarely stated (but still closely observed) precepts about the representation of such a gesture. These precepts expressed in visual form the codes of civility and decorum formulated, as we have seen, by Castiglione, Erasmus, and their disciples from the Renaissance onwards.

The Mona Lisa was thus not alone in smiling, but she was also the best minded to keep her mouth firmly shut. For individuals to have their mouths open in a painting in Western art, back to Antiquity, generally signified that, if they were not in the grip of extreme passion, as outlined by Charles Le Brun, then they were plebian or insane. Ribera's painting of a Spanish peasant boy (1637) in the Louvre shows the lad opening his mouth to reveal dirty and deformed teeth -- and he has a club foot to boot. Individuals from the urban popular classes were also represented in this way. Their uncouth open mouths displaying teeth were featured when they were engaged in Rabelaisian high jinks. The teeth often resembled those of a human skull (and indeed, quantitatively speaking, the largest proportion of human teeth to be represented in Western art from the Middle Ages onwards are on death's heads). Although plebian mouths were frequently used for comic effect, they could also imply threat or danger. The dark, forbidding facial orifices of beggars, gypsies, strolling players, and other social marginals portrayed by Caravaggio, Georges de la Tour, Velazquez, and others fitfully generate a sense of menace. Caravaggio's I Cavadenti (1608-9) shows sinister tooth-pullers hard at work among assorted low-life. The display of open mouths in George de la Tour's Rixe de musiciens ('Fight between traveling musicians' (1625-30)) is no more edifying.

A further connotation of the open mouth in Western art is folly. Velasquez painted King Phillip IV's court jester Calabacillas comically and toothily smiling (1637-9) but it was broader than that. Those in rational control of their feelings kept their mouths closed so as to evoke a dignitas and gravitas which is beyond the reach of not only the lower orders but also of those who have lost their reason, temporarily or permanently -- or are, simply, more comically, somewhat dim or mentally impaired. Merry or drunken figures fit within this rule.

 

[JJ Katz]

When you step out into modern society ... Whether it's a mix of aesthetics or just your general Gap kind of clothing, what do you assume about those people? That they're all criminals?

How do you look upon your own family members who are probably not wearing three-piece suits every day?

I can't even begin to decipher how what I wrote translates into: "wearing GAP clothes = criminal"... are you trolling or just not very bright?

I have teenage kids who dress as they please. In the rare occasion their dress looks slovenly or inappropriate, I tell them, in the same way i would do so if they burped loudly (they don't). Hopefully they'll listen.

 

[JJ Katz]

Something amusing that I learned today: it was once considered coarse to openly smile. An excerpt from Colin Jones' book "The Smile Revolution: In Eighteenth-Century Paris." Not putting it behind a quote tag because of the layout. But below is the excerpt:

I think that statement is historically an exaggeration. It was considered impolite to have your mouth hanging open, not least because after sugar became plentiful in Europe many/most people had badly rotted teeth.

It is still, today, rude to speak with your mouth full of food or chew with your mouth open. It does not make you a criminal, just coarse (to us 'classists', that is).

 

[Alexidb]

I think that statement is historically an exaggeration. It was considered impolite to have your mouth hanging open, not least because after sugar became plentiful in Europe many/most people had badly rotted teeth.

It is still, today, rude to speak with your mouth full of food or chew with your mouth open. It does not make you a criminal, just coarse (to us 'classists', that is).

If you look at 17c (English) etiquette books there are administrations to keep your mouth shut and if you smile to keep your lips together. Your first thought might be that this was when everyone was a Puritan, but this is also the century of The Cavaliers and the Court of Charles II. This may have been a do as I say but not as I do kinda thing, and perhaps people went around beaming smiles, but I doubt it.

 

[JJ Katz]

If you look at 17c (English) etiquette books there are administrations to keep your mouth shut and if you smile to keep your lips together. Your first thought might be that this was when everyone was a Puritan, but this is also the century of The Cavaliers and the Court of Charles II. This may have been a do as I say but not as I do kinda thing, and perhaps people went around beaming smiles, but I doubt it.

I don't think we're disagreeing. I was offering one reason for that admonition.
Do consider that, at any particular time, etiquette guides tend to be at the rather prim and proper end of social mores.
Famously, until the late 19th (in many places 20th) C., it was unfashionable or uncouth to have a tan, which later inverted.

A more philosophical approach, across many eras, was to advise moderation. Smile if you feel happy or amused, sure, but why gurn, mouth agape, all the time to signal some impossible state of constant transport? Do enjoy a nice sunny day by all means, but why spend hours lying in the sun to maximise solar radiation damage on purpose?
Etc.

 

[Bromley]

I figured no one smiled in old-time photos because they were tired from blacksmithing or doing up all the buttons on their boots or tuberculosis.

To speak more specifically to respectability/clothing-- who (in this discussion) wouldn't find themselves making some character judgements of someone wearing a MAGA hat and a Confederate flag shirt at the coffee shop.

Certain behaviors say things like, "I live in a society and respect the strangers who may be affected by my public behavior", and certain behaviors say things like, "I don't give a **** if everyone sees me reach into my sweatpants and scratch my balls right here in the grocery store because I'm a proud male with no apparent stake in society".

I feel pretty comfortable assessing a stranger based on his/her public behavior and even clothing if I understand that they're deliberately using those things to broadcast a message.

What of contemporary American standards of etiquette do you think people will find especially quaint and senseless in like, 2070?

 

[dieworkwear]

I figured no one smiled in old-time photos because they were tired from blacksmithing or doing up all the buttons on their boots or tuberculosis.

To speak more specifically to respectability/clothing-- who (in this discussion) wouldn't find themselves making some character judgements of someone wearing a MAGA hat and a Confederate flag shirt at the coffee shop.

Certain behaviors say things like, "I live in a society and respect the strangers who may be affected by my public behavior", and certain behaviors say things like, "I don't give a **** if everyone sees me reach into my sweatpants and scratch my balls right here in the grocery store because I'm a proud male with no apparent stake in society".

I feel pretty comfortable assessing a stranger based on his/her public behavior and even clothing if I understand that they're deliberately using those things to broadcast a message.

What of contemporary American standards of etiquette do you think people will find especially quaint and senseless in like, 2070?

I agree there are certain norms that would be considered respectful of others. I think that's different from respectability. Granted, it's a fine line, and people who talk about things I consider to be respectability politics will say that they're just talking about being respectful. But I think it's an important distinction. "Don't scratch your balls in public" is very different from "tuck in your shirt."

 

[Bromley]

I love this band, Silver Jews. The guy was Jewish, and also published a book of artwork. I used to make myself Silver Jews t-shirts with fabric pens, and would always sketch out one of his abstract line drawings below the band's name-- these shirts always ended up having a rough, aggressive look to them. I live in a neighborhood and kind of subculture that knows that Silver Jews is a rock and roll band. All is good.

Anyway, I'd outgrown one of these shirts, so recently I cut out the front and safety-pinned it to the back of a winter coat-- a way to keep wearing the artwork and also a nod to the band's punk rock influences. I've been wearing it around for a while, albeit mostly when I go out to bars etc. in my neighborhood. Last Sunday I wore this coat to Costco and three (three!) people confronted me, thinking the back patch was a white supremacist thing. I was able to explain (one of these people was only satisfied when I was able to get a wave down the aisle from my Asian girlfriend), but it was really embarrassing to be antagonizing these well-meaning people with my confusing clothes. Dressed poorly for the occasion, I guess.