Clothes maketh the man... do things

First of All I would like to make an apology for an article I wrote last year where I made fun of a man wearing a ‘Make Ardern Go Away’ as the hat didn’t seem to work.

It turns out I was wrong. The hats do work.

It just took a really really long time for it to work. Like $2 shop paracetamol.

It does make one wonder about the influence of clothing. Marketers have used them for years, putting brand names, bands, slogans, etc. on every conceivable piece of fabric that can be slapped on a person. For example, I remember back in the 90’s and 2000’s, the No Fear brand was everywhere, track pants, hoodies, you name it. Now, you barely see the brand. But you know what I do see though?

Increased anxiety in the general population. A Coincidence? Most definitely!

But that’s never stopped my ranting before. Noticed how people are more and more miserable nowdays? And also how no one is wearing the ‘have a nice day’ t-shirts with the smiley face on it?

That’s right. People are only crabby these days because clothing has stopped telling them to have a nice day.

Yes, this is all coming back to my old arch nemesis Big Pants. The clothing giants that control the world… through clothing. There is some logic to it.

A band makes an album and sells shirts with the band name or the album artwork on it then people pay money to buy the shirt and provide free advertising to the band, which increases sales of the album.

Then the people who buy the album, like the band and show their musical preferences by buying a t-shirt. Does the t-shirt exist to market the band or does the band exist to market the t-shirt. The answer is, both exist to make music executives rich. But back to the conspiracy theory.

I’m writing about this now because the other day I was in town and came across a young man wearing a hoodie that said ‘Obey’. And that frightened me. I don’t want to obey him, he was sitting in town on a Tuesday at 2pm with no friends and nothing to do.

I came back an hour later and he was still there. This guy has nothing going on, just sitting around. I could imagine the horror of his clothing coming to fruition and me one day having to obey this young man.

“What do you want of me master?” the young man shrugs his shoulders nonchalantly and glares mindlessly into the people of the CBD.

I would be the first person to literally die of boredom. This fear of the overpowering power of personal panoply has got me thinking that I could use this for good.

I could wear clothes that say ‘Recycle’ or ‘Donate to the food bank’ or ‘Life hacks are just a socially acceptable way of being cheap’ And change the world for the better.

I would be like a super hero, a fat middle aged super hero with t-shirt powers.