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Excavating Snottyness
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The Precariousness of Things
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For God's Sake, the Kid Will Outgrow It In 10 Minutes Anyway
So the smocked bubblesuit is girly. I don't really care, and since Felix has outgrown the outfit anyway, it hardly matters. There are some snapshots to make everyone happy or amused or what have you, and that's fine with me.
But I didn't realize how that was just the beginning of the sartorial issues Felix is facing. One of my sisters-in-law kindly visited her storage space and dropped off a batch of long-outgrown outfits of her daughter's. This was fantastic since Felix busted out of everything and I hadn't given his wardrobe much thought. My building's superintendent, witnessing this drop off began a litany that continued for weeks. "Oh, Felix is wearing girl's clothes. Don't let him know that he's wearing girl's clothes. What will people think if they know he's in girl's clothes?" It did not help when I told her that Felix was probably not going to be wearing pink skirts. She remained convinced that this was a bad idea.
A bit later, to dodge a storm on the Upper East Side (a neighborhood Felix and I don't often frequent), we went into a clothing store and got this comment. "Oh, you must live downtown. I can tell from the colors your baby is wearing. Those are very downtown colors." He was wearing black pants and a little denim jacket (handed down from his cousin). I had been thinking that his outfit was a little unremarkable, but apparently, I was wrong.
And then today, the New York Observer published this article about parents dressing their children in "cool" message t-shirts and outfits. The piece voices great objection to parents putting their kids in Che Guevara onesies or Ramones t-shirts, or political outfits that proclaim things like: "I already know more than the president."
To a certain extent, I agree that it is a little easy to make one's kid a billboard. In a sense, though, that is what one does anyway, with one's politics and religion and opinions and style. Every parent I know is astonished when his or her kid starts talking and sounds like a creepy parody of the adults in the house.
Really, though, I think there's enough analysis. If people want to look like idiots (and this is also my Abercrombie and Fitch argument) they can have at it. There's only so long they can inflict their sartorial wills on their kids anyway.
Why shoot the parents like so many prone fish in a barrel? The kid doesn't do much at first but look cute, so what if they get some amusement out of labeling it with a symbol of a revolutionary leader whose causes they don't remember. Hey, maybe the Che onesie will at least make people a little curious. Really, the kid is innocent. The only person who looks foolish is the parent with whom the kid is affiliated.
(For my part, I don't care for outfits that refer to: the kid's smell, breastfeeding, excrement or unpleasant future personality traits ["selfish"] or professions ["tycoon" "socialite" "future rock star"], but more because they're dumb than because they threaten the psyche of the wearer. Then again, I also can't stand the weird pink flowered brain elastics that people stick on little girls, and those can hardly be called "cool.")
The truth of the matter is, stuffing a kid into silly t-shirts and onesies isn't a criminal act and it won't even damage them so much that they need therapy before they're in preschool. People will always dress like fools and people will always find lame ways dress their children. This is hardly a syndrome. It is simply the way it always has been and always will be. I've already built my boat to Hell. I did it with smocking and the "Avant Garde" shirt my mother brought for Felix at the RISD gift shop.
Sex and the City made every day Halloween in Soho, why is it surprising that people inflict fashion on their children? And, it doesn't stop there. Have you noticed what dogs about town have been wearing?
posted by Elise at 10:47 AM
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1/19/2006 3:30 PM
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