Wednesday, November 4, 2015

Rainbow of pantsuits

Gee whiz. You open your laptop to write a blog and before you know it you're knee deep in Borat clips on YouTube. Hours have passed. It's now dark outside. My leg is numb from this weird position I'm sitting in. Oh Internet, you little devil you. Come back here with my precious time.

Back to the matter at hand. I was listening to 'The Takeaway' on NPR today (yep - I'm smart) and it was all about Hillary Clinton's wardrobe.

As you'd expect, the whole segment was terrible. They interviewed a lady named Robin Givhan who is the Pulitzer-Prize-winning fashion editor for The Washington Post. She talked about how Hil first started to wear pantsuits back when she was first lady.

"You could almost hear the sigh of relief when she finally said, 'enough with these pink skirtsuits and headbands!'"

Did you almost hear the sigh? I didn't almost hear the sigh, but I'll take Robin's word for it.

Then she goes on to talk about how Hillary took things a step further during her senate run, choosing to wear only a black pantsuit as a sort of uniform.

"It gave her the same kind of freedom that a dark suit gives men, which is that it took the conversation of clothing off the table."

Well, it obviously didn't take the conversation of clothing off the table completely. You are, after all, currently discussing her clothing on national radio right now.

Robin continues:

"When she ran for president the first time and had that rainbow of pantsuits, I think to some degree she was again sort of struggling with this idea of power and femininity, and 'how much can I embrace being a woman and declare that as part of my campaign."

What the actual F.

I highly doubt Hillary Clinton was agonizing over which shade of pantsuit portrayed the right level of femininity.

My main problem with this—what made me want to scrape my ear drums out with a rusty spoon—was the way that they tried to frame the typical 'fluff piece on a female politician's clothing' into some sort of enlightening feminist thinkpiece. Come on, NPR. Just admit that you wanted to talk about Hilary's pantsuits because they're funny. Don't try to make it deeper than that.


 

Now that's more like it!  No, it's not a traditional costume from East Asia. It's the actual coat she wore over her actual dress to the actual 1993 Inaugural Ball.

Image by Henry Dunay via Wikimedia Commons


See ya,
Margaret

P.S. I mean, I love Project Runway as much as the next guy, but there's a Pulitzer Prize for fashion writing? Really? OK, that's fine. Fashion is art. Fine! I get it. It's OK. Nevermind.

P.P.S. Did you know that Hillary Clinton watches 'Real Housewives of New York'? My source: Dorinda Medley (so take it with a grain of salt)

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