# Purpose of fashion **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [February 9, 2005, 8:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purpose-of-fashion/289268 "2005-02-09T20:37:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Lilairen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8491ac/32.png) [@Lilairen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lilairen)\ **Post date:** [February 11, 2005, 4:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purpose-of-fashion/289268/21 "2005-02-11T04:16:14Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > If that’s your definition of fashion, it should be obvious why most women dress fairly fashionably. Clothes that are currently fashionable are the ones readily available in stores. This is the comment I’ve been thinking of trying to articulate, so thank you for doing it. I’ve done serious clothing shopping maybe twice in the past . . . several years. I have no idea if the pants I got the more recent time are considered fashionable; they were comfortable, appropriate for a professional-level job such as the one I am intending to apply for, I liked them, and they were on sale. I got them and I left the store. The other time, I was going to a store that had what I wanted (which I happen to know is subcultural or at least not commonly available in department stores – hippyish loose colourful skirts). Small specialty store which I was told is now going out of business, so I’ll have to find somewhere else that has hippy skirts for me. Purses to match my shoes? I have one pair of shoes and one pair of boots, and no purse at all. My wallet goes in my inner jacket pocket. > [@](#): > > Many women wear jewelry that has special sentimental value, either because it’s a family heirloom or it was a gift from a loved one. That has little to do with fashion. My jewelry is mostly like this; the only major category you missed is ‘religious’. (I might count “fidgeting supplies” as a minor category. . .) > [@](#): > > Surely there’s some middle ground between what you describe and “sweats and flip flops”! I’m certain that most American women fall in that middle range. I personally have never encountered the sort of women you’ve described here, and I know a lot of women. Actually, I know hardly anyone _but_ women – I attended a women’s college, worked “pink collar” jobs, and am now pursuing a master’s in a female-dominated field. I can only think of one woman I know personally who even came close to displaying as much interest in fashion as these women you know, and she was a former beauty queen. My social circle’s styles tend to be jeans-and-t-shirts, jeans-and-flannel, quirky-in-jeweltoned-nice-textured-fabric, and business-casual. (Only the “quirky” category is strongly gendered.) I have one friend who might possibly parse as “fashion-conscious”, but I don’t actually know if she _is_; it’s not a subject that comes up. I know she’s fond of bargain-hunting, though. ---
**Author:** ![Moe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/moe/32/2972_2.png) [@Moe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moe)\ **Post date:** [February 11, 2005, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purpose-of-fashion/289268/22 "2005-02-11T16:09:42Z")
I agree with people who are emphasizing the point that the OP’s social circle is not representative of the majority of our society at large, but I also know where he’s coming from. While I can’t say that many in my immediate circle are fashion-conscious in that way, my mom’s, sister’s, and GF’s circles are. My sister buys another pair of shoes just about every week despite the fact that she can’t even afford them comfortably. For her, buying shoes is not a matter of function. > [@Epimetheus](#): > > My take on womens fashion in general is that it is there to impress other women. Like jewlery, my guess is that the majority of men just don’t care much about it. We don’t care if a beautiful, intelligent women is wearing zirconians or a 7 Karat diamond, or if she is wearing Tommy or Wallyworld sweaters. Fashion is a societial pressure put upon women by other women. To impress or for social standing. I think focusing on jewelry helps your point better than clothing. As others have pointed out, one’s reason for buying a specific piece of clothing can lie anywhere on the spectrum from comfortable to trendy, or along many other dimensions (quality, price, etc.), but at any rate, everyone wears clothes by necessity. No one needs to wear expensive jewelry (allowing for a few exceptions like perhaps wearing a wedding band to show you are unavailable), yet there are few gifts that the women in the circles I mentioned above would rather recieve than something with diamonds on it. They also unanimously agree that cubic zirconia is tacky and just plain wrong. Why? I’m asking the same thing as the OP. The answers I’ve gotten from my mom or my GF are actually very much what the OP proposes: it’s a way to impress upon other women their social standing. They feel special and important when their SO spends so much on them and I believe the degree to which they feel this is in relation to the contrast between them and their female peers. If it became commonplace in a particular circle for every guy to spend X amount of money on his SO, that feeling would go away and it would require 2X to produce the same effect. ---
**Author:** ![Lilairen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8491ac/32.png) [@Lilairen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lilairen)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2005, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purpose-of-fashion/289268/23 "2005-02-12T00:11:25Z")
> [@Moe](#): > > No one needs to wear expensive jewelry (allowing for a few exceptions like perhaps wearing a wedding band to show you are unavailable), yet there are few gifts that the women in the circles I mentioned above would rather recieve than something with diamonds on it. They also unanimously agree that cubic zirconia is tacky and just plain wrong. Why? My guess is “They’ve bought into the social delusion that colourless stones are rendered interesting by artificial scarcity and price inflation.” 😉 There is a _lot_ of effort and advertising put into equating diamonds with love; it’s not terribly surprising that this is at least somewhat effective. If someone’s operating from that viewpoint, a zirconium (just as boring to me as a diamond, but at least the boredom comes cheaper) is trying to pass off an illusion-of-diamond as real, and thus is associated with illusion-of-love. It’s a victory of advertising and materialism. (I have a couple of pieces of ‘nice jewelry’. All of them but my engagement ring were gifts from one of my parents. I hardly ever wear any of them.) ---
**Author:** ![Fiveyearlurker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/da6949/32.png) [@Fiveyearlurker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fiveyearlurker)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2005, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purpose-of-fashion/289268/24 "2005-02-12T02:47:33Z")
Well, the thing I always think about is that if fashion weren’t really about impressing other people, it would never change. Why is something fashionable this year, and not next year? The climate hasn’t changed, so it’s not like I need warmer clothes this year. The only reason that it is currently fashionable for women to wear boots that appear that they shoved their feet into the asses of muppets is that it impresses other people who notice such things as muppet boots. I think the cool kids in high school still needed some way to feel superior after graduation day, and they weren’t doing it with success or money, so they stuck with clothing. ---
**Author:** ![Lissla\_Lissar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8491ac/32.png) [@Lissla\_Lissar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lissla_Lissar)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2005, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purpose-of-fashion/289268/25 "2005-02-12T18:47:37Z")
> [@](#): > > Whether you’re a man or a woman the purpose of fashion is to project an image. When you put on clothing you might be telling everyone you’re sexy, you’re a professional, etc. The standards change over the course of the years but that’s essentially what fashion is all about, image. Fashion is about lots of things- particularly conspicuous consumption, social status/position, and image. Both sexes play the game. You dress in a way that reflects your aspirations, interests, and perceived self-image. You dress the way you do to tell the world you’re college educated/hipster/blue-collar/fashionista/conservative/obsessed with exercise/artsy/successful businessperson/hippie. It’s a way of easily signaling who you are. In our culture women and adolescents are more comfortable playing around with their projected image than men tend to be. This is not to say that everyone spends hours agonising over dress choices. In my experience, we tend to gravitate towards clothes that project whatever image we feel is most _us_. It’s a question of emotional comfort and conformity to one’s scoial group. YMMV. ---
**Author:** ![Idlewild](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/8491ac/32.png) [@Idlewild](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idlewild)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2005, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purpose-of-fashion/289268/26 "2005-02-12T19:29:44Z")
To add a data point: I work in a field that is neither male nor female dominated, at a company that doesn’t have a dress code to speak of. I am not a fashionable dresser but I do have a personal and somewhat quirky sense of style. I would say however that 80% of the women who work in my department are dressing for comfort and professionalism first, relatively flattering clothing next, and fashion last of all. The other 20% probably split 50-50 between the quirkies like me, and the ultra-fashionable. These statistics are of course purely unscientific and off the top of my head from observing the women at work. Nevertheless, I would say that most of us are trying to look _nice_, just that fashion doesn’t seem to factor into what we’re defining nice as. I see a lot of shirt-waist dresses, long jumper dresses, and pantsuity sorts of things. Not precisely cutting edge. I don’t know if you can theorize from that who these women might be dressing for. I, personally, dress to please myself first - mostly from long experience that I cannot quite hit the fashion note - I’m always just a shade off key in some way. It’s like being tone-deaf to fashion. So I gave up on that long ago. ---
**Author:** ![ralph124c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8797f3/32.png) [@ralph124c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralph124c)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2005, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purpose-of-fashion/289268/27 "2005-02-13T17:04:39Z")
If you look at a book of fashions (of the last 1000 years) you will notice that things have pretty much fossilized since about 1900. Men’s suits are essntially unchanged from that era…and women (except for the shorter skirts) dress pretty much the same. Going back, if you compare the styles of 1400 with 1500, you see tremendous differences. Take the clothing of the high renaissance…fur-lines capes, hats of all sizes and shapes, garish colors, etc. By contrast, our fashions of today are pretty staid and sober. Any chance this will change? ---
**Author:** ![Moe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/moe/32/2972_2.png) [@Moe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moe)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2005, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purpose-of-fashion/289268/28 "2005-02-13T18:45:31Z")
> [@Lilairen](#): > > My guess is “They’ve bought into the social delusion that colourless stones are rendered interesting by artificial scarcity and price inflation.” 😉 > > There is a _lot_ of effort and advertising put into equating diamonds with love; it’s not terribly surprising that this is at least somewhat effective. If someone’s operating from that viewpoint, a zirconium (just as boring to me as a diamond, but at least the boredom comes cheaper) is trying to pass off an illusion-of-diamond as real, and thus is associated with illusion-of-love. It’s a victory of advertising and materialism. Oh certainly. Diamonds may be the greatest example of effective marketing the world has ever seen. But you buy diamonds for your lady. She knows they are real and thus, according to her constructed viewpoint she has received the message that you love her. But why does she wear them? I mean, it’s true that they often do make a very aesthetically effective fashion accessory. But when I ask the people I know who buy into this viewpoint they almost always throw in (in addition to it being a symbol of love or just remarking how stunningly beautiful it is) something about displaying a level of status in relation to other women. I guess there is something I find fascinating about that. ---
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2005, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purpose-of-fashion/289268/29 "2005-02-14T14:48:40Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > Fashion is also largely about social conformity. Try wearing a beach outfit, or a Victorian walking dress with whalebone corset and bustle, to a job interview at any but the most far-out, unconventional companies. Doesn’t matter how successfully your outfit shows off your wealth, beauty, and allure—you probably aren’t going to get the job. > > The ability and willingness to conform to social conventions about dress is regarded as a symbol, or test, of social competence and adaptability. Men are just as likely to apply this test as women are, IME. > > **Epi:** \*Fashion is a societial pressure put upon women by other women. To impress or for social standing. \* > > Don’t be too quick to assume that all “guys” or all “women” think the same way. Some men don’t care what women wear, and some men do. It’s also an important part of the mating ritual…a ritual that is locally controlled per social norms for that area. You can find pockets here and there in America where 1980s Big Hair is still all the rage. That is the fashion that will catch you a mate in that area. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2005, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purpose-of-fashion/289268/30 "2005-02-14T19:18:46Z")
> [@Lissla Lissar](#): > > Fashion is about lots of things- particularly conspicuous consumption, social status/position, and image. Both sexes play the game. You dress in a way that reflects your aspirations, interests, and perceived self-image. You dress the way you do to tell the world you’re college educated/hipster/blue-collar/fashionista/conservative/obsessed with exercise/artsy/successful businessperson/hippie. It’s a way of easily signaling who you are. In our culture women and adolescents are more comfortable playing around with their projected image than men tend to be. That’s pretty much it. In fact, my various circles of friends of the years are so conscious about dressing to fit into social norms for our peer group that we all end up wearing the exact same thing on a number of occassions. At work, we’ve noticed that so many of us wear the same outfits that as a joke we had the entire department wear the same outfit on the same day. It really freaked some people out. ---
**Author:** ![Kaitlyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/73ab20/32.png) [@Kaitlyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kaitlyn)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2005, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purpose-of-fashion/289268/31 "2005-02-14T21:01:24Z")
It depends upon how you define “fashion”. If it means wearing clothing that is similar to that of other members of a peer group so that one will fit in, I think that males are much more fashion conscious than females, and what’s more, it starts _very_ early. I’ve seen 1st grade boys who felt they had to dress like clones of each other, and the gang chic clothing is firmly entrenched by the time they reach about 5th grade. Women, in my experience, and I fall firmly into this camp, when dressing to go out, dress primarily based on how what they’re wearing makes them feel. I don’t want to feel out of place by being too dressy or too casual, but I want to always feel feminine. The feeling of fitting in or feeling sexy or feminine, or whatever the goal is, is highly dependant upon how others percieve us, and getting appreciative looks and compliments from either sex can produce or enhance that feeling, but IMO, it is the feeling that is the goal, and not the effect produced in others. This is why we’ll wear matching fancy lingerie under our clothes when we want to feel sexy, even if nobody is ever going to see it. This is why many women have to pass the mirror test before going out. We need to feel that we live up to the standards we’ve set for ourselves. “Fashion” in the sense of wearing what some group of elite designers in Paris and New York decide is “in” this year completely escapes me. I think the vast majority of women dress for a combination of comfort and to look good as is appropriate for the situation. For me, the balance comes down slightly on the side of appearance. I’ll choose attractive over physical comfort quite often because it makes me feel good to have that sense of looking good. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/purpose-of-fashion/289268.md?page=1)