Freely saying what i think and using photos to support each idea.

For the love of whatever, i don’t get the need for style. I understand it being pretty and all, but i don’t see it as a need. I’m growing tired of watching all those style guru wannabes, talking crap on an almost daily basis about how important clothes and accessories are, how they define us and how we can use them to make a statement. Do not forget that nowadays style is, above all, a very lucrative business, focused a lot more on selling useless stuff than on educating people about beauty.

What if we take a step back and try to understand what were clothes created for in the first place? Since we live in a world with varying temperatures and weather conditions, we need all this apparel to keep us warm or protect us from rain or snow. That’s it! Of course, you could go on saying that in a fictional history, some religious folks decided we should be ashamed of our “God given” bodies and that’s why we need to cover them up. I wouldn’t buy this explanation, not even if it were free or if i were to be paid for it, as it’s based on a legend. If i did, than i might as well start believing in elves, gnomes and fairies.

Let’s take some of the reasons that get tossed around on why we need to have style, whenever at least one dressing kid gets together with himself or with others like him, in front of a fashion “journalist” (aka dude or chick who writes about bright, sparkling, trendy, fancy stuff we mere mortals fail to understand):

• being able to dress properly makes us look better. That’s probably one of the few valid point about this. In our perpetual struggle to impress and find mating partners, we need to hide our body flaws, if not all, at least some of them. That’s why we might opt for darker colors or a tighter waistline to make us look slimmer, vertical lines and designs if we want to appear taller and so on. Unfortunately, this has less to do with style and more with emotional intelligence. It’s up to us or our stylists (if we’re lucky enough to have one) to find the right combinations for our body types. The great downside to this is we might get carried away, knowing there is going to be a way to hide our excesses. Before you know it, that favorite dress or pair of jeans won’t fit you anymore or those rock hard abs will turn into a nasty beer belly, which no designer shirt can hide.
• knowing how to dress correctly for each occasion. Again, this has more to do with how we’re brought up and with the fake standards society imposes on us, rather than with an intrinsic quality our wardrobe might have. I think above all, the problem with dressing inappropriately for a certain event or appointment, is that your presence might turn into a distraction for everyone else around. Imagine you’re in a board meeting, with ten other managers and you’re the only one dressed in beachwear. You might not be the best looking one in the room, but given the whole “always be proud of yourself” trend, you shouldn’t also be ashamed to show your beauty to the world, thinking that you might offend someone. However, when showing up dressed like that, people’s mind will inevitably start to wonder, fantasizing about their next vacation and there might not get that much work done. Of course, there are also the snobs blaming those who don’t wear a suit and tie/bow tie when attending a play or an opera. That’s one of the most absurd things I’ve ever heard. Those kind of cultural events started out as entertainment for the masses and they should have remained that way. After all, it matters how you behave and respect those around you at such shows, rather than what you’re wearing.
• you can make a fashion statement or show your social status by picking those clothes that represent you. That’s again one very stupid thing to do in my opinion. Don’t you have a voice and two hands to either should it out loud, write it down or draw it for all the others to see? Is your statement about being as shallow as you can be? What happened to expressing our views in a vocal and relevant way? It’s true you might want to show how much you like a music genre, how emo you are or how much you’re supporting a social cause. However, I’ve failed to grasp what all those candy chicks wearing skimpy little dresses, high heels and designer (trash) bags have to say. As far as i know, they tend to limit themselves to “let’s go shopping, girl” or “papi, please fuel my credit card some more and I’ll take care of you tonight”.  In other words, they’re letting the world know they’re rich, carefree/careless and have little or no things to make them happy in their lives.
• clothes have become a modern art form. Give me a break! Assuming we could rightfully call this fabulous, as the word used by people wearing it to describe themselves, we could abbreviate it to a more convenient name: FART. That’s about it really: A flamboyantly flatulent expression of creativity emanating from certain designers. On the other hand, if you take a look at modern art created during the last couple of decades side by side with the runway shows there are plenty of similarities both in lack of taste and complete disregard for beauty. As far as I’m concerned, i think that’s as much art as leaving a dog to starve in the corner of a gallery: it’s pointless, ugly and cruel (let’s not forget all the fur designers). Plus, i doubt any of those mall marching dolls have any idea what art is all about, what sets the great apart from the forgettable and what to do with it after the purchase.

As far as I’m concerned, most people with style, or better yet obsessed with having style are deeply frustrated, shallow and have no true joys or preoccupations in their lives. In other words, they are more or less high maintenance morons lacking any real skills or talent.

Above all, fashion has to be functional and serve our daily needs. Style, either inherited or developed should come as part of a whole package. There’s little or no use in being able to pick the right clothes, if you can’t behave properly or dissapoint anyone by opening your mouth. In the end, it all comes down to taking the time to really look at things and having some basic common sense.