I have a new idea
by V.E. on November 17th, 2008
filed under beauty, entertainment, personal, thoughts, to do
I’ve always been fascinated with the way people to things and why they do them. I’m going to—for a while—focus on the upturned collar… often callously known as the “popped collar.”
I hate popped collars. When I hear those words, I think of a drunk frat boy in a light pink polo shirt with the collar up saying things like “Bro, that’s so legit!” and trying to feel up naïve freshmen girls.
In contrast, upturned collars on jackets and coats strike me as elegant, lovely, and even classy.
So, in light of my contrasting views on the upturned collar, I started a new project over at Blogspot called The Upturned Collar. (I know—I’m a genius with names.) I’ll be posting one image per day of an upturned collar for as long as I can find unique images and I’m still interested in this idea (though I’ll probably let you all know here if the interest wanes). We’ll see how that goes.
Head on over there and let me know what you think.
On a side note, I got this idea from the song Let It Rock, by Kevin Rudolf; specifically, the first four lines read (italics mine):
I see your dirty face
High behind your collar
What is done in vain
Truth is hard to swallow
… and I was thinking that the first two lines are really beautiful, even if I’m not sure what they mean. It could be “I see your dirty face / Behind your high collar” but it’s not, so it’s lovely but confusing. It also could be “I see your dirty face / Hide behind your collar” and though that would make more sense, it’s not nearly as beautiful.
The popped collar:
I hate it when guys do it but find it attractive when women do. It seems to be turning it around on those jerk guys. It appears to say to them “How macho are you, really? I don’t have a penis but I can wear my shirt like that too!”.
What do you think? Is it rebelling against the dominant group (white, young, presumably able bodied, men)? Or is it just trying to “be like them”?
Also, what do you think about drag kings and transmen? Are they empowered individuals that are changing what it means to be one gender or another, or are they ultimately giving up the greatest gift- of being a woman?