THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, January 9, 1995 TAG: 9501070057
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Column
SOURCE: Larry Maddry
LENGTH: Medium: 67 lines
ARE MEN A bunch of weenies or what?
Here we are with the 21st century only five years away and we're no closer to getting rid of the necktie than the poor males who resented them back in the mid-1700s.
This past Christmas, 10 million men were given neckties for Christmas. Odds are that not one complained about it. ``Gee that's really great Aunt Edith, just what I needed,'' is the standard reply.
Riiigght. Like a hole in the head.
It's never going to end, you know. I'll swear to you that in the 22nd century, when people will be vacationing at eco-spas on Mars and Venus, wearing fishbowl helmets with oxygen links and receiving music from sensors planted under the fingernails, men will still be wearing them.
And not only wearing them but asking their wives or girlfriends whether the blue with polka dots or the red with vertical stripes goes best with their pressurized, all-weather jump suits.
Men. Weenies. The necktie proves it.
Ask any man whether he really likes wearing neckties and the answer is almost always ``no.''
Then ask, ``Why don't you stop wearing them if you don't like them?''
And the answer comes back: ``Duh, I'd like to, you know. But everybody else is doing it.''
These are the same men who went to the moon, developed the personal computer and got rid of typhus as a worldwide destroyer of life. But can they get rid of a scrap of colored cloth dangling around their neck that serves no earthly purpose?
Nah.
Hard to explain isn't it?
If women wore neckties regularly, they'd have burned them long ago, as they once did with bras. Remember how women once wore hats whenever they went outside? No more. And notice how executive Demi Moore goes without stockings in the film ``Disclosure''?
You can push a woman only so far. But a man is a pushover forever when it comes to neckties.
Don't get me wrong, I wear ties myself. I have a closet full of them. But I'm not proud of a single one. They are the visible reminders that I am a wimp - a pawn in the hands of the international neckwear cartel.
Oh, sure, there's an international neckwear cartel. They are everywhere, manipulating the male's psyche around the clock - like a masseuse in an all-night massage parlor.
And, to strain the metaphor further, we are putty in the cartel's hands. Their latest ploy is the publication of a book by Francois Chaille, a French fashion writer. ``The Book of Ties'' is a richly illustrated book describing tie fashions through the years.
When it comes to chirping the praise of the necktie, Chaille is to the cravat what the Mississippi warbler is to dawn.
Listen to this conclusion of Chaille's book: ``Whether considered as a vehicle of self-expression, as a means of accentuating one's charm, or as an object whose touch can calm the spirit, neckties offer decisive advantages.
Nowdays . . . a man would have to be almost crazy not to wear one.''
Arrrghhh.
Somebody needs to accentuate that writer's charm with a kick in the keester. I'd really like to. But not unless everyone is, of course. by CNB