“I’m just expressing how I feel inside, which is really no particular way because everyday it changes how I feel about the world and myself,” – Jaden Smith for GQ
After Lightning – a rose-haired animated character from the famed Japanese video game franchise Final Fantasy – now it’s Jaden Smith’s turn to be the star of the new Louis Vuitton S/S 2016 ad campaign and ‘The Heroine’ video series, photographed by Bruce Weber. The dauntless upshot has been receiving mixed reaction from the public, causing uproars from every corner of the media.
While Jaden is known for his existential bizarre thoughts, and speaking the ‘Jaden’ language fluently, his words (as mentioned above) rings true to our generation. As the brand’s brilliant creative director himself puts it,
“He represents a generation that has assimilated the codes of true freedom, one that is free of manifestos and questions about gender. – Nicolas Ghesquiére
W H A T M R S . F O X T H I N K S
Hello everyone! Hope you guys enjoyed a nice long holiday. I can’t believe it’s 2016 already! 2015 was a good year…certainly not an easy year to forget but let’s start this year with a better, more positive attitude. A new ‘gender-less’ year with new chances and new beginnings. I won’t waste anymore of your precious time, so let’s cut right to the chase before I bore you all with my new year pep talk.
Time is definitely changing. Values and priorities are slowly but surely shifting. And like any other entity, there are two sides to every notion: the positive and the negative. However, for this particular young generation, I don’t think a man wearing a skirt should be that big of a deal. Even though we are far more liberal than our ancestors were a hundred years ago, our society today is still not 100% boundaries free. There are still certain unwritten rules and codes that people know they shouldn’t cross, but gender is evidently not one of them.
“Over the years, I’ve learned to embrace both my love of lipstick and my facial hair, my affinity for sequins and my broad shoulders. I’ve learned to love all parts of myself equally, to hold my femininity and my masculinity in tandem – understanding them not in opposition, but as compliments to one another.” – Jacob Tobia, Genderqueer Activist
The way I see it, it’s like the color white. White may appear colorless, but white actually consists of all the color of the spectrum. Life these days is more about exploring those colors instead of labeling them collectively. If you are a man and you love to wear lipstick, it counts as one ‘color’. If you are a man who despise wearing pants and prefers wearing skirts but you still enjoy playing football, it counts as another ‘color’. Whatever works for you, really. And it goes the other way round for women as well.
“The sex division turns out not to be a true division at all.” – Costume and Fashion: A Concise History, James Laver
Although some are concluding that this passing phenomenon is lucidly a phase, I beg to differ. There was a time when showing your ankles was considered provocative. And back in the days, wearing heels was something that is common for both men and women. In fact, in those days, women adopted heels to look more masculine because high-heeled shoes were associated with men, and not the image of femme fatale we are used to at this age.
Then we have women dressing sharply in suits with shoulder pads to flaunt their portrayal of power in the 1980s. And it is by no means true that men have always worn bifurcated clothes since the invention of apparels. The great Greeks and Romans wore tunics, which is basically a dress. The Scottish wear kilts, which undoubtedly falls into the skirt category. The Baroque King, Louis XVI of France was the man who shot elaborate wigs and heels to fame.
The world has evolved vastly in the last decade alone, substantially in the digital age. Look at us. We have smartphones, free wifi, apps that allows us to share pictures of our breakfasts and nails for strangers to see because who knows why, and let’s not forget the annual video compilation of news anchors failing hilariously at their job which everybody seems to benefit from. We enjoy different kinds of amusement. We see things differently. We communicate differently.
To be perfectly honest, the ‘Jaden Language’ is not entirely my cup of tea. But there are still so many horrible things happening out there for us to be overly concerned with whatever it is a male in a tube-shaped piece of garment represents. Exhibit A: the Donald Trump’s campaign video (we have nothing against the man, but as visual art enthusiasts, my team and I agree that it could use some fixing), or Exhibit B: the more horrid reality of global terrorism.
While it is important to take some time to contemplate about where this whole gender fluidity thing is taking us next, or how does it fit into the digital generation’s legacy, we should leave more space in our heads and hearts for things that really matters, like bringing sophistication back into fashion to fight the kitsch for a change, or minimizing bigotry instead of bad-mouthing a 17 year old boy wearing a skirt, which I might add does not even look girly at all.
In conclusion, whether you’re a male or female, a bit of both, or neither at all, I think we should all work together to shape a better world, a less-segregated world. Us women have successfully done our part in crossing to the other side of the gender spectrum in daily dressing, maybe now the time has come for our men to do so, perhaps even without losing the charm of their manliness. After all, nobody ever said that one specific type of clothing was ever invented exclusively for only one gender or the other. Where’s the harm in having more options to make ourselves look better?
Savvy Wishes from Mrs. Fox, wishing you all a productive year ahead!
The Savvy Mrs. Fox 