Friday, September 17, 2010

Transvestite Shirts?

Google transvestite shirt acne and you'll find copies of a news release touting Acne's "Transvestite and Crossdressing Collection" of three shirts. You'll find an article from Time Magazine and UPI among many others.

I've been trying to see if the shirts button male or female, but I haven't seen a large enough picture. I'm just curious if they're men's shirts in women's style, or women's shirts being marketed to us gurls.

I've also been trying to figure out why this is a dumb idea. I know it is, but I couldn't figure out why.

I figured it out.

It's clearly a good way to get your product free publicity. A news google search for the above words gets a bunch of hits. A web search shows it being repeated in numerous blogs, plus Vogue, the Huffington Post, and New York Magazine. It's hard to pick out the actual articles, because google also indexes ads and sometimes there are articles about acne and the ad links to Acne transvestite shirts. But the name of the company is not why it's dumb. (They're partnering with Candy, which makes the searh even harder. Google "acne" and "candy".)

Today, I'm in my office wearing a women's Charter Club shirt. It's white with blue stripes and kind of like this or this. Other than buttoning the "wrong" way and not having a breast pocket, it look's like a man's shirt.

How many people in this office of 50+ know I dress? One. Maybe two. I have specifically pointed out to one that I was wearing a women's shirt and she hadn't even noticed. Even though I had told her in the past that I wear women's clothing to the office sometimes.

I think there are four large categories of crossdressers:
* less than 1% of the people they know (outside of the community), know. This is where I fit, and I think it's the largest category.
* nobody knows. Alas, this is probably the second largest category, and the loneliest.
* everybody knows. These are the gurls who go 24/7, or are out and proud. A small group.
* Many people know. The smallest group, and the hardest to control. One leak, and everybody knows. Stana walks this tightrope.

I have no statistics but I'd guess 95% of us are in the "less than 1%" or "nobody" category. We may want to enter one of the other groups, but we're either sensitive to those close to us who'd not share our enthusiasm, or we're terrified of reactions. Or there's a combination of the two.

So why the heck would we wear a shirt that basically has I'M A TRANSVESTITE written on the back in large glowing letters? I'd rather wear a nice skirt and blouse. I can probably buy several for the price of one designer shirt, and I'd certainly enjoy it more.

5 comments:

  1. I think that right now, I'm in the final group (Many people know), but desperately wanting to get into the 3rd group. I fear repercussions for my school aged son, for my wife and for my business. The information is *really* out there, even more than Stana, but nowhere nearly as many people read my blog as hers. Mine is probably a bit self absorbed and boring.

    I agree very strongly with your final paragraph, except that I like to wear dresses more than skirts and blouses, and tend to buy a lot at op shops for less than $10 each. :)

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  2. Um, those shirts are just plain unattractive, and I can't see anyone shelling out big bucks for them! You'd think they'd at least be beautiful!

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  3. Maybe we should go for the t-shirt, and a demin skirt? :)

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  4. Being a cross dresser, at least to me, means wearing clothes that were designed for women. I think that there would be something lost in wearing a 'TV shirt'. I have never purchased anything on line that is marketed as women's clothes designed for the male figure at sites that specialize in catering to CDs and other TG folks. Also these clothes are likely to cost more.

    I enjoy the reports of CDs doing their shopping at Goodwill, or the discount chains or your use of 'freecycle'. To me this is a womenly approach.

    I also note that many of us are very concerned with the money that we spend (or more accurately would like to spend or fear that we could spend) on woman's clothes, shoes, etc. Is the 'thrill of the hunt' a male or female trait? Is our concern for not spending too much money on our femme selves a recognition that our money spending has to have a set of priorities? If I had that extra $100 I would love to take my wife out to dinner, go play an extra round of golf, go find an aging rock band to hear, buy a dress and shoes, or all of the above. While I will buy stuff for 'Pat', there is a guilt issue that keeps the purse strings tight and limits my shopping to the 'clearance' rack.

    I loved your 4 catagories of cross dressers. I think that the subject merits its own post and comment collection.

    Pat

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  5. ... more interesting - go on to the official acne web site and search for 'transvestite' and it does not match anything! I'd like the one with the big bow for when in male mode...

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