After seeing my recent post about kinky boots, a very nice but clueless fellow pointed me to this article saying: «you were right fetish fashion is eve-ry-where!»
Which is right, of course, except the part about fetish fashion. In fact, one thing I never got is why mainstream media have to swoon over “fetish” and “bondage” stuff which is not – by a very long way.
Let me give you a practical demonstration. All the left-side pictures are from some issue of Vogue, and all the right-side ones are from a two minute Google picture search:
Evidence 1 – footwear
The most refined fashion magazine in the world wants me to believe that those awful boots sandals things on the left are “fetish”. Now, never mind the fact that in so many years of attending fetish parties everywhere in the world I never saw anything like that, but please explain what should be so exciting in that mess of sloppy buckles and flailing straps. Also, while doing that, you may want to notice that the sandals on the right are still ugly but at least they are sensible, and you can find them in sex shops worldwide for about 1/100 of the price of the other set.
Evidence 2 – “bondage dress”
It would be easy to bash the sort-of-tie-thing here for just not being very “bondage” at all, but… Hey! Hold on a second! That poor girl’s neck was broken to turn her head full around! Look at the photo… This is the back of her body! How soulless must you be to kill somebody just to get a fashion picture? It’s no wonder that the real bondage lady is smiling: she is still alive and having fun, after all. Which brings us to…
Evidence 3 – “harness”
I am not that much of a reader of fashion or women’s magazines because I sorta cringe before any blatant attempt to instill impossible-to-reach goals and whole industries whose goal is to make their customers sad and insecure – but the last time I checked the models were at least human. Now, unless this is not a rare shot of young Christopher Walken in drag. what sort of alien, pre-dead and angry beast is the Vogue creature? Why the ‘I’m about to vomit through my crooked teeth’ expression? And why are they trying to convince sensible people to pay hundreds of dollars for a $20 harness, and wearing it the wrong way?
Evidence 4 – “bondage lingerie”
Again, a couple of satin straps don’t qualify as ‘bondage’, but this is beyond our point by now. What I’d like you to focus on is this girl’s expression and pose, and how they should be supposed to portray the epitome of sexyness. I won’t delve into the genetic disorder suggested by her eyes, but let me compare the full picture with a proper lingerie-with-straps shot. I think you got my drift: proper fetish/bondage/kink don’t look like its supposedly fashionized counterpart at all. This cannot be for research difficulties, since anyone with an Internet connection can easily find thousands of examples in a single search. But the most disturbing part is how the fashion industry is actively trying to remove any eroticism and appeal from one of the last few bastions of sensuality. While I’m sure we could find a very deep and insightful semiotic interpretation for this, I’ll leave the exercise to you. On my part, I’m going back to write about proper kink…