George Will calls on Edmund Burke, St. Paul and the ghosts of Fred Astire and Grace Kelly to denounce a great modern evil: Denim?
Denim is the carefully calculated costume of people eager to communicate indifference to appearances. But the appearances that people choose to present in public are cues from which we make inferences about their maturity and respect for those to whom they are presenting themselves.
Do not blame Levi Strauss for the misuse of Levi's. When the Gold Rush began, Strauss moved to San Francisco planning to sell strong fabric for the 49ers' tents and wagon covers. Eventually, however, he made tough pants, reinforced by copper rivets, for the tough men who knelt on the muddy, stony banks of Northern California creeks, panning for gold. Today it is silly for Americans whose closest approximation of physical labor consists of loading their bags of clubs into golf carts to go around in public dressed for driving steers up the Chisholm Trail to the railhead in Abilene.
This is just plain silly. Denim is the perfect fabric. It looks good with anything from a plaid shirt to a sports coat, it's durable as hell, and its maitenance needs are minimal.
At first, I thought Will was just being elaborately playful. But that would be out of character for him. Anybody who can bring himself to say something like this -- "Denim is the clerical vestment for the priesthood of all believers in democracy's catechism of leveling" is taking himself entirely too seriously.
