Pizzagirl, it gets really tiresome that you consistently state that anything that is different from what you think is “proper” or “normal” is tacky or low class.
It really is possible that people can have different tastes from you and not be tacky or classless. Really.
Carry on…
“Harvest-I’m not sure how you can tell from photos that they are of “questionable quality” unless you mean because they are not all natural fibers………”
Well click through the 4 pics in the link below on one of their kilts which is mid-priced at $200. Something wrong there, they need a new seamstress.
Anyway,I still do not understand the whole concept and just asking questions to get better educated on something I had not encountered before, but seemed pretty commonplace to other posters. I like to keep current.
http://www.utilikilts.com/index.php/kilts/the-mocker-4811.html
OP here, who has already said I’d stay quiet about it thanks to your helpful advice. I do appreciate it. I was most reassured by comments that the kid will hear about it from others, so no need for me to upset anyone. I previously stayed quiet about the hair, and the tattoo, and no doubt will shut up when the next offensive (to my side of the family) modification comes along. Kid is in HS. I can not imagine that more than a very few there have similar piercings. This one looks more like something an indigenous tribal person would wear than small rings. I term this extreme because it has been months since I saw anything remotely like it, on anyone, anywhere. What does it mean - drug use, risky behavior, or just individual expression, wanting to be hip? Who knows. The hair and tattoos on a neighbor kid were the first sign of huge problems, think hospitalizations, so I am skittish about these extremes.
@harvestmoon the only guy I know who wears a utilikilt wears it at Burning Man.
“I don’t really know why people want to actively put on lower-class signals to themselves, and IMO those snakebite piercings and such as lower-class signals, but it’s a free country.”
Well, maybe it could in some instances be because they ARE lower-class, or at least come from it. I grew up poor - my family was often on public assistance or receiving donations from food banks and local charities. When people criticize me for choosing to a wear this class marker I tend to bristle. Why shouldn’t I be allowed to signify in some way where I come from in my appearance?
In the process of (hopefully) becoming upwardly mobile, I have had to change the way I speak, the way I dress, the way I associate with others (networking is REALLY difficult for me), and otherwise cover up parts of the identity that I developed growing up. In doing so, there are people in my life that I risk alienating. Is it so wrong for me to want to keep some signifier to those people that even if a lot of things about me have changed, that I am still the same person at the core? On the other side of it, I feel that sending a message about where and what I came from (honestly, what some here would probably consider “white trash”) can help to communicate to others that they shouldn’t make judgments and that intelligent, good people come from all walks of life. Sure, I know that they are people who probably make assumptions about me on the basis of how I look, but I think those assumptions are very quickly proven wrong and in doing so I hope I can help people learn not to make those sorts of judgments as readily.
EDIT: On a more lighthearted note, I am heartily amused by the posters who are just stuck on the utilikilts. I’d never heard of those before, either.
I guess my children have officially mellowed me out. When I hear “extreme piercing” I think either your face sets of the metal detector in the airport or it is somewhere normally covered by a bikini.
Hyperjulie, I grew up in a working class area - now a poor area - of a major east coast city. Those who learned how to “pass” for middle / upper middle class, who learned the mores and norms, were able to lift themselves out of it. Those who stubbornly clung to the lower-end class markers didn’t.
Of course I’m using class here to denote socioeconomic status – because, of course, true class in the other sense of the word has nothing to do with money or outward accoutrements.
Utilikilts are often seen around Seattle. The middle-aged white guy I see at work actually has full sleeve tattoos, but no visible piercings. His knee high socks and tshirt are coordinated with the kilt and looks quite put together. Better, anyway than some I see with wrinkled shirts and jeans w/o belts. He wears them every day. He’s not cross dressing. I daresay most of the wearers aren’t cross dressing; they just like the comfort.
If anyone wants to see them up close and personal, if you visit Seattle, they are sold at Pike Place Market. That was the first place I saw them-the friend I was with is of Scottish decent and said kilts are so much more comfortable for certain male body parts that he wished he could wear one every day. I can believe it.
I’ve worn traditional kilts on a few occasions, and they are both comfortable and inconvenient. Utilikilts are an attempt to keep the comfort and up the convenience, by making them easier to get on and off and by adding, ya know, pockets and stuff. I’ve known a few guys who wear them, but I don’t personally care for the style.
I would argue that class is the ability and willingness to ignore socioeconomic status and focus on the virtues of the individual - are they good people, nice, hard working, etc… which is perhaps why I find the whole conversation amusing. The whole conversation about the need to present yourself in a certain way is to me an indictment of those perceived as having power, the need to protect oneself from their lack of true class!
Since it has been proffered by others, I come from a solid middle class background, but am one generation away from pure white trash. My parents escaped from that poverty, but my extended family still swims in it.
I had never heard of snakebites before today, but I am familiar with utilikilts. A good percentage of native North Carolinians descended from Scottish settlers and some men occasionally wear their family tartans. One of my friends wore his to church! I grew up seeing men in kilts on occasion. In recent years I’ve seen a few utilikilts as well. Some men like less constriction in “that” area. Neither kilts nor utilikilts seem to be associated with a particular sexual orientation.
I abhor piercings, other than for earrings, and even then I can only take one hole per ear. I am so squeamish that I didn’t get my own ears pierced until I was 30, and only because I love earrings, and clips are too uncomfortable.
But I would keep my opinion to myself in this case.