Down with pantyhose
In the Ann Romney Jay Leno outfit thread, quite a few people criticized the currently fashionable bare leg look for women.
Random Thoughts also dissed the usual alternative, pantyhose:
I absolutely detest pantyhose, and am beyond thankful that they are no longer “de rigeur.” I can’t think of a more dated, uncomfortable and useless piece of female apparel, unless it’s shoulder pads in blouses.
I agree on the pantyhose, although I do prefer the look of some sort of stockings to bare legs, especially for older women (disagree on the shoulder pads—how can they be uncomfortable? And they’re flattering if you have narrow shoulders. But I digress.)
Pantyhose are one of the worst fashion innovations ever. It’s almost humorous that they are/were touted as an advance over old-fashioned stockings with garters, when they are a huge negative in the comfort arena. They became popular when miniskirts came in, because the skirts had become too short for gartered stockings. It seems there was no turning back, except as an occasional novelty in the bedroom.
The problems? Getting into them is awful. When one leg gets a run, you have to throw the entire apparatus out. The choice of what size to purchase is a never-ending coin toss. Don’t get me started on the bathroom issues.
And did I say they were uncomfortable?
Looking it up for historical accuracy, I find that yes, my memory is correct, pantyhose were (was?) popularized during the 60s—the era that which was supposed to be about freedom and non-encumbrance. Hrumph. And the Wiki entry lists scads of health problems that come from pantyhose. You can skip that, too, if you like.
But if anyone wants to know why so many women seem to be jettisoning the pantyhose and all the alternatives and going au natural, it’s no mystery. Although come to think of it, maybe it is a mystery, because women certainly wear a ton of other fashion items that are remarkably uncomfortable—such as, just to take one small example, heels so high that walking becomes a perilous and painful undertaking.
Neo. I commented on the bare leg look of Ann Romney. I hope you didn’t think it was criticism. Having been raised and lived most of my life in a fashion environment that required hose for dressed women, I just expressed surprise that fashionable women were going so natural.
But, I say good for them.
Still, if I may say so, I also miss the old fashioned stockings with garter belts.
I also commented on shoe styles, and I unabashedly say that I think the current styles are awful.
I recently went to a wedding and did not wear pantyhose. It was my first time without, and it was so cool and comfortable that I’ll never go back. I also cut the shoulder pads out of my dress. Neo, you may have narrow shoulders, but I don’t need extra padding anywhere.
If I were president I’d mandate that all attractive women wear stockings and heels to improve the economy.
And men will be prescribed ties and jackets. 🙂
Bare leg over pantyhose any day.
To see, touch or feel, never wore any so cannot post on that position.
Oh, that I could go without pantyhose (which I despise, always have, so icky feeling and so hard to get on). Given my varicose and capillary veins, though, going sans pantyhose is not an option for me. I can get away with long skirts in summer w/o pantyhose, not at any other time. I would look half-dressed and it would reveveal the blotchy, veiny skin. Yuck!! Colored “tights” are not so bad though.
I used to really like watching my wife get dressed. The high point was the pantyhose. That’s just me though.
Oldflyer: even if it were intended as criticism, there’s nothing wrong with that. That’s what blogs are for :-).
And I very very very much doubt you’re the only man nostalgic for the garter belt/stockings combo.
Very much doubt.
I don’t like the feeling of bare feet in cold stiff leather. I wear pants most of the time, so I can get away with knee highs.
Neo
And I very very very much doubt you’re the only man nostalgic for the garter belt/stockings combo.Very much doubt.
Do you REALLY REALLY REALLY doubt that? 🙂
“And I very very very much doubt you’re the only man nostalgic for the garter belt/stockings combo.
Very much doubt.”
…and what’s wrong with wearin’ ’em with a mini skirt? 🙂
I guess this would be a bad time to mention that Kate, the Duchess of Cambridge regularly wears pantyhose and like everything else she dons it is creating a new trend that direction? Some sources say there has been a 500% increase in sales in the UK.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2139534/Kate-Middleton-style-Flesh-toned-tights-sales-soar-500-thanks-Duchess-Cambridge.html
Personally, I gave them up a few years ago and I’m not sure I can go back. A little like jeans sitting at the waist. Took me forever to be comfortable with them lower, but now that I am? Ha.
Sure like to see a little girl stuff in a political blog!!
Tex – I second that sentiment
Roman – I like to watch my wife undress, but if i read your post backwards, we’re on the same page.
On a serious note, I’m a little concerned how this trend might impact economically disadvantaged siamese twins who make a living sticking up convenience stores.
I’m also wondering if I should have said no to that marguerita at lunch.
I don’t like pantyhose either. A little (or large) glimpse of garter belt and upper stocking is a mighty fine sight.
As a teenage boy and later in college I found pantyhose a frustrating obstacle designed to impede my attempts to ‘run the bases’. 😉
Ann Romney was demonstrating that she’s a “liberated” woman.
“As a teenage boy and later in college I found pantyhose a frustrating obstacle designed to impede my attempts to ‘run the bases’. ;-)”
I’m older than you, Parker. In MY college days, the problem was girdles.
As regards the bathroom and similar issues associated with pantyhose I should point out, for the record and only in passing, that men heard the plaint of women about these issues in pantyhose and promptly created crotchless pantyhose.
Why? Because we are sensitive to the needs of women.
The tenth-grader in me snickered at the title of this post.
This topic has me thinking about being 17 and in the back seat of a Ford Fairlane with a wonderful, sexy girl; and both of us hot with lust, but panty hose was the rather convenient wall against consummating what we both wanted, although she was understandably afraid to grant. Those were not innocent days, but they were days of innocence.
I think this must be an age thing. Obviously all of you who say you hate pantyhose or how uncomfortable they are have never had to wear a girdle with garters. Contrary to the Victoria Secret world of today, most women did not wear garter belts, one of the most uncomfortable contraptions ever invented, they wore girdles. Pantyhose were the very symbol of liberation.
I think bear legged women over the age of 20 and without a very dark tan just look stupid and rather gross. I was shocked to see Moochelle bear legged to meet the Queen.
I would never ever go back to stockings with garters. I do like the thigh highs that are available everywhere these days.
PS: I remember as a very little girl how my Mother would always stop at the last minute to have my Dad check to make sure her seams were straight and then hiking up her skirt to undue garters to shift the stocking slightly to make sure those seams were ruler straight.
You men make me laugh, in a good way. And yes, I’m looking at you, vanderleun
Sara, “bear legged women” might want to consider shaving. Stockings aren’t going to hide that kind of hairiness.
Laughing so hard I messed up the html, darn it.
Random Thoughts,
Speaking solely for myself; women are in general sexy IF they are not beyond 20+or – pounds of their ideal weight per height, shave their legs, and like men. Men don’t need sexy underwear; in fact we prefer women sans underwear.
Personally, the scent of armpits and nether regions is the real turn on. (Please excuse me for being so blatant.) I say this as a man who freely admits to having sex with only 3 women in 64 years. The third woman is my wife of 42 years. She remains extremely sexy to me.
FASCINATING thread. 😉
Parker,
Knowing your lady’s scent is extremely important to me also…. Hair, foot, chest, everywhere.
I could pick her out of a lineup even blind folded. Though she doesn’t like leg wear she does on occasion for me…
During winter field exercises when I was in the Army, more than a few male soldiers wore pantyhose to help fight the cold. I thought about it, but ultimately stuck with the issued stuff, plus some socks I purchased. I respected the soldiers who used pantyhose, though. If it works, it works. Fighting the cold was an obsession we all shared.
}}}} Don’t get me started on the bathroom issues.
I can understand that they might be uncomfortable, yada yada yada.
But how are they any different here than a tight pair of pants? Other than that you DON’T have to unbutton them? It’s not like you’re guys and they’re in the way of standing there to pee. You have to pull ’em down just like everything else in the way.
Not saying I’m right, just I don’t see it as all that much worse.
Second: Regards “runs”… unless you’re talking about a pretty generic pair of gartered stockings, you have to throw out both leggings if one gets a run… at least until some music celebrity manages to turn mismatched stockings into a temporary fashion fad at some point…
Call me a philistine if you wish, but I’ve never understood the “logic” behind pantyhose, or nylons, for that matter. I’ve had women tell me they make their legs hot in the summer, provide minimal warmth in the winter, run if you look at them wrong, and cost far more than they’re worth. I understand that they conform to a certain idea of “beauty”, but to me they don’t look like they’re worth the effort. Same thing with women’s high-heeled shoes. Why torture your feet (and legs, knees, back, etc.) that way?
walt, I can’t speak from a lady’s pov, but they do both make a woman look good. I presume the same must be true of ties, they somehow work on a guy that appeals to women because they are remarkably uncomfortable… and that’s the only possible justification for wearing them.
For heels, they certainly have a slimming effect on the calves and tighten the muscles in the leg, which makes them look better from a male pov. For hose, it’s a matter of the fact that even skin tone is an attracting quality, and even when they aren’t showing skin (color, pattern, whatever) they still emphasize the leg, which a large percentage of males find as a primary attractor (along with breasts and butts).
Women are aware that how they appear to men is a significant factor in the whole power structure of life, and thus these things come into play (the fact that most of the women who decry such things are either older or uglier says this whole feminist resistance to such measures has a lot to do with the battle for the power structure among women than it does to do with men — that’s why the attractive women among the feminists ditched it as a part of the feminist argument pretty early… I don’t think it made it out of the very early 70s if it even made it that far).
}}}} Sure like to see a little girl stuff in a political blog!!
I don’t think of neo as a poliblog, even though that’s a major focus. It’s more of a psych blog, though much less of one than Dr. Sanity.
Neo touches on too many other topics to be a simple poliblog, regardless.
LOL, on the vague subject of fashion:
May I take your purse, madame?
Pantyhose on my wife of 38 years acts as a substitute for Viagra. They really “really ring my bell” among other things…
here is my big long kvetch complaint on the complaining.. 🙂
women praise and b everything without any regard… how many men have ever had their life change cause of their grannie pants? and how many men bitch about the clothes they wear, and then blame women for forcing them to?
its inane to watch… but as was said in many quotes, a woman is incapable of being happy, as everything has a down side, and nothing is perfect, and princess and the pea win out.
this is actually so bad that the ‘movement’ actually tells them what to do so they dont actually make choices and so are not responsible to themselves for the outcome. it the patriarchy, its the panty hose, its the white men, its the system, its the consipiracy to force women into high heels, its its its…
on the guys side its like a constant droning of the most miserable people with the nicest smiles kvetching endlessly.
I will bet that you wont hear Luba Wold complaining about a convenience that she had a choice whether to purchase or not, and whether to copy other women to a race to the bottom to expose themselves to get more ‘action’ and ego boost from strangers who if they whistle are also hated (and gives the opportunity for the movement to explain the violent male gaze and how it should be stopped (kind of informs you why they dont really protest the burka much after running women down to lycra nudity to get a hostile environment).
its amazing to watch with a sense of neutrality… the women with straight hair get body waves, the ones with waves get japanese straightning… those with long hair pine to have short, those with short pay for someone to glue instant extensions on it. they hate when men pretend to be something they arent, but in the morning they decide what they are and how much illusion to present (with most young women today looking like a fashion version of the pirate women on a rum bottle and peter pan with a smattering of jane fonda barbarella).
women even complain about the fact that they have to decide how tall they are, and which separate wardrobe for the different heights hems to wear.
if one was to try to sum them up in two words, vanity and complaining would do well, and thats even for the nicest best of them.
is it any wonder that these two things put in to gear are enough to get them to break up their families, abandon their current and future children to the state (if they haven’t pruned their family tree for eternity), and validate the complaints all the way to buying their votes to achieve totalitarianism through nanny statism? not at all…
and by the way, there is a small group of women who really hate this about the majority of others.. another complaint but at least more valid than wasting time on how horrible pantyhose is… ONLY women can have love hate relationships with everything in reality
[soon a certain someone may tell me i am wrong, which is technically a complaint that i don’t censor or couch better… but still a complaint]
here is a perfect example of the schizo typical dissonant reality in a nutshell.
To this day, I don’t love my arms. People want more fit arms, but my arms are too fit. But I’m not complaining. They pay my bills.
Serena Williams
when they are complaining they arent complaining so they really dont complain, right? and yes, that is the kind of logic i get when i point it out… (and if they realize that fails, they just harrumph and say i am a man and cant understand. another complaint as wouldn’t it be nice if men was schizo too.. no, cause if they were, women would complain that that was worse if they got it)
[edited for length by n-n]
why did men make society and modern living and brought us to new civilized heights?
because women wanted it..
why then did men tear down the society, freedom modern living, and work towards collective slavery and subsistence
because women wanted it.
after all, having a collective future as a slave is a future… so whether they want freedom or not comes second after being born… the men know that, and so they will make the future THAT WOMEN WANT as a group.
which was and is the whole point of feminism… control women, you control the men, and you can make a society anything you want by feeding their ego and validating every complaint (while inventing new ones and providing their people with them).
the men cant have babies, so they have to edchange society for children… if slavery and misery makes women happy (and it does) and men cant show them something better (it would make us unequal), then guess what kind of society we will have?
this is why the end game is over…
the winners don’t know they are winners (being told they are the biggest losers since men and women were invented!!!!!!!!), and like the boy sun king, has regents exercising their power in their name
We always get the society that women want because women put men to work one way or another… when they don’t, the whole of it decomposes and degrades and regresses, like a property that is not maintained.
from lysistrata to using the principal for gain.
by the way… neo makes the point that the reason we went to this horrid thing (as women complain about) was because of the SEXUAL REVOLUTION…
so you can just add that inventino to the pile of bad ideas to be created from the socialist revolution of 1968!!!!!!!!
without sexualizing and making women objects, they could not complain that they were objects and had to fight this objectism..
while of course normalizing exhibitionism whether they liked it or not.. 40 years on now, you have childrens dolls like brats teaching young girls that the best they can be is a pole dancing sex tart (with attitude of course)
what women want, men make..
its what providers do, and whether women as a whole get this, or not, doesn’t matter… women have always ruled the world from Agrippina to Hillary… whether in office or not, they set the agenda.. because men need to live with them for there to be any future.
i mean what a mix of self aggrandizing bs even from the doyens that are seen as moderates or even anti.
“There is no female Mozart because there is no female Jack the Ripper. ” camile paglia
tell that to the men who met eileen wournous, and the maids of Elizabeth Bathory. and how about Giulia Tofana? who sold poisons to women so they could kill their husbands.
The prostitute has come to symbolize for me the ultimate liberated woman, who lives on the edge and whose sexuality belongs to no one. Camile paglia..
kind of why short skirts and panty hose make the hooker liberated woman of modern day. [by the way, they hate the wife, who is below the hooker!!!!]
Let’s get rid of Infirmary Feminism, with its bedlam of bellyachers, anorexics, bulimics, depressives, rape victims, and incest survivors. Feminism has become a catch-all vegetable drawer where bunches of clingy sob sisters can store their moldy neuroses.
[edited for length by n-n]
@Bupkis: I guess that depends on your idea of beauty. I’ve seen village girls in Thailand and Indonesia, wearing capris, t-shirts, and flip-flops, and no makeup, who would put most supermodels to shame. They and their clothes were clean, fit them well (did they ever!), and the girls were as well-groomed as their limited incomes allowed. To me, there’s a lot to be said for a natural, unaffected look.
art,
I really don’t think pantyhose came from the sexual revolution. Before pantyhose, there were nonstretch stockings sold by size and held up by garter belts. These were followed, as noted above, by panty girdles that held up the stockings. When Leggs figured out you you make one-size-fits-all stockings and stuff them in a plastic egg wihout carefully folding them, pantyhose took off. I can remember having to look for size 9s in the color I wanted, and I can remember how much space stockings took up in stores. I think advances in synthetic materials and more efficient mareting, plus shorter skirts (does anyone here remember the Bandstand skirts (A-lines with 4 buttons on the front?) were driving factors.
Sara: “obviously” nothing. I am indeed ancient enough to have experienced all those fashions: girdles, garter belts, panyhose.
See this for my opinion of girdles. Summary: even more uncomfortable than pantyhose. But that doesn’t make pantyhose comfortable.
And I disagree also about the garter belt. I don’t know what kind you were wearing, but mine were quite comfortable.
But now I’m bordering on Too Much Information. And I think I’ll just stop there.
The stocking clips on both girdles and garter belts left indentations in the thighs when you had to sit on them all day in school.
I love panty hose, though I haven’t worn it in 30 years. Makes you feel silky and intact, and makes legs look good.
Good Ship: Intact? Intact???
Pulled together. Is that better?
Good Ship: Much!
Synonyms: complete, entire, flawless, indiscrete, perfect, scatheless, sound, together, unblemished, unbroken, whole
I don’t know. I like Goodship’s use of “intact.” Lord knows that when I’m “falling apart”with stress and tiredness, dressing to the nines definitely helps me act/work better.
BTW the first time I noticed a bare-legged woman was at the DNC when a woman behind Mrs. Obama was bare-legged and every shaving nick showed up in the background. I’m sure that if the woman saw it, she’d have wished she’d worn stockings.
After the previous thread, I looked around again and found a US company that makes practical garters and compression stockings. I had a pair of compression socks that I wore when hiking in the mountains, so I’ll try these stockings and see.
Wow! What a lot shared information. Maybe too much in a few instances.
As is often the case I am not sure I understood Artfldgr. If he is trying to understand women, or worse yet change them, I would suggest that he spend his time more productively.
I could say several nice things about the ladies, but will restrict myself to one observation. Females, women and girls, do make a valiant effort to “look good”. Of course I don’t always agree with their concept of what looks good. Still, from the point of view of an old fellow, it is so interesting to observe the rituals. For instance, if I do not see my daughters or grand daughters for a period of time, I wait with eager anticipation to see what the current hair color will be, while shuddering at the thought of the cost. (Doesn’t work with my wife; she is defiantly natural with regard to color; although the styling changes periodically in a futile quest to find one that she likes.)
Admittedly, some guys are almost as particular as the females when it comes to their hair. One advantage of being old and very thin on top, is the liberating ability to tell a barber–no stylists please; “have at it, you can neither improve nor damage what is there.”
As I said early on, it is a real pleasure to see a stylish woman, stylishly dressed. In fact it is a rare pleasure to see a man who makes the same effort.
Susan is correct. I started wearing tights (NOT pantyhose) with my skirts & dresses specifically because the Duchess of Cambridge does. Mine are generally decorative, though, which she can’t really do in her position.
Yeah! pantyhose has some issues. You have to be careful of your step footing while wearing pantyhose. It depends upon person to person whether they like this fashion innovative clothing or not.
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