Women in kilts

[Ancienne Alliance]

Not to change the trajectory of the thread too far, but in this and the other "women in kilts" thread I don't recall anyone specifically pointing out the huge disaparity in choice of hosiery between men and women. Women have a vast array of choices that are just not open to men, all of which can be used to say "yes, I am dressing as a female."

To wit:


From the "Sock Dreams" website

Lady Chrystel in her own Black Stewart kilt (worn with sporran, hose, sghian dubh and all...)

[Pleater]

Because a kilt is my everyday wear, I sometimes put on the small handbag I wore back in the early 70's, when I dressed hippy - and which I wore around my waist, on my left side, being mostly left handed.

I have always had backpacks, even before they were fashion items, and so a shoulder bag would have meant too many straps, having to take one thing off before the other could be removed and so on.

Not putting down a money containing item whilst filling the machine at my local launderette was really sensible for an impoverished student - or anyone else for that matter.

I think that I really have a problem in understanding the 'dressing as male/female' concept. Maybe a costume making and theatricals has that effect.

Having - for instance - four people painting the scenery all in identically bespattered overalls and caps, do I go over and check how many are male and how many female, and bring the ladies their tea in delicate china and the gents in burly mugs? I don't think so.

Perhaps to some it is really important that life is lived with every moment being differentiated by the correct image and every choice of clothing, speach, behaviour is within that strict concept.

I find life exhausting enough as it is, to be trying to live according to such rules would be just too much to cope with.

Anne the pleater

[DWFII]

I think that I really have a problem in understanding the 'dressing as male/female' concept. [snip]
Perhaps to some it is really important that life is lived with every moment being differentiated by the correct image and every choice of clothing, speach, behaviour is within that strict concept.

It's as natural as any other survival mechanism...every day we have to make choices that discriminate between a happy outcome and a not-so-happy outcome; every day we are called upon to exercise a most basic, primitive, and fundamentally critical judgment that can, and often does, determine our fate; everyday we must decide in one fashion or another...literally or metaphorically...whether what we are seeing is lion or lamb. Combined with experience, such survival mechanisms keep us from attempting to cross a raging river; from picking up a deadly snake; from getting too close to a fire.

As society evolves these survival mechanisms do not disappear, they are simply subsumed into different situations. They become the building blocks of good taste and civilized sensibilities. Combined with experience they set up the hierarchies of "good, better, best." Of the crabapple to the Braeburn; of Mogan David to Chateau Lafite Rothschild; of salt to sweet; of dirty to clean; of sick to healthy; of life-threateningly cold to searingly hot; of pleasure to pain; of serene to manic; of friendly to hostile...and that includes sexually.

All these dichotomies present us with critical choices on a daily...hourly...basis.

The very people who so vociferously advocate for a 256 colour grey scale of choices would be the first to scream bloody murder if such an indeterminate world resulted in a a "mistaken identity" in a courting/dating situation.

[GDub]

Lady Chrystel in her own Black Stewart kilt (worn with sporran, hose, sghian dubh and all...)

She looks great!! IMHO, it would take a case of extreme myopia to confuse her gender because of the kilt.

[O'Callaghan]

I think that I really have a problem in understanding the 'dressing as male/female' concept. Maybe a costume making and theatricals has that effect.

Having - for instance - four people painting the scenery all in identically bespattered overalls and caps, do I go over and check how many are male and how many female, and bring the ladies their tea in delicate china and the gents in burly mugs? I don't think so.

Perhaps to some it is really important that life is lived with every moment being differentiated by the correct image and every choice of clothing, speach, behaviour is within that strict concept.

I find life exhausting enough as it is, to be trying to live according to such rules would be just too much to cope with.

Anne the pleater

Welcome to our world!

Women can get away with wearing anything, but men are supposed to stay within narrow limits. I have no idea why. It's not as if it is so hard to tell the genders apart, no matter what we wear.

To the limited extent that society lets men get away with something other than trousers we are beset with yet more rules.

For example, in window shopping online for a kilt for my wife, I found that the various vendors sell what they refer to as billie kilts (mini length), ladies' kilts (knee length), kilted skirts (calf length) and hostess kilts (full length), and yet their men's kilts are all knee length, and there are often precise instructions as to how to get the 'right' length. BTW, those who maintain that there's no such thing as a ladies' kilt haven't looked around much.

The only explanation seems to come from the uniform regulations of the highland regiments. Newflash! I've never been in anybody's army, and my celtic ancestry is not even Scottish, but Irish! So why should I care?

I suppose we are our own worst enemies. I admit to a sense of horror at the thought of wearing anything that would be labelled as female clothing, and yet it seems that women are eager to don anything from the men's department. Does this come from some deep conditioning in both genders that men are superior and women inferior? If so, this makes no sense in the 21st century, not that it ever did.

[macwilkin]

The only explanation seems to come from the uniform regulations of the highland regiments. Newflash! I've never been in anybody's army, and my celtic ancestry is not even Scottish, but Irish! So why should I care?

Because of the fact that many credit the Highland regiments of the British Army for saving Highland attire after the Act of Proscription.

That is why you should care. It's a matter of simple respect.

Todd

[Jock Scot]

Because of the fact that many credit the Highland regiments of the British Army for saving Highland attire after the Act of Proscription.

That is why you should care. It's a matter of simple respect.

Todd

Thank you for saying that-------I was not going to be so tactful!

[M. A. C. Newsome]

I'll just chime in to say that Scottish Highland men have been wearing their kilts knee length long before there were such a thing as kilted Highland regiments. The regiments adopted the kilt of the Highlander, which was a knee length garment. They certainly didn't set the length.

[thanmuwa]

Welcome to our world!
To the limited extent that society lets men get away with something other than trousers we are beset with yet more rules.
........
I suppose we are our own worst enemies. I admit to a sense of horror at the thought of wearing anything that would be labelled as female clothing.

You said it yourself, these are actually your rules for yourself, based on some nebulous perception of society. You already wear a kilt, which is outside the norm, why cling to other "rules" without examining them to see if they make sense to YOU?
There are no kilt police who will arrest you for having a kilt longer or shorter, just look at some of those ren fair pictures!

Because of the fact that many credit the Highland regiments of the British Army for saving Highland attire after the Act of Proscription.
That is why you should care. It's a matter of simple respect.
Todd

Although it may look silly, how would having a different length of kilt be disrespectful, unless you were actually in the army at the time?
If changing the length of a civilian kilt is disrespectful, then what about changing other aspects? Are pockets in a kilt, or reverse kingussie pleating, or narrow aprons or contemporary sporrans disrespectful? Is wearing anything that doesn't exactly meet mess uniform standards disrespectful? Because if we are talking of breaking the dress code of the British Army as being a disrespectful thing for a civilian to do, that probably makes all contemporary kilts, all the beautiful Ferguson Britt Sporrans etc etc disrespectful...

[macwilkin]

Although it may look silly, how would having a different length of kilt be disrespectful, unless you were actually in the army at the time?
If changing the length of a civilian kilt is disrespectful, then what about changing other aspects? Are pockets in a kilt, or reverse kingussie pleating, or narrow aprons or contemporary sporrans disrespectful? Is wearing anything that doesn't exactly meet mess uniform standards disrespectful? Because if we are talking of breaking the dress code of the British Army as being a disrespectful thing for a civilian to do, that probably makes all contemporary kilts, all the beautiful Ferguson Britt Sporrans etc etc disrespectful...

My response was to this statement:

The only explanation seems to come from the uniform regulations of the highland regiments. Newflash! I've never been in anybody's army, and my celtic ancestry is not even Scottish, but Irish! So why should I care?

It appears that there was some statement made earlier about the length of kilts in reference to the Highland Regiments; my comments were intended to be a more general statement about the important role the regiments played in preserving Highland attire.

But, you are also putting words in my mouth by implying that I believe civilian variations are somehow "disrespectful", which is simply not the case. Civilian attire is not governed by military regulations, but civilian Highland attire has been greatly influenced by military fashion related to the Highland Regiments.

T.