Why Men In Skirts Are Dangerous, Part 2

This essay follows Why Men In Skirts Are Dangerous

Me in a kilt in my 30s

After another lively weekend spent badly faking a Highland Fling at the Kansas City Irish Fest, I find myself crawling reluctantly back to daily life. Having missed the 2020 festival owing to the pestilence, I loved the return to live music, cultural exploration, and being around people who, like me, enjoyed being entirely in the moment. And I took the opportunity to do something I seldom do anymore: I wore my kilt out in public.

Two years ago, last time I had this opportunity, I wrote about my entirely-male co-workers, many of whom expressed astonishment that I actually wear kilts. “I could never do that,” one said, sending me on a spiral of contemplation about what might make a man express such aversion. I decided the opinion must express sublimated class-based anxiety about the consequences of rocking the boat. These conclusions seemed obvious and inescapable, from my personal vantage point.

That’s the problem with anecdotal analysis, however: it reflects my vantage. My friend Jerry, who works a white-collar job, expressed a counter-opinion: “I think, for me, it's more of a case of it would make me feel physically vulnerable, not having my loins girded?...I like having those dangly bits more protected.” I love such reciprocal give-and-take, because it forces me to refine my thinking. Especially when my comments have larger implications, they require testing.

Jerry makes a valid point: men, in most English-speaking cultures, grow accustomed early to having our genitals covered by fabric. This practice has practical implications, especially in manual trades: the thought of operating a circular saw or pneumatic hammer without my junk swaddled in cloth makes me reflexively cringe. We probably had similar reactions in humanity’s primordial environment: imaging fleeing a sabre-toothed tiger across the savannah with your gonads flapping.

Okay, now unclench your thighs.

Counterpoint, though: anybody who’s raised children, even in a helping capacity, knows the difficulty of convincing toddlers to wear trousers. Small kids often need coaxed, cajoled, even threatened to not strip their britches off. Clothing isn’t naturally comfortable; humans need conditioned, at early ages to assent to having our bodies packed in cloth. Anybody who has worked outdoors in high summer knows the sensual joy of stripping your jeans off and letting your legs breathe.

Not everybody outgrows this feeling. In recent years, we’ve witnessed the phenomenon of teenagers, mostly boys, refusing to wear long-legged trousers, even in winter. As rigid social standards surrounding clothes have relaxed, some youth have rejected the imperative to cover their legs. The most commonly cited reason is because having their knees and calves encased feels unnatural and intrusive. Simply, they refuse the conditioning necessary to see pants as mandatory. For good or for ill.

When I purchased my first kilt, I assumed it’d be my last. I intended to wear it in certain limited circumstances, mostly in oppressive Great Plains summer conditions. I started wearing it to university, basically because it got a reaction from certain squares who needed a good jolt. But I kept wearing it, and buying more until I had four kilts, because it was exceedingly comfy. As noted before, I became known as “Kilt Guy.”

Me in a kilt in my 40s

Then, I began teaching. I wore a kilt once, and realized it didn’t work: I needed my students paying attention to my lessons, not my clothes. I stopped wearing kilts on teaching days. Then I left teaching for the manual trades, where having my entire legs covered was important, and loose-fitting fabric that could get caught in the equipment was a critical safety hazard. First, I got accustomed to wearing kilts. Then I got unaccustomed.

At Irish Fest this weekend, I wore my kilts for the first time in two years. As the opportunities to wear kilts and feel comfortable in them has diminished, I’ve grown uncomfortable in the clothing choice I once embraced. Even before the plague forced everyone into isolation, I became uncomfortable wearing kilts to the park or the pub, places I once most enjoyed wearing them in my thirties. I’ve become a conformist, pants-only stiff. Again.

Therefore I suggest, both my previous semi-Marxist reading of the jobsite, and Jerry’s explanation of protecting his goolies, are canards. My co-workers’ defense of britches, arises because britches are workplace safety gear. They see pants as manful because they see themselves as manful, and they wear pants. My definition of manhood doesn’t require pants; but my definition of comfort has evolved to demand them. Then, the Irish Fest made me comfortable again in a kilt.

Every explanation I’ve encountered is a post-hoc construction. Humans need conditioned from toddlerhood to wear clothing. We wear certain kinds of clothing because we’re conditioned according to culture, economics, and climate. And our conditioning changes according to how society rewards and punishes us. Our explanations aren’t wrong, necessarily; they’re just retrospective. All explanations arise from needing to defend an answer we’ve already reached.

Therefore I stand by what I wrote before. Except when I don’t.