keniakittykat said:
I got into a fiery argument with a coworker today, just because I wore an ed hardy shirt. I personally love the brand and I always find loads of it at second hand stores and goodwills. So even if it's outdated, it's still pretty!
But he just couldn't let it go and kept ripping on my favorite shirt... It quite upset me how this person who I thought was a nice guy just drilled me into the ground because I like the thing he didn't.
But as my dear colleague informed me, apparently, there's indeed huge hard-core haters that just get angry whenever it comes up, and most people don't like any of it and will take the chance to make fun of it whenever they can.
Me being completely oblivious to trends, along with me generally not giving a fuck about fashion, I was not aware that wearing shirts and sweaters with colorful flashy artwork makes me a douche. (Or whatever the female equivalent of that is)
So I ask the internet council (you guys) the question, what do people have against this very specific brand? Is there some big anti-color conspiracy I don't know about?
Actually there IS something of an anti-color "conspiracy". As some people have pointed out "Ed Hardy" is associated with douchebags as a brand, but it's also the style. A lot of it goes back to a book called "The Game".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Game:_Penetrating_the_Secret_Society_of_Pickup_Artists
Basically a book about being a pickup artist and also sharing some of the techniques. To an extent there is a lot of truth to it once you understand that it's largely about playing the numbers and your typical pickup artist is going to strike out 9 times for every success (or more). One of the techniques this discusses (which has been around longer than the book, but this "popularized" it and brought it into more common usage even if people don't know the technique) is called "Peacocking" that is to say a guy dressing up in bright colors in order to stand out from the rest of the pack and be more noticeable, a lot of the typical "douchebag" imagery including thick exposed necklaces, or having a colorful shirt open to show a tight T-shirt or mostly bare chest are part of this as well. Broadcasting a confident "alpha male" attitude even when it's not true also enters into it, especially when your dealing with girls your presumably approaching with them in a state of at least semi-inebriation.
The point here is that the whole "Ed Hardy" thing was pretty much developed to cater to people who wanted to try and be like this, which is why you see it so often in clubs, and why it comes with such a negative association since the people who dress like that tend to intentionally act like jerks. People who do it even when they aren't at clubs or whatever are viewed as being the worst of the worst. Of course in general a lot of people who do it intentionally don't care what people think, the point being that they expect 90%+ of all people to hate them, as the cost of occasionally scoring way out of their normal league. Quagmire from "Family Guy" is pretty much an exaggeration of the entire stereotype your dealing with here.
Now, like everything there are exceptions. In the right places at the right times there is nothing wrong with wearing a nice Hawaiian shirt, or something similar, or even having it open. However for the most part guys should in general wear more basic colors, especially when wandering around casually. You might not be doing it intentionally, but especially nowadays walking around wearing a lot of bright colors gives people a negative impression due to the huge number of people who do it to "peacock" (even without knowing the term, or when and how it became popular to this extent).
It might not be fair if you just like the shirt or the brand (which is infamous for a reason), but expect this kind of reaction to continue. Also don't be surprised if you go to the wrong place at the wrong time that you get the living crap beat out of you. It's a great way to make someone think your after their girlfriend in certain places, or worse yet can be considered a "bullseye" for irate boyfriends who want to prove their manliness, especially if your alone. Your basically presenting yourself as exactly the kind of guy someone looking for a fight feels they can hit (even if they don't know you) without feeling bad about it in the morning.
You might not believe me, but this is just an elaboration on some things people have also explained. It's right up there with why it's recommended you don't actually wear sports "number" shirts and jerseys around casually in a lot of places and why a lot of schools have banned them, albeit with different reasons. In the case of the sports stuff it's gang related with a lot of gangs, especially when "colors" have been banned in an area, to recognize each other. It can get complicated and varies from organization to organization but the idea generally comes down to the gang being a "team" and the numbers representing rank or what someone does based on the position of a specific player. In some cases it can get complicated enough to spread out among a number of sports, and even vary regionally. You walk into the wrong place wearing say Michael Jordan's numbers (23 and 45 I believe) on a basketball shirt, that's a good way to get yourself killed or stabbed. It's also how a lot of accidents during drive by shootings happen when they get the wrong person (ie they go by enemy turf planning to shoot members of a rival gang, and shoot the first person wearing the sports memorabilia of the rival faction). It's situational and something school dress codes have just been finally catching up to causing a lot of headaches from people who don't get why... but it's similar.
In short, be careful of what you wear, and understand you'll be associated with people who dress a certain way whether it's fair or not. With things like Ed Hardy it's sort of like Versace for douchebags especially in the club scene.
