“Once upon a time, men wore the pants, and wore them well. Women rarely had to open doors and little old ladies never crossed the street alone. Men took charge because that’s what they did. But somewhere along the way, the world decided it no longer needed men. Disco by disco, latte by foamy non-fat latte, men were stripped of their khaki’s and left stranded on the road between boyhood and androgyny. But today, there are questions our genderless society has no answers for. The world sits idly by and cities crumble, children misbehave and those little old ladies remain on one side of the street. For the first time since bad guys, we need heroes. We need grown-ups. We need men to put down the plastic fork, step away from the salad bar and untie the world from the tracks of complacency. It’s time to get your hands dirty. It’s time to answer the call of manhood. It’s time to wear the pants.”
The Call for Men to Wear the Pants: Dockers’ Manifesto
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I saw that!!! I loved it so much I wrote to the website and corporate encouraging them for it.
It’s a shame some think women are empowered by weakening men. Women have already been given power by God: Eve, Deborah, and Elizabeth are just a few who were powerful, take charge women when God commanded it, but who were also totally feminine. The very first feminists were wives and mothers who wore their hair long, their dresses modest and their legs covered.
You’ll probably be gratified to know men still hold open the door for me, plenty of times; ladies do the same for others when necessary. No one I know has ever given it a moment’s thought.
Jennifer,
I agree with you, except for one caveat/question:
Why can’t we just say that we are “biblical women” instead of “feminists”?
Not a woman alive would disagree with the definition of feminism if it were simply: “The belief that women should be treated with equal value as men.”
But we also all know that feminism has moved far beyond that simple definition (though many women who claim to be feminists would differ in their personal definitions of the word), and many flavors have been immensely damaging to the culture and completely opposite any kind of womanhood described in Scripture.
All that to say, as Christians, shouldn’t we be about espousing biblical womanhood (and using the terminology, giving credit where credit is due), glorying in all the power that, like you said, is already given to women, and not espousing a term that has taken so many anti-Christian, anti-family forms?
Wow thats awesome. And see the how the ripples flow… if men would be men… maybe women would be women. We do need heroes – and ladies as well.
LOVE. IT. They have received a “thank you” email from me 🙂
Absolutely, Kelly. I wasn’t even trying to promote feminism perse; I just thought it relevant to point out that the first ones did indeed just want equal regard for women. They proved this with their feminine life choices and mannerisms, and I wish more now would do the same.
I saw this yesterday and emailed them too! I love it! I hope more people email them with a positive response.
I’m amazed! I love it too.
Perfect! I’ll have to print this out for my husband. We have some real catch phrases in our house – “play the man!”, “get yourself some trousers”! All in good humour for our young men, of course.
Hooray for Biblical manhood! 😀
Bravo!!! How refreshing! Think of our Grandfathers…they would laugh a lot of the “men” we have created.
Bravo to Dockers and Levi’s, their parent company. It is a nice change to have a mainstream corporation lament the rise of this androgynous culture being forced upon the masses.
Despite best efforts, we are not a genderless society, can never be, nor should we aspire to it.
i love this! i’ll have to share it with the guy i’m seeing.
i got a little flack yesterday from some coworkers that fits into this… my guy gave me an old pair of his carhartt coveralls to throw on over my clothes for super cold walks to work (it was 20 below windchill yesterday!but man those things are warm!) i joked with my (extremely liberal) coworkers before i went to take them off ‘look at me! i’m playing dress up!’ and one said ‘who are you dressing as’ and i joked ‘a big tough guy!’ and suddenly i’m given a hard time about gender stereotyping etc etc… women can wear work clothes too, you know there are plenty of women in construction, why do you think only men would… blah blah blah. but you know what? those overalls are a symbol of manliness as far as i’m concerned, and the fact that c. gave them to me to keep warm i can’t help but read as a sweet gesture of his trying to take care of me! i would never dream of wandering the mall in them, those are boy clothes! (lol, as i read this i realize that yeah, i’m defeating a little of the purpose of this conversation by saying that I was wearing the coveralls, but i assure you i had a lovely, modest, girly outfit underneath ;-)… anyhow i wanted to share this rant… hope it made sense… it’s early… you should feel honored kelly, your blog came before coffee this morning!
Unfortunately, I doubt this ad had much to do with Docker’s view of Biblical manhood/womanhood, and a lot more to do with making men and women, this Christmas season, run out and purchase more Docker’s. All I see here is a bunch of disguised materialism.
authentically me,
“The former preach Christ from selfish ambition, not sincerely…What then? Only that in every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is preached; and in this I rejoice.” Phillipians 1:15-18
Shanie,
Woohoo!!! Loved the rant!
I find it even funny that some woman are upset that I let my husband be a man. To them, it looks as though “HE” MAKES me stay at home with our kids and MAKES me do all the house work. They don’t see it as this is what I want too.
Love you post. Just love it.
Sorry for dropping links all over your blog, Kelly but I don’t want to keep making my usual post-length comments.
I had some recent thoughts concerning the significance of gender role reversal and why it is an affront to God to engage in this practice… http://onmysoapbox2.wordpress.com/2009/11/16/midnight-musings/
For the record, I believe it goes a LOT deeper than whether women wear men’s clothing , but rather is rooted in an attitude of rebellion toward a God-ordained order which is intended to represent to His creation Who He is in a way that we might be able to (however weakly) comprehend. I certainly don’t condemn women for wearing pants, and have heard of depression era stories of families that were so poor that younger brothers had to wear older sister’s clothing. I expect this happens in many poor societies around the world today. When the Law was established, everyone wore “dresses”–albeit gender-specific ones.
The spirit of rebellion that encourages us to embrace the doctrine of gender-neutrality is the same one that is destroying the family picture that God designated as symbolic of the Christ-Church-Individual believer reality.
Christians appreciate the social/occupational/apparel distinction between male/female because we have an understanding (or should) of what this actually represents.
Again, it is not as much a focus on a person’s clothing but the heart attitude with which (s)he wears it.
Pretty amazing, IMO>
I saw this last night and thought it was pretty funny. I sent the link to one of the articles about this to a Boston area talk show this morning, the Michael Graham show (not Christian at all), and sure enough, he put it on his blog and is currently talking about it on air. Pretty cool.
http://michaelgraham.com/archives/please-don-rsquo-t-tell-margery-eagan-about-this/
Very cute…
[…] Why you were surfing the Dockers website is another matter, Drew. Regardless, good looking out. Here’s the whole text. […]
Love it!
Kelly, This is great! I love it and the Philippians verse is awesome! Thanks for posting!
I find this hilarious just because of the brand behind it… Dockers khaki pants? The uniform of the latte-drinking, salad-bar-eating man.
LOL Touche, Allie
A man who is insecure about what kind of coffee he drinks seems more like a weakling than a man who shares authority with his wife and his female colleagues. This ad panders to men who feel threatened by women’s increased power in society.
“This ad panders to men who feel threatened by women’s increased power in society.”
You may be correct, Elizabeth. It is true that the clothing does not “make” the man. It is, after all, intended to boost product sales.
On the other hand, a man who understands the purpose for which his Creator has designed him is far less likely to be swayed to drift into the gender neutral (behavior) zone and allow himself to be emasculated by an upside down society.
I am reminded of an experience my husband once had at Wal-Mart. The store was selling a very girly-looking style of seat called a mushroom chair. It was covered in hot pink “fur” and hardly something one could carry inconspicuously alongside the hip.
He found out his younger sister wanted one. And although she could certainly have afforded it herself, he stopped to pick one up as a surprise for her. While he was standing in line, two youngish guys got behind him and were obviously smirking at his intended purchase.
And he smiled straight back and said “Only a REAL man can go through the Wal-Mart checkout carrying a pink mushroom chair!”
Chivalry with a sense of humor.
🙂
I meant to say that the ad is intended to sell…
Dang Elizabeth, you nailed it.
Love this!!
Great story about your husband, Heather.
I will say my husband was totally shocked at the idea that drinking lattes or eating salad is considered effeminate behavior. He had literally never heard or considered such a thing. He doesn’t hang out on conservative blogs as much as I do.
I do feel bad for men. There seem to be a lot of weird rules for what is considered “masculine” versus “effeminate” behavior — and the condemnation for falling into the “effeminate” category is pretty harsh. My husband is an all-American, football loving, hunting, Carhartt wearing dude who also loves to bake, shop for clothes, gossip and hang out with his mom. I often tell him I love his “feminine” side and he takes it as a compliment.
Absolutely LOVE this ad! I’m a homeschooling, Atheist, Conservative, stay-at-home-mom of four children and I’m married to a real man 🙂 I’m raising my sons to be men and raising my daughter to marry a man like her daddy. Kudos to Dockers for having the guts to go outside of the societal norm, speak up and say “enough already!”
I love this! And my Dockers wearing preacher hubby will get a kick out of it too. He definitely “wears the pants in the family” and I’m very happy to let him open doors, offer me his arm, and treat me like a lady. 🙂
Great read. Personally I think people under appreciate the internet and this glorious age of information. The jury is still out on this and it’s better for teachers or worse it really depends on who you ask.
My brother suggested I might like this blog.
He was totally right. This post truly made my day.
You cann’t imagine just how much time I had spent for this information!
Thanks!
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