The ending was about as bleak as endings get.

Fun fact, for decades Harley has made more selling their clothes to wannabes than selling their shit bikes to dentists with a midlife crisis

Not nearly as bad as the lady who briefly worked in my office. She had a ton of Harley-Davidson accessories. Literally the first thing she told us was that she and her husband love the brand and riding motorcycles. I asked how many Harleys they had. The answer? Zero, but they hoped to buy one someday.

They made "hoping to own something" their whole personality.

To be fair, it's not just an American thing. Plenty of beemer bros in Europe.

That definitely wasn't my wardrobe approach. One of my main inspirations as I was learning how to dress better was Chalky White from Boardwalk Empire.

I like colors. Tended toward the ostentatious. But I was working in politics, so it helped to be eye-catching.

~~This~~ Twitter ~~channel~~ is pretty racist btw.

FTFY

Being concerned about what strangers think of you & your attire is the opposite of self-respect.

Fashion is cringe and try hard. Intentionally slotting yourself into a wealth ranking based on some cloth and a watch isn't the flex you think it is. All it tells me is that you can't afford the next tier of clothing.

At least $18 sweatpants in an $800 hotel gives a bit of mystery.

Why would you dress up for a hotel?

When traveling "looking fancy" is the last thing I care about.

I used to occasionally go to nightclubs in LA with some older guys that insisted on wearing nice, fitted suits. They actually bought me one when I first moved out there. If I was in a nightclub in my 20's, it was usually cause I was working. So I don't really have much to compare the experience to. But I'd say they were attention-getting - not necessarily in a good way. One dude tried to start a fight with me. And a girl I texted afterward was surprised to discover that I was, in fact, quite poor. That was a while ago. I have plenty of suits now. I never wear them. I guess nobody dresses fancy anymore.

I'm glad that pretending to be fancy is falling out of fashion. It's extremely uncomfortable (save me the speech about how I need a well fitting suit or whatever, no thanks) and it's expensive (very much in conflict with your claim below that it's cheap to dress up. I'm not sure how you could possibly believe that). As someone who routinely dresses comfortably af, nothing was lost when people stopped dressing up randomly such as on airplanes. Being comfortable is very important to some people, especially those on the spectrum. I've got nothing to prove to people by being uncomfortable. I'll keep wearing gym shorts on a plane and I literally feel for people wearing suits as I know how uncomfortable every aspect of it is.

I was at a funeral recently where about 1 in 10 people were wearing cargo shorts or jeans, a graphic tee or a polo shirt, and sneakers.

Not that I think we should go back to dressing in powdered wigs and hose but I think there is room for clothing choices to mark an occasion

Grew up near Chicago…

A lot of those people commute into the city and walk several blocks to their building. Sneakers are just better for that. Most probably keep dress shoes at the office and change at work. Also makes your dress shoes last longer and keeps them all polished up.

"dress shoes" feel awful.

Oh come on, they're Balenciaga!