Category Archives: Style & Fashion

Church Marketing Sucks T-shirts!

Church Marketing Sucks T-shirts: That's How We've Always Done It!Ever since I started working on Church Marketing Sucks I thought it would be so cool to have CMS T-shirts.

Well, that day has arrived.

We’re selling Church Marketing Sucks T-shirts. There are five unique designs (I love the dinosaur), but we’re only taking orders until December 4 (so act quickly, after that it’s too bad for you). All the profits go to support the Center for Church Communication and the work we do on sites like CMS, so even if you scoff at the $18 price tag, know that it’s helping a good cause–helping churches not suck.

Now you know what to get your pastor for Christmas.

My Shoes are Keen!

Keen hybrid shoe sandalsOn a fun note, my shoes are Keen! I blew a big chunk of my birthday money on these shoe-sandal hybrid things, the green Newport H2. They’re open and airy like sandals, but they have the traction and closed toe of a shoe. Very handy for active summer wear since you don’t need socks and your feet still get the nice cool breezes.

I’d been looking for some comfier sandals (my old pair were a from a going out of business sale in college and hurt my feet if I wore them for any extended period) and I actually tried two different pairs of Chacos. Tried as in bought them, took them home and wore them for a day or two before realizing how much I disliked them. Thanks to REI’s generous return policy, I was able to keep trying until I found a pair I liked. Because when you’re spending real money on footwear, not just going out of business money, they need to feel good.

The Keens look kind of goofy, but the more I wear them the more I like them. I don’t think I’ve ever been much of a sandal guy (that pair I bought in college was probably the only pair I’ve ever worn regularly–I don’t even remember owning sandals in high school), which is probably why the Chacos didn’t seem right. But my feet seem to like this hybrid deal.

Ah, every now and then you need a good everyday blog entry.

Laziness + Cheapness = Cool

I need a haircut. As happens too quickly in my life, my hair goes from the halfway decent, fresh from the barber look to the shaggy, colic. I usually realize this while standing in the bathroom at work at 7:59. My bangs are curling and I have colic that only cement can cure.

Lately my hairstyle plan has been to cut it so short you can’t really comb it. It works great for winter. I put a hat on, I take my hat off, my hair looks fine. That is until I reach the inevitable shaggy state. Then my hair stands to attention like a soldier.

I need a new look. Tonight I went for the bandanna. Unfortunately, the gang look doesn’t exactly mesh with the dress code at work. I’m tempted to grow my hair long. I don’t exactly know what that means, other than the fact that I’ll have to go through a painfully long shaggy state where my hair doesn’t know what to do, and neither do I. But I take encouragement from my balding friends at work: grow it while you got it. My hair will surely abandon me on the day when I need to feel my youngest, so I might as well enjoy it while I can.

All this talk about hair makes it actually seem like I care about style. I don’t. I’ll probably end up with the disheveled look, which is so two years ago, but not for stylistic reasons. Shear laziness will be my primary motiviating factor. In all honesty, laziness paired with cheapness are the inspiration for most of my fashion choices.

Will there come a day when I like myself again?

You want to change the world but the world won’t change for you.

I wake up in the morning and wonder where I am. Come to my senses try to put my best face on. It’s not so easy before the sun rises. I’ve got to make an impression, got to be the one all the boys want. That’s what I’m talking about. You say it’s not true, but you don’t know the way they look at you. That look can mean so much, it can be everything.

You find the clothes that look best today. Whatever happened to my favorite pair of jeans, that comfy sweater that reminds you of rainy Saturdays and Monopoly? That doesn’t cut it any more. I dress with my back to the mirror, not wanting to know the latest. Maybe tonight I’ll be in better shape to face the music. I know what the magazines say, but my body doesn’t want to cooperate on Monday mornings. You wouldn’t cooperate either if you had to get up this early, with this little sleep, with this much to do.

By the time I walk out the door, I wonder if I’m really myself. I don’t listen to my mother’s makeup advice anymore. Nobody does. Someone from New York whom I’ve never met tells me how’s it done. That’s who everyone at school listens to, and I do the same. Once upon a time it was normal to be yourself. But no one’s interested in this self anymore. So I do what I can, I try my best to make myself presentable, acceptable, likable, lovable.

I never quite know if it works, if I can manage to pull the wool over their eyes, over my own eyes. Sometimes I just pretend it works, and ignore the fact that my pants are too loose or too baggy, that my shirt is too tight or not tight enough, showing too much cleavage or not enough, showing enough of my stomach or not enough. Sometimes I pretend my thighs are slim and my stomach is taunt and my breasts are just right. Sometimes I don’t give a shit.

Sometimes as I walk to the bus stop I wonder if I’ll ever look in the mirror and see myself again. I wonder if on the other side of the adolescent jungle is something worthwhile. I wonder if adults go through the same self-flagellation, or if we grow past this pathetic phase of gratifying total strangers and jilted popularity mongers.

Will there come a day when I like myself again?

I never want to be that cool.

Orange is the new red. Punk is the new preppy. Thrift shop is the new casual. Old school is the new school. Trends and the latest in are so out with me. I get a kick walking around the mall and seeing the styles stores are trying to peddle as the latest and greatest. Everything is so phony. They’re manufacturing cool and selling it at discount prices.

My favorite is the new chic punk. The tough looking clothes that once defined rebellion are now sold in soft girly yellows and pinks, toned down and trimmed to be a hackneyed copycat lacking the soul of the original. But it’s okay, cuz you’d look so cute in that.

A close second is the fabricated retro. It used to be cool to shop the thrift stores, buying actual clothes from the seventies. But who needs frayed tees that smell like your grandma when you can have the same thing with artificial logos and a brand name? It incorporates all the style of Salvation Army with none of the price.

And finally, the only thing falling faster than the stock market is the waistline of women’s jeans (“Here Come the Buns”). The low-rider is suddenly back, but it wasn’t enough, we had to have hip-huggers again and ultra-low rise and really really low rise, and this-is-so-freaking-low-you-can’t-really-call-them-pants-anymore-low riders. And low-rider jeans coupled with the thong spells trouble for the DEA: plumbers aren’t the only ones dispensing a little crack.

It’s getting to the point where prissy little pre-teens need to coordinate before going to the mall. Are we going fake sweat suit casual or preppy punk? Because you’d hate to mix genres while hanging with your friends. But you don’t want to overdo it. I saw one dynamic duo at the mall that were a little too coordinated. They were going for the chunky tennis shoes, split-side bell-bottoms, and retro rugby shirts. They looked like a pair of walking mannequins.

I never want to be that cool.

Bugle Boy? Umm… no.

The other day I felt like a modern suburban American. I was wondering through the mall on a Sunday afternoon and the only thing I was missing was a cell phone. Pop culture puzzles me.

Retro is in. However it has to be simulated retro, not authentic. Every storefront was sporting the latest style from twenty years ago at today’s prices. Apparently going to Goodwill isn’t good enough.

And while I’m on the subject of malls, what’s up with Sam Goody? That store charges $16.99 for a CD on sale! Regular priced CDs were $18.99. What idiots are buying CDs there and keeping that place in business?

It’s also bothersome that you can’t buy plain clothing anymore. You have to become somebody’s walking billboard. And the worst part isn’t that you have to submit to having some corporation’s logo plastered across your chest, the worst part is that’s what determines how cool you are. Abercrombie? You’re cool. Bugle Boy? Umm… no.

Another thing that bothers me is magazines trying to make ends meet. Rather than try to improve their content to bring in ad revenue, they run several full-color pages of their target demographic wearing trendy wares, and then tell people where they can buy each item of clothing and for how much. Killer ad placement.

I’m also bothered by magazines for teenage girls that feature stick-thin models on the cover, and then have articles moaning about stick-thin models and warning of the dangers of anorexia. It’s magazine-orexia. Then there’s the magazine’s for guys, put out by the same companies, with nothing but pictures of rail-thin women and articles about how to score. It seems we’ve mastered the art of selling magazines and ruining a generation’s concept of self-worth–at the same time! What a deal.

And finally I love the attempt to be on the cutting edge. Every teen magazine and website has a little trendsetter’s club you can join and share the latest trends. It sounds like a totally fresh and out there idea until you realize the magazines are just culling you for information, taking your fringe, soon-to-be-cool trends and putting them on the front page so they can look hip and sell more magazines.

Is there anybody out there that actually cares about people?

The Epitome of Superficiality

The world can be a scary place to live. Especially when you spend a few hours flipping through teenage fashion magazines. If a horny little 15-year-old guy is looking for some soft porn, there’s no better place to go than women’s magazines: Cosmo, Mademoiselle, Vogue, Seventeen, YM. And we wonder why girls have self esteem problems and develop disorders like anorexia and bulimia.

What’s even better is when one of these magazines runs an article on eating disorders, pretending not to be a cause of low self esteem and the source for insecurity. Today I even saw an article about breasts that started off talking about how all the images in society can cause young women to feel bad about their boobs. The article didn’t say anything about the breasts splashed across the cover or the previous page of that very issue.

The double standard is pretty ridiculous, but it pales in comparison to everything else. You can’t distinguish the ads from the content, and sometime the content is advertising. It’s materialism at its best (and it’s certainly not limited to fashion mags). Sex is simply all over the place, with tons of articles on how to do it, how to do it better, and how to avoid any risk while doing it. It would shock my mother and grandmother, but it’s to be expected. In a world with no values, why not tell a teenager how to give the best oral sex. Especially if it sells magazines.

It’s the epitome of superficiality. It’s rebellious in a conformist sort of way.

What I find truly frightening is that while the world is modeling this kind of thinking and lifestyle for young women, what is the church doing? Not much. And I work for a publication that caters to teens. The best thing I can think of that comes close to even addressing the issue is Brio magazine, which quite honestly, fails. It’s a Focus on the Family magazine for teenage girls, and they don’t do much to tear down the messed up ideals that girls need boyfriends to be something, that beauty is only skin deep and can be improved with the latest product from L’oreal.

The last time I checked God said that the lilies of the field were decked out better than anyone on People Magazine’s Best Dressed List. Superficial beauty doesn’t last. It’s not the shade of your lip-gloss or the color of your eyeliner that makes you beautiful. It’s not your cup size or the curve of your hips that matters worth anything. Every big-boobed, bathing suit babe will one day be wrinkled and old, and every guy that ogled and fantasized about her will be long gone. She’ll be old and alone and her days in the spotlight will be a distant memory, hardly worth holding on to. Some things are more important. Some things are eternal.

We’re losing a society of young women to the god of vanity. They’re powdering their noses while their souls rot. What are we going to do about it?