Hi everyone, it's Justine! This is a question asked by one of you under one
of my videos: why do men wear trousers and women
skirts? where is that coming from? it's a great question... you would say, well, it's
culture, that's the way people in Western Europe/countries dress, right? but in fact, as for
many matters of culture we need to go way back in time to find the answer. at
the beginning everyone wore skirts. in Egypt, everyone from the Pharaoh high up
in the hierarchy until the simple farmer was wearing skirts. you know about linen, you
know this fine paper and those fine fabrics from Egypt - that was for everyone.
in China, the emperor would wear a floor-length dress in bright yellow,
usually made in beautiful, beautiful silk. in South America, the Inca civilization...
men and women were wearing skirts as well. in ancient Greece and in Rome, men
and women wore tunics, so a sort of dress dress draped around the body together with a
cape. and the whole thing was held on the shoulder with a fibula, a sort of clasp, a
brooch. you see some in museums now. so men's dresses were shorter women's were
longer (more around the ankle) but everyone was working around in skirts
and it was fine. they would even see skirts as proper clothing, as opposed to
what the barbarian people around them were wearing, like people in Byzantium,
people of Carthage and my super rough barbarian ancestors the Gauls, later called...
the French :-) those are different examples from all around the world and from
different moments in time but you can see that pretty much everywhere and
untll pretty recently, skirts were fine for everyone... so when did that shift
happen? when did pants become the only garment acceptable for a man?
the influence of the Bible: in the Bible, this subject is mentioned as well: the woman
shall not put on the weapons or the armor of the warrior, neither shall the warrior
put on a woman's garment, for all that do so are abomination unto the Lord thy God.
this is believed to be the correct meaning because in the time when the Old
Testament was written, years and years and centuries before year zero of
our calendar, women and men would go to war, in ancient civilizations. so what the
text here says is believed to be:we people who believe in God and follow the
Bible are not going to do it like this. in our culture, only the men will go to
war. and the other way around men should not try to escape going to war by
putting on women's garments. that's what we now believe it meant. then in 1604,
a long time ago, King James 1 of England ordered the Bible to be
translated again, newly, into English. the way in which this version was written is
a lot easier to follow, a lot easier to read than the original version... but also
in some places it's either inaccurate or freely translated. to make it easier
sometimes they interpreted the original text. but it was so much easier to read that
it became extremely popular among all english-speaking Protestants all around
the world and that's the version that really "sticked", so to say. the King James
version of the Bible says: the woman shall not wear that which pertaineth
unto a man, neither shall a man put on a woman's garment, for all that do so are
abomination unto the Lord thy God. so it's already a lot more general. and then
a newer version was done in modern international English and that one says:
a woman must not wear men's clothing, nor a man wear women's clothing, for the Lord
your God detests anyone who does this .now this refers to all clothes in general! it
became more and more general with every translation, but that's the meaning that
was kept in the end. so from that moment on, it really wasn't okay for men to wear
skirts. then men's fashion and women's fashion we became more and more
different and more and more separated. but beyond the biblical influence there
were also practical reasons: trousers are just smarter to work, ride horses or go
to war - things that men did. Women on the other hand were not expected to do
much, and in women's fashion for many many centuries practicality was not really a
concept. also it was easier in a skirt to use the restroom, because women need to
sit down at least squat. when they had their periods, sometimes they would wear
a rag between their legs, to catch the blood, but fabric was expensive so most
of the times they wouldn't wear anything. and in a skirt it was easier to clean
yourself several times a day without staining your outfit. also in a time
when birth control did not exist, women spent more of their lives pregnant. so a
skirt can be shifted up or down, a dress is more forgiving... pants just won't
fit anymore, hence the need for pregnancy trousers nowadays. and now? now in most
Western countries, if a man walks down the street in a skirt or a dress, he will
probably get laughed at very badly it's ingrained in our education, our
principles, our culture... but in many other parts of the world, right now, men still
wear skirts or dresses. and when you travel there as a tourist,
it doesn't bother you at all does it?examples: in Bhutan, the equivalent of
dressing up for work or for events is to wear a kira for the ladies and a gho
for the gentlemen. I think it looks terribly chic. if it gets cold, they just
add thick socks underneath, going up to knee. and this fold in the front serves as a
huge pocket. if you thought that Bhutanese men all have a belly in the
front, it's actually the stuff they're carrying around with them. and that beats
any purse ;-) Buddhist monks wear long dresses
everywhere in Asia: does that look weird? not at all! it looks incredibly elegant!
on Bali, men wear a sarong, so a long wrapped
piece of clothing. it's a skirt and they wear it with their sandals or
flip-flops. this length is usually between the knee and the ankle, from what
I've seen there. it's actually a perfect length to cover what needs to be covered
but still have great freedom of movement. let's talk about Scotland please: I think
a man in a kilt looks amazing. usually the fabric of the kilt is a work
of art in itself: it's nicely woven, tight, thick fabric and the folds are
always absolutely impeccable. why don't more men wear skirts?
thumbs up if you enjoyed this video, thank you VERY MUCH! and thank
you to the person who raised that question, I love questions like this!
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I will see you in the next one, until then: take care,
bye!