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Fashion Trends

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Because if you wait long enough even culottes will become trendy. Because some people apparently love ugly.

culottes
(click picture for video)

This requires us to ask: will fundies ditch their pseudo-britches now that the world has called them cool?

Time will tell. And what’s next a fashion craze for denim skirts? It could happen…

115 thoughts on “Fashion Trends”

  2. Oh no, if they even notice culottes as a trend, it’ll just be some fundy individuals at the mall seeing a girl wearing a pair.

    They’ll at first think she’s a Christian, then they’ll want to separate from her because of the low neckline on her shirt. Then they’ll decide she can’t be a Christian because of her hair, and then they’ll tell the pastor and he’ll preach the next Sunday on how even the world knows what a woman shoud be wearing and this here’s the proof.

    There shall be no dent in the armor, never fear.

  3. Back in the late 70s I attended camp. All the girls knew one-piece suits were required, but no one really knew why. Most of the girls in their early college years had suits that barely covered the derrière and plunging necklines. I thought it was hysterical and also got my first clue about why it was time to leave Fundyland. We were just taught rules, not how to think.

    Me? I was still wearing my old suit because I didn’t have the kind of body for the Bo Derrick look. I was one of the only girls who didn’t have to wear a t-shirt over my suit. I kept my thoughts to myself, but I soon found a different church where grace, not law, was taught.

        1. What is seen cannot be unseen. I have no idea why you felt the need to traumatize everyone with that link.

        3. Which link?

          I did forget to add a “Not safe for prudes” disclaimer, for which I apologize.

      3. You could get the same coverage as these suits with a couple large Band-Aids. And for much cheaper, though not as sexy.
        Anyone else shudder a little at the thought of waxing for these? Maybe they did laser.

      4. There’s no way that second swimsuit can stay on long in the water. Also, those things can’t be real, if you know what I mean.

        1. And how would it stay in place? You’d need tape or glue or something, and that’s gonna sting like hell coming off.

      1. We were actually required to wear dresses to services at camps! The suits, of course, were for swimming! (Although dress shirts and ties on the guys were preferred for services, as well).

  4. Fifth! (as a good Episcopalian, we always know that when there are four in a room, there’s always a fifth…)

  5. My wife and daughter are both fans of Pinterest. I take it that a lot of fundy women like this site (as well as a lot of non-fundy women!). I am surprised that there hasn’t been a backlash against making home-made jewelry, items for the home, etc. because of all the worldly influences in it!

    Of course this is all being silly.

    Fundamentalism tends to be reactionary, defining what is good and godly by being against the world instead of being for a right relationship with God. It is easier to let the world take the lead, so you can be against something. It is not so easy to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with God.

    1. So true, but fundies want rules and regulations instead of the freedom that is in Christ Jesus.

      1. Paul told the Galatians that a compulsion to return to the bondage of rules/regs was “bewitched.” Interesting word, that.

    2. No because see, they like Pinterest and the home made jewelry and the like, so there’s nothing wrong with it!

      But if they didn’t like it, you’d hear sermons.

  7. The last time gauchos were popular, many fundies, including myself at the time, still criticized them and wouldn’t wear the popular style because it was “too sexy”. (Read: clingy over hips and behind, so somewhat flattering.)

    So no, I don’t think that the renewed popularity of gauchos or culottes will change anything.

    1. I can’t imagine in what universe culottes would ever be considered “flattering”! My theory as to why fundy teen girls are forced into wearing culottes is because leadership is hoping that the hormonal teen boys won’t be sexually attracted to the girls wearing them. Little do they know that hormonal teen boys are attracted to girls no matter what, even if they’re wearing a floor length potato sack.

      1. I can testify that when I was a teenaged boy, the girl’s clothes made absolutely no difference to us. It wasn’t the clothes that interested us.

      2. I agree that that is the primary reason.

        A secondary reason for some is to “mortify the flesh,” to reinforce in girls’ minds that they are not to care about their outward adornment, a sort of modern “sackcloth and ashes.” It’s hard to feel confident and pretty when you know you look awkward and ridiculous so if they wanted to make people “die to self” (or not have self-esteem) making them wearing weird clothes is a good way to do it.

        2. Mag, the reason why fundies haven’t gone Amish is they need electricity and cell phones to access Ashley Madison and porn.

      3. Well, more attractive than the fundy pleated version, anyway. The ones I remember being popular for about a minute a few years ago were stretchy and fit like yoga pants at the top, then flared into gauchos.

        And yes, I agree with your theory. Yet another case of “it’s always the woman’s fault”.

  10. Umm, no, probably not.

    “Culottes” were deemed holy, buy a group of official looking people in suits and stuff, who gave the natter much consideration and prayer. The fact that they are temporarily cool (until the world puts on their glasses) should not affect culotte’s holiness.

    If anything, there are many fundies praising God for the “revival!”

    1. Goodness! Pardon me! “by” and “culottes'” -I repent of my sins of poor grammar and punctuation.

      Also, the printed heels are immodest, therefore sinful, especially when paired with culottes.

      1. So long as the shoes don’t show toe cleavage, it’s all good. I’m guessing Bill Grady would probably object to printed shoes no matter the cleavage.

      2. What if the shoes are printed with something religious, like the stoning of Stephen or the flaying of St. Bartholomew?

        1. Not St. Bartholomew. With the word Saint in front of his name, he’s obviously Catholic. (Please don’t bring up St. Paul or St. John.)

  14. They will always be a symbol of embarrassment for me. I have no interest in ever wearing them, no matter how “trendy.”

    2. It took my wife years to wear a skirt again after graduation from fundy college. And she has yet to wear a pair of hose.

      1. I finally wear hose, when it’s cold and I have to wear a skirt. One of the hazards of wearing hose to school is that my tiny students rub and pluck at the nylons: Teacher, what is this STUFF on your legs?!

      2. I threw all my hose away after graduation from college and have not worn any in the ten years since! If it’s too cold for bare legs, it’s too cold for a skirt!

        1. Amen! I love being free to make my own weather-appropriate clothing decisions. I grew up in MN and went to Bible college in WI, so I endured many with of freezing legs.

      3. My family had a rule that I could not wear jeans to church when I was growing up. As an adult, I have worn jeans to church for 16 years. I very rarely wear a skirt.

        Up until recently, I attended a church where most people wore sweatpants in the winter. 🙂

    3. This is bringing up very bad memories! Oh, the winter days I spent wearing culottes and — wait for it– KNEE SOCKS! Then I got all trendy and tried them with leg warmers….aargh!
      I’m going to crawl under the bed and spend some quality time with my PTSD now.

    4. Just watching the video gave me the shivers. Lots of embarrassing memories flooding back. In high school, my homeschooling family was the only conservative one in a GARBC church. So I wore culottes to youth group when I was allowed to attend, which wasn’t often, lest those public school kids be a bad influence with their jeans and CCM!

    5. Oh my goodness yes. One of several things I won’t wear now. I will only wear a denim skirt if it is stick straight, above knee, and worn with tights/boots a la Amy Pond. Don’t even get me started on hose, and physically shredded my last pair =D

  15. I’m waiting for this to turn into a discussion on Socialism. How do culottes and Socialism go together?

    1. In the Worker’s Paradise of the future, every man, woman, and child will be issued culottes to wear at all times.
      Orwell predicted overalls, but he got it wrong.

      1. Thank you for explaining that!
        Now because of the lack of trolls or Poe’s, would you also delve into how culottes are part of the gay agenda?

  16. I made the mistake of wearing culottes/gauchos before when they were trendy but I won’t do it again! I wouldn’t be caught dead in those hideous things. As a matter of fact, if I AM caught dead in those abominations, please launch a kidnapping/murder investigation because the only way you would get me to wear them is if I was forced at gun-point.

      2. Oh a couple years ago at my Alaskan fundie church two young ladies showed up dressed like hookers (fishnets, mini skirts, super right tank tops) and sat in the front row. I thought it was very funny and had a hard time keeping a straight face. Never mind the “make a brother stumble” sermon fodder that came out of it. They no longer attend. But neither do I!

        1. (wife says) “Put your eyes back in your head, dear. You’re married. And no, you cannot invite the new people to lunch after the service.”

    2. … or did you mean you miss a particular miniskirt, that you used to wear, but that got lost in a flood or something?

    1. Goes away…

      Although the bad grammar could just be me regressing into an infantile state because I’m curled into a fetal position…

      Under my desk.

    1. Unless it is a completely shapeless garment 5 sizes too large, NO clothing actually “conceals the shape of a woman”. God made us with curves for a reason!

  20. WAY back in Fundy High, some rocket-surgeon in charge concluded a change was needed because the cheerleaders culottes would rise too high during a twirl. The fix they came up with was to sew weights into the hemlines.
    Any of you who have ever whirled anything on the end of a string can likely see the outcome of this little experiment. The male students certainly did.

    2. Total lol! Wasn’t there anyone who knew physics with any input into that experiment. (Or anyone who was even a little curious about centrifical force as a child?) I can still see my cat wobbling when we let him out of the drawstring tote bag after we had shut him in there and twirled it a few times!

      1. Wasn’t there anyone who knew physics

        It was a Fundy Christian school. Qualified teachers were no available for unimportant classes like math and science.

    3. Ugh the fundy school connected to my former church put the cheerleaders in these AWFUL calf-length straight denim skirts. Why couldn’t they be knee-length and flared, or non-denim?? Just blech. I love the costumes cheerleaders wear at college basketball games and the like. Just lengthen the skirt and they’d be plenty good enough for fundies, but nope!

  21. Next there will be Culottes Cabbage Patch, culotte Monster High, and the ever popular Culotte Barbie!

    1. I paired mine with XXL sweatshirts. Baggy sweatshirt, baggy ankle-length culottes! I’m so glad the internet didn’t exist back then. I’d not want those pictures on Facebook!

  23. I don’t even like the words culottes and gauchos. “Coo” is not an appealing sound to me, and “lots” means “a big bunch” which isn’t a thought I like to have related to that particular part of the body that the culottes are covering.

    And the first syllable in “gauchos” rhymes with cows.

    1. Which fits quite well, since a Gaucho is a South American cowboy.
      This item of dress is named for a traditional style of clothing the Gauchos wore, making it “apparel which pertaineth to a man”.

  24. I ran into her again today. That little, meek woman who always wears high-necked T-shirts under a jacket, with a long, shapeless straight skirt (why not a pretty swirly twirly one? too much chance her legs will show?) and her hair colored and highlighted and curled and ironed and barretted and sprayed in a way that just makes her ugly glasses look even uglier. She looks like a high school girl dressed up as a mom. She’s in her 30s at least.

    I haven’t seen her stand up straight in years. The kids keep coming.

    2. I wonder what church she goes to, and if her dour appearance is worth the Man’O-gid’s praise. 🙁

    3. Does she wear shoes?

      Honestly, the fundy notion of women as baby factories is so pre-1900s.

      My Grandpa was one of 13 children. His generation was the first one in which nearly all of the children born actually lived to have kids of their own.

      Today, infant mortality is low enough we don’t have to multiply excessively to have progeny.

        1. My wife wears flats. It isn’t as hard on the feet for her.

          Well, we did have 4 children. The last two were not as planned as the first two, but we are glad to have them! But we did NOT want any more after that. We had friends who were going for #6. They had 5 boys and the mother was desperate to try for a girl. Unfortunately we moved before we ever found out what she had.

  26. I wish I had a pair of culottes like Joan Hackett wore in “Support Your Local Sheriff”. Of course they may not look as good on me as they did on her.

  27. I swear somebody in the fashion world has to be punking the general public. Even the “trendy” culottes are fugly. :s

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