Although I learned during week one that they were not mandated by the company dress code, I continued wearing neckties to my new job until week three: mostly because, for yours truly, the image of me in a necktie was as novel a sight as a gorilla in a shopping mall reading Anna Karenina. The novelty has since lost its affect – like similes with gorillas or puns on the word “novel” – and with summer fast approaching (let’s hope Greenland doesn’t start thawing again), only the hipsterest hipster could bear wearing a sweat-slopped business-noose for the sake of ironic self-parody.
The lesser reason that I kept wearing ties was as a social experiment: do people treat necktie-wearers differently? I discovered that the courtesies and hostilities of everyday urban social interaction remain: what changes is who exchanges what.
For example, in my non-work attire, I accidentally happened upon Chevy's: a menswear shop on 86th Street
in Gravesend. The moment I entered, the owner, sitting behind the counter,
asked, with a very subtle enmity:
“Can I help you?”
“Can I help you?”
I responded “just browsing!” and began perusing his wares.
Much of it was Italian-made, which meant, to my own paranoid, left-wing head, that I could
buy something and not fear that it came from a sweatshop.
As I walked to the back of the store, the owner rose and
began sneaking quick glances at me, strongly resembling nervous butler with a peasant in
his midst. I felt self-conscious and unwelcome. When I approached a rack of
neatly-hung jeans, the contempt he held for my class and kind became clear:
“Those jeans cost $135. Is that a problem?”
Such a question can only be asked to humiliate. “No,” I
lied, “that’s not a problem,” but I nevertheless considered buying a pair just
to best him. I smiled savagely and asked if he carried the jeans in a size 29.
“I don’t,” said the sallow, class-prejudiced, pathetic little fuck.
“I don’t,” said the sallow, class-prejudiced, pathetic little fuck.
“That,” said I, Shakespearean, triumphant, “is a problem,” and I left, mouth
puckered inward, teeth clenched tighter than a streetfighter’s fist.
Blatant classism is bad enough, but I was more disturbed by how my peers, or those whom I would regard as such, treated me when I wore a tie. In the subway, my
fellow countercultural twentysomethings, with their piercings, thrift-store clothing and
chunky headphones blasting almost loud enough to drown-out their student
loan anxieties, no longer looked at me with an acknowledgement of <DROOG> in
their eyes. No matter what your actual job entails (I would consider my line
pro-social), no matter how much David Graber or Michel Foucault you’ve read, and no matter that
you’ve listened to every song on Sandinista! at least twice,
a necktie immediately makes you The Man.
The absolute worst, however, was the socially-engineered, resentful obsequiousness of the very poor; the exaggerated nicities that we assume we should bestow on those of high rank. Having that directed at me was the straw that broke this camel's heart.
Thus lay a mess of neckties on my dresser table, gathering the same dust that all things, splendid and decrepit, generally do.
