Federer & Conspicuous Consumption

Jeg sidder lige og læser i et gammelt kompendie, hvor der er et kapitel fra antologien “The Sex of Things - Gender and Consumption in Historical Perspective”. Det er skrevet af David Kuchta, hedder “The Making of the Self-Made Man” og handler om perioden 1688-1832, da engelske aristokrater begyndte at gå diskret, nøjsomt klædt for at signalere rationel tankegang og mådehold sådan som oplysningstankerne fordrede. Man har vist nok tidligere troet, at maskulinititetens særlige relation til det afmålte, økonomisk velfunderede og ikke-luksuriøse (såkaldt masculine renunciation) især opstod i 1800-tallets middelklassekultur og stod i kontrast til netop pyntelystne adelige, men her viser det sig så, at idealet om manden som røvkedeligt klædt allerede begyndte at vokse frem efter en eller anden revolution i 1688, da aristokratiet fik travlt med at holde middelklassen langt væk fra magtens institutioner.

Her er et citat fra kapitlet:

“In attempting to display the modesty and sobriety that signified publicc virtue, aristocratic men created a style in direct contrast with conspicuous consumption. (…) fashion became associated with women and the lower orders, and displaying wealth was no longe requated with displaying worth: gentlemen were called on to lead the nation by setting a moral example rather than by attempting to outspend their extravagant emulators. Aristocratic men could claim social leadership in part by renouncing the world of fashion, by adopting ‘noble simplicity’.”

Ja, og så var det bare, jeg kom til at tænke på Roger Federer og hans outfit ved Wimbledon for et par år tilbage og de annoncer, hvor han optræder med sit private jetfly og alle sine trofæer, og jeg tager mig selv i, hver gang jeg ser hans totale dekadance og manglende ydmyghed, at tænke ham som totalt for meget og så samtidig smile lidt for mig selv og konstatere, måske på grund af hans majestætiske tennisspil og adfærd på banen, at han, og kun ham, på en eller anden måde kan pull it off.

Her er nogle flere citater fra kapitlet, uden nogen sammenhæng til R-Fed i øvrigt:

“Aristocratic men used the label of effeminacy to directly exclude from power all other men — lower and middle-class men, as well as men with alternative sexual practices — and to indirectly yet doubly exclude all women from power.”

“Women were excluded from political institutions both by the equation between political legitimacy and masculine renunciation and by the naturalized equation between femininity and lusxury. It was precisely this double exclusion that posed such great obstancles ot women’s claims to political participation: early feminists had to both denaturlize this feminization of fashion and degender virtue.”

“When women such as Mary Wollstonecraft and Catherine Macaulay sought to gain entry into political culture by degendering virtue, by asserting that “the cold arguments of reason … give no sex to virtue,” masculinitsts accused them of political cross-dressing, the “affectation of manliness”. By naturalizing women as the fair sex — as inherently associated with luxury, beauty, and consumption — male political writers denied women a political voice precisely because men saw women as too beautiful for words.”

Hej hej.