Cross dressing

[Kidnapped]

Hmmm - the shift of tone in this conversation is quite surprising to me. In the beginning this thread was all about "how interesting is it to cross dress".

And somewhere in the middle this turned into a declaration of freeing yourself from society's expectations, even suppression of what you are supposed to wear as a man.

Personally I find exactly playing with society's expectations to be the interesting part. I mean... just imagine what would happen if the utopia some of the participants in this discussion would come true: Imagine all attire was unisex and no one would care what you wore. Well... 

On 3/24/2021 at 4:58 PM, paul2809 said:

.. formal dresses, nice long wigs, make up, stockings, heels, all while wearing furs or sensous burlesque feather boas going out for a night with some one....

...would be nothing special anymore for a man. It would be no exciting adventure, nothing you needed to be brave to do... it would be... well... without meaning. Just another man wearing something something. 

What a boring world that would be...

[Worker 11811]

I like the idea of men wearing women's clothing (or, maybe better said, "non-traditional" clothing) when it's done well because it's different.  As you hinted, variety is the spice of life.  Yes, it would be boring if everybody wore the same thing.  I can't imagine myself wearing a dress but, if the time and the place and the circumstance was right, I wouldn't rule it out, either.  It would have to be the right clothes that fit me, fit my personal style and look good.  I don't know what clothes those would be or what the time and circumstance would be but, as they say, you never know.

Look at Monty Python... Men dressed up as the "pepper pot" women.  They did it for practical reasons at the beginning.  There weren't any women to play the parts but they went with the comedy bits, despite.  Dammit!  They were funny!  They were so funny that you almost forget that they are men wearing dresses.

What about Le Cage aux Folles?  That show ran for four years on Broadway and was revived more than ten times in different cities.  It's been a long time since I've seen it (in movies) but I remember being amazed at how good the performers looked.

In my town, there is a group of men who cross-dress and advocate for a person's right to dress as they want.  They have meet-ups and sponsor public events where men are encouraged to go out in public wearing non-traditional clothing.  (Women's dresses.)  They go to movies, restaurants and coffee shops together, as a group.  I've seen some of them and met them, dressed in both men's and women's clothing.  You wouldn't know the difference.

By saying, "you wouldn't know the difference," I don't mean that they could pass as being actual women.  I mean that they just look like people.  The first time I saw them, I was kind of shocked but mostly confused.  You don't see people doing things like this, very often.  It takes time to get used to the idea.  Then, when you look again, they actually look pretty good!  After that, it's just... normal.

When I was growing up, I lived in a dysfunctional family.  There was alcoholism and lots of other stuff.  My father was a bigot, a racist, a womanizer and other things that I don't want to talk about.  Most of the other adults in my life were narrow minded and bigoted, too.  I took on a lot of those traits, too.  When I went away to college, I started to see what the world was really like and, as I grow older, I am learning that most of the things I grew up with are utter bullshit.

Like you, I kind of enjoy giving the proverbial finger to all those narrow minded people in my past and I don't hesitate to call bullshit on bigotry and bullying.

How does the proverb go?...  "A man's right to swing his arms ends at the tip of the next man's nose."