9) We wear each others pants in this relationship

Sure, men and women both wear pants, but the fits are completely different. Men’s pants are generally more formless and baggy, while women’s pants usually accentuate curves. Although under these generalities, clothing companies have further compartmentalized, to appeal to a wider range of consumer niches. On the Levi website alone, men can get “relaxed,” “slim,” and “bootcut” jeans. Women can get “flare,” “skinny,” and “low-rise” jeans, among others.

Nowadays, however, clothes long-established for one specific gender are being “made available” to the other. For instance, males within certain music subcultures are known to wear “girl pants.” Girls are now also being marketed to, with “boyfriend jeans.” What does this say about our societal norms for clothing? We expect men to wear their “own” clothes and women to wear their “own” clothes. But when they do go outside of these norms, it’s somehow special enough to get its own label.

This really just further proves how arbitrary the conventions of femininity and masculinity really are. If you can be feminine just from wearing girl pants, or masculine from boyfriend pants, isn’t the whole thing a charade? If you stripped away all the feminine skirts, the masculine cologne, and the now-androgynous girl and boyfriend pants, what would you have? Are these people really inherently masculine or feminine, or does it mostly stem from material possessions? What it all comes down to, in the minds of those buying the clothes, is “who do I want to be today?” Though it seems like it may be blurring the lines between the genders, fashion has just become another way to perpetuate gender stereotypes, by marketing femininity and masculinity.