For those of you who do not as yet know me, my name is Anastasia and I am reporting to you live from U.S.(alt). In the third part of my series (see Part I and Part II here), I will explore the subject of: FashionIt has been said that fashion is but a reflection of a culture and of it’s evolution (or devolution) in a given society, and a translation into fabric of what designers perceive as the wants, needs and tastes of the public they serve. To understand how the fashion trends in the U.S.(alt) of today came about, we have to go back to yesteryear, to the times before Purification Day. As you may recall, in those days, special interest groups were virtually running Congress(alt). One of the most ‘successful’ of these groups was the NRA(alt), which not only made it a point to block any legislation to control gun violence, they pushed through (read: financed) the enactment of new laws which effectively overrode or repealed any and all restrictions on gun ownership, making it possible for anyone, at any age, to buy as many weapons as they wanted. The motto, “The only one who can stop a bad man with a gun, is a good man with a gun”, was replaced with, “The only good man, is a man with a gun”, implying that anyone who didn’t own a gun was likely up to no good. In fact, owning a gun was touted as proof of goodwill towards one’s fellow man. In churches, that part of the mass which previously called for shaking hands, was changed; parishioners now clinked guns instead, crossing muzzles like swords. There were a few unfortunate incidences of heads being accidentally blown off, as one or the other of the ‘clinkers’ forgot to put the safety on and, caught up in their fervor of showing amity, squeezed the trigger just a wee bit too much. Guns became available for purchase everywhere, even in drug stores, which stocked these, conveniently, right next to shelves with bandages, gauze, wound disinfectants, antibiotics and, of course, something very potent to kill the pain, allowing survivors of gunshot wounds to trip and smile through their subsequent ordeal. The NRA(alt), by this time on a roll and virtually unstoppable, made an unholy alliance with a little known pharmaceutical company, whose already less than stellar reputation, was further beleaguered by a Justice Department(alt) investigation into their questionable business practices and inhumane treatment of laboratory animals. In return for a cut of profits from drug sales, the NRA(alt)first had the J.D.(alt) investigation quashed, and then managed to declassify the said pharmaceutical company’s powerful pain killer, aptly called ‘Blaid’ (short for Bullet-Aid), so that it no longer required a prescription for purchase but instead, could be sold over the counter. The design of semi-automatic assault rifles, particularly popular among citizens hell-bent on visibly demonstrating their goodness, was improved, allowing users to upgrade these to ‘full automatic’ by the simple flip of a switch. This, of course, increased the weapon’s rate of fire or RPM (rounds per minute) so naturally, large capacity magazines had to be made even larger. Unfortunately, material cooling remained a problem. Many hospital E.R.’s reported a marked increase in incidences of ‘trigger finger burn’ due to rifles overheating. Overheating also caused a phenomenon called ‘cook-off’ where ammunition was discharged from a rifle unintentionally. In instances where this resulted in someone being wounded or killed, the alleged shooters used the, “It wasn’t me, it was the gun” defense, invariably availing themselves of free legal services provided by the NRA(alt). A well-know company, already one of the leading retailers of weapons in the country, opened a new chain of stores called Walguns(alt). To the charge that owners of this behemoth of a company were enriching themselves at the expense of public safety, and therefore had the blood of victims on their hands, a spokesman for the family countered with the well-worn mantra that “Guns don’t kill people, people kill people” and that was that.
These days we want to be seen, and in technicolor! The key word in the fashion of today is visibility, celebrating the return of sanity and of safety and of the idea that the most important right any of us have, before all else, is the right to live!
Next time, the subject will be tourism. Till then, this has been,A. J. Aston Reporting to you live from the United States(alt)Article first published as An Alternate Reality United States, Part III: Fashion on Blogcritics.