I met a parent recently that would not allow her son to wear a hoodie. She said “hoodies for boys are a bad idea”. She felt they promoted a negative attitude and even worse, rebellion. “Only criminal types put them on” she said. I didn’t agree needless to say, because I had worn them for a long time and don’t consider myself to be a “criminal type.”
I did however recently read a British news article where a certain style of hoodie was going to be banned. It was a faceless hoodie, one which could be zipped around completely cover the wearer’s face. It even had two transparent elliptical plastic eyes to check through! Security forces felt it had been sinister and allowed wearers to completely conceal their identity. I must admit it was pretty wicked looking and reminded me of someone wearing a gas mask or a full-bodied hazmat suit. It had been camo colored and I just knew the wearer had a concealed assault rifle somewhere!
This got me thinking about hoodies in general. I mean, why are they frequently associated with criminal behavior now days. It didn’t was previously that way. Didn’t people from all backgrounds just put them on to be casual and stay warm concurrently. When I was a youngster we just called them sweat shirts with hoods and you either wore a pullover or one that zipped up. I thought the pockets were what made them cool, one big one over the front you could lock your cold hands in. They even annoyed me sometimes when I’d lose the neck string inside the sweat shirt also it would take me hours to get it back!
I was thinking about all of the famous or notorious personalities through history who wore hoodies. There is medieval monks, they wore sort ‘a corny looking dark pullover with hoods. And during the same time the average European peasant wore a hoodie like coat or blanket, right? Think about Robin Hood? There was Little Red Riding Hood. spider hoodie and Snow White herself. Needless to say so did the wicked queen when she was a witch. Actually many witches ware hoodies! What about Shrek… and Rocky? There is really a couple or hero types that wore a hoodies (and a beanie in Rocky’s case). What I’m saying is just about every stereotype can be found wearing a hoodie at some time and time. Even the Mexican Serape would have a hood onto it if Sombreros weren’t so cool!
The point is that hoodies are for everyone even for boys, plus they don’t make anybody good or bad. We do that ourselves with or minus the hoodie. Hoodies can be made with certain colors combinations or logos to identify the wearer with a certain lifestyle or group of people and maybe that’s were one needs to use a little discernment or good sense but after that I think it just boils down to they are comfortable, convenient and down right practical. So in the end I will continue to wear my hoodie and hopefully it generally does not upset anyone.