I hadn’t planned on writing about this topic, but it was the perfect opportunity for trying out the TrackBack feature so new to me. Jimbo wrote about his experience in a Texas country bar and described himself as metrosexual.

According to the Word Spy notes:

A metrosexual is a clotheshorse wrapped around a dandy fused with a narcissist.

Really, the last time I encountered the word dandy outside of Yankee Doodle was in a historical romance novel I read in high school. It was in the same paragraph as words like mincing, fop, tights, pastel, and lace. This was not a description of the hero, mind you, but of the young men who paled in comparison to the darker, more virile, more masculine, more intimidating alpha male character that was the hero.

So now, even though the definition really has nothing to do with the 18th century mincing fop, I hear the word metrosexual and see the poor dandy covered in pastel and lace.

But that can’t be right, can it? Is the metrosexual today the equivalent of the tights-wearing fop of yesterday?

Then I thought about The Beatles. The 40th anniversary of their American invasion is coming up, and their faces are once again plastered all over the media. They looked so cute and clean-cut in their suits, their hair just barely covering their eyebrows and ears and skirting the backs of their necks.

Parents back then disapproved of The Beatles and criticized their long hair and their wild “that’s not music!” music, but The Beatles are such a far cry from rockers today, who have much longer hair and much wilder “that’s not music!” music. How can the two be the same?

Then I realized that it’s all relative. As soon as the Beatles hair became acceptable, rockers had to have longer hair to be seen as wild and rebellious. They are still called long-haired rockers, just like the Beatles were; they are simply flashier, grungier, and louder, and they have longer hair.

So… could I say the same of fops and metrosexuals—that the metrosexual is really only the descendant of the fop? And if so, does that mean Texas cowboys are the darker, more virile, more masculine, more intimidating alpha male types? (Good God, I hope not, because that would mean George W. Bush would make the ideal romance novel hero, and the guy does absolutely nothing for me except make me frigid.)

My conclusion?

I think if Jimbo is hiding pinker pastels, tighter tights, and a bigger, frillier lace collar in his closet, then yes, maybe so. But after seeing South Park‘s episode on the subject, I am more inclined to believe that a metrosexual is nothing more than a successful male graduate of Queer Eye for the Straight Guy.

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