It took me a long time to understand why I disliked the negative commentary concerning Gwen Stefani's harajuku girls, the discussion of racism seemed fundamentally racist, as if the presence of harajuku girls was making a comment about all Japanese people rather than celebrating the strides in fashion made in the style district of Tokyo. It felt to me as if prejudice towards Japanese women already existed and was betrayed by a sudden violent but flippant reaction to some dancers who were not caucasian.

I'm having the same response to the discussion of the recent injured idol trend. One person interviewed commented that the bandage trend made it easier to pick up men and as a result this has been picked up online almost uniformly as an anti-feminist style. Even the feminist blogs have run with this notion despite it clearly being quite sexist, for instance if you interviewed a man on the street in London and he remarked that he wore pinstripe suits because they made him taller and women find taller men more attractive I doubt that he would be labelled as sexist. It's the idea that this is linked to bondage, that styles linked to those things are a little dubious, that women wear clothes that men like that's being responded to. This is all mixed in with the idea of exoticism, of men exoticising women of different racial backgrounds to themselves but to make that link unconsciously and carry it across the Internet in response to a style of clothing, no matter how weird, is both racist and sexist. It seems important to remember that people who really think about their clothing do so with the primary intention of looking better from the perspective of other people. If the motivation is linked to your sexuality it's not surprising and I rarely hear an argument that tackles this basic idea in a practical sense.

People should dress their bodies rather than their genders. It seems an obvious and rational statement yet it is in direct opposition to accepted behaviour.

In many countries clothing is sorted into three definite consumer categories: male, female and unisex. Most people automatically opt for clothing that fits into their gender description. They position their bodies in line with the binary categorisation that consumer culture provides. The actual shape and silhouette of their bodies is placed within that structure regardless of what it actually looks like, whether it’s actually the right shape for the clothes.

Even if a specific body would suit the clothes of the opposite gender from an aesthetic perspective, even if different clothes would accentuate masculinity or femininity more people tend to stick to the correct category. Shopping outside of those consumer definitions is regarded as subversive by those that consider it and not regarded at all by a huge number of people. There’s a tendency to listen to the bureaucracy rather than the shape of the body that you’re dressing and that is related to cultural pressure, the need to be more female or male, more in line with culture than self. Occasionally a woman who buys jeans from the men's section will pipe up about it but rarely will you hear of other instances of women buying men's clothes and the suspicion is that those women come from a culture of light cross-dressing, are backed up in this choice by their peers. Gendered departments are usually viewed as a rule rather than a guideline.

There is a better school of dress to subscribe to. People who have choice should disregard the gender categories that consumerism provides and think about their bodies, what fits them, what they look good in and most importantly the ways in which their bodies are naturally structured. People need to think about their hips, their shoulders, their thighs and chests and waists and garb themselves according to the rules of their bodies and not wider society. It’s difficult, not least because you have to see yourself and clothes and it is tough to think about what suits you as well as what you like, hard to find clothes that do both. Even more so when you’re breaking taboos. But what is this foolish gender divide that we allow society to infringe on us? I hear the refrain “Men and women are different” all the time but I’m a little more concerned with similarities, particularly those parts of our gender construction that were written centuries ago. If we’re so different why create more difference? If it’s already there we don’t need to mark it out, that happens naturally so the suggestion has to be more freedom to wear what we want, the clothes that make us more beautiful, that emphasise the strengths we have individually.

Walking around Plitivce National Park in Croatia it struck me that I could not tell the difference between German and American pensioners. They were wearing the same kinds of clothes, the style, cut, colour, functionality were the same and only when really focusing was the ability to recognise nationality apparent. Not only does that lack of difference make it clear that people construct identity through their clothes, link themselves to culture and all of its excesses and practicalities but it also seems to say something about the generational attitude toward function over appearance. British female pensioners are far more likely to wear skirts than German or American women of the same age. A loose guess would be that those particular women who wear skirts regularly grew up when they were specifically in fashion, that the skirt was always seen as a popular, attractive fashion item and moreso than in the States where trousers were more normal in the 40s and 50s. German culture has had to undergo such upheaval that a different course of cultural events seems to have led to a similar conclusion. It's clear that people in their 50s and 60s now are far less likely to wear skirts more regularly than trousers, even if they are British women because they grew up with trousers as normal, functional clothing.

Fashion represents the social and political climate of a given period. The type of garments that are worn and the presentation of sex and gender through published photograph’s exist as a result of cultural tensions. The very nature of relationships between men and women are demonstrated by the clothes that they wear.

Fashion is so clearly related to outward appearance that its association with gender is readily apparent. The construction of the body has been manipulated through the use of corsets, surgery and other methods over the last hundred years and this is particularly true for women. This construction of the feminine is presented to the observer in magazines and through the use of advertising. Primarily a masculine trait, the active observation of the other gender is becoming increasingly ambiguous, especially in relation to the sex of both observer and the observed subject. Prior to the understanding of relationships between fashion, gender, the body and the gaze must come knowledge of the clothing industry, as it now exists. There are currently two modes of fashion: Couture and Confection that contribute towards the figure of the human being. Manipulation of the body appears to take place in a similar form on analysis of these two modes.

Couture is designed and created by the fashion houses. Designer labels at the top end of the clothing market such as Chanel and Gucci turn out designs twice a year for the different seasons, Spring Summer and Autumn Winter. Both Haute Couture and the ready to wear collections are handmade and extremely expensive but the latter are mass produced and not specifically created for the individual. Couture relies on a manner of advertising, commonly exhibiting clothes through the pages of magazines, that has contributed to the emergence and increased gender ambiguity of the active gaze but more importantly it has provided a means for male fashion to gain strength thus allowing such ambiguity to grow.

While Couture has leant itself to subtly increasing gender ambiguity it is the second mode of production that has overwhelmingly changed our view of masculinity and femininity. Confection is ever present in the media. Magazines, billboard posters, the television and many other forms are used to advertise High Street clothing. Confection covers a number of different types of store; any clothes that are industrially mass produced come under the heading.

Gilles Lipovetsky recognises the obvious distinction between the two modes and cites this ‘bipolar’ system as having ‘emerged during the latter half of the nineteenth century’ (p.55). Previously clothes were made at home or by Couturier’s for those who could afford the price. The larger industrialisation of the western world allowed clothes to be produced on such a scale that they were affordable to the lower classes. This new system rewrote the face of advertising and thus magazines such as Vogue came in to existence giving designers a wider audience and allowing the female to widen her choice of garment. This, in turn, became part of the emancipation of women and has contributed towards the ambiguity that is now present in all facets of fashion. The implications of industrialisation are clear in British culture and quite positive for women. They have the choice to wear trousers and clothes that were deemed masculine in the nineteenth century. In fashion their position has equalised and, to some extent, surpassed that of men.

Women are seen, certainly on the High Street, as the target consumer of clothes. This is evident not only through the quantity of garments that are available to them but also through the presentation of shops. The majority will house the female lines on the ground floor, allowing the consumer to walk in and examine the product. Men often have to walk up or down a flight of stairs in order to access the clothes. Only a small number of shops deviate from this rule. Couture does not necessarily make this assumption because it has outgrown the attitude of the higher classes towards clothes. While the High Street caters to the worker clothes were a status symbol to those who could afford the lavish and thus many designer labels exist primarily to manufacture men’s wear. Above all this demonstrates a difference between Couture and Confection, the history behind them relating to the attitude maintained towards gender, the bias towards women is less fundamental in fashion houses.

The focus on female fashion stretches to include the various types of advertisement. There are many magazines dedicated purely to women’s fashion and fewer that provide this service to men. While Vogue has a long history that almost embraces a century, male literature on the subject has existed for little more than twenty years. Thus the opportunity for women to become the active observer and adopt this masculine trait is only now forthcoming