Comment|Commenting on the costume fashion for the castle parties is strongly gendered, but it is also a good thing, writes Hilla Körkkö.
Finns are a rare people when it comes to dressing.
If it seems that a member of parliament is violating the etiquette of the parliamentary session hall, it will be reported easily.
If fashion is talked about in an unusual context, Finns notice. For example, when Helsingin Sanomat toldthat the spouse of the president of the republic Suzanne Innes-Stubb had chosen to wear a shirt for the state visit to China, in which a strong message for the Ukrainians was hidden, there was an uproar in the comment field.
Instead of clothes and fashion, only “important things” should have been discussed.
Soon In Finland, the country’s biggest party fashion event is celebrated, Linna’s party, where important things, people and fashion dance together.
It is a difficult place for many.
“I would hope that that look would start from what is done and the contents of politics. When this politics is not a beauty industry”, MP Saara-Sofia Sirén (kok) comment Helsingin Sanomat in 2018 about the focus on the appearance of the castle’s celebrations and the celebration-related grooming of women’s appearance.
Although fashion is different from the “beauty industry”, Sirén’s comment is understandable and humane.
Invited guests to the castle party cannot decide how the media and the public will react to their appearance. In addition, the commentary is blatantly sexist.
”
Fashion is political.
Why the media then comment on the costumes of the invited guests?
First of all, because Finnish fashion, craftsmanship, textile industry and innovations deserve visibility elsewhere than in the international showcase offered by the spouse of the president of the republic.
And also because fashion is socially relevant. Even if the sweater of the president’s spouse does not become a form of diplomacy comparable to the Chinese pandas, the idea of clothing as a political or social symbol dates back to ancient civilizations to the present day.
In the Roman Empire, the use of the toga was limited to the right of free men.
Former and future President of the United States Donald Trump typically appears in the colors of the American flag, blue suit, white shirt and red tie. President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyi often wears an army green shirt.
Donald Trump wears the colors of the American flag.
Fashion is political, and as in the parliamentary session hall, it is also regulated by etiquette in the Presidential Palace.
Although everyone in Finland has the right to dress according to their perceived gender, formal dress fashion regulated by etiquette is strongly gendered. It particularly strictly regulates the dress of those who identify as men. Women have more freedoms, and that’s partly why party dress fashion has been seen as a women’s thing in modern times.
The fashion editor of The New York Times newspaper by Vanessa Friedman according to fashion has been used as a tool to belittle women by associating them with superficiality and trivial topics instead of “important things”.
That’s why, according to Friedman, it’s important that fashion and talk about fashion follow women to high administrative positions as well.
They must also accompany the Castle’s celebrations. If that didn’t happen, the media would also agree to the idea that what is typically considered feminine is bullshit.