Bean Boots and Self Expression

I arrived in Cambridge last August a wide-eyed freshman from a beach town in southern California. I had a distinct style. It was half anti-establishment and half The Weeknd wannabe. I wore, and still predominately wear, minimal color. In fact, in the first week of college, my roommate told me my closet looked like that of a cartoon character because it was literally all white, gray, or black t-shirts. Same style choices go for my shoes, jackets, and sweatshirts. I do get a little crazy with my socks, but that’s about it.

At first, I found what east coasters wore to be comical. I chuckled when I saw my buddy show up to class in white loafers, blue shorts with pink whales on them, a white Lacoste belt, and a pink Lacoste button-down. But when winter hit, I was not prepared to deal with the preponderance of L.L. Bean Boots on my classmates’ feet.

To me, these are the ugliest shoes ever to be mass-manufactured. I was in shock when I realized people were not wearing these as an ironic statement, but actually paid a lot of money to wear glorified clogs. Anyone who wants to argue that the L.L. Bean Boot is aesthetically pleasing can contact me via email, because I am yet to find anything pleasant about the boot. The craziest aspect about the boot is that it is so universally worn. Whether you are from Alabama or Alaska, there is a 50 percent chance that, if you go to Harvard, you wear Bean boots.

I sincerely doubt that the population of Bean boot wearers at Harvard walked into a store and happened to pick out the Bean boot for its aesthetic appeal. Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure there is a contingency of Harvard students who genuinely gravitated toward these boots, but I’m also sure a sizeable amount of students went and purchased them because they're a mainstay on Ivy League campuses.

There is almost an implicit promise on the tag of Bean Boots: “If you buy us, all your Ivy League friends will think you fit in.” The boots do not lie either, as purchasing them lets everyone in the Harvard bubble know that you adhere to a certain set of confines and rules. Buying ugly shoes to fit in is no different than any other form of buying friends, like joining a final club or laughing at jokes you don’t find funny. It is just a more visible method.

But as I try to make sense of my disdain for Bean boots, I’m realizing that there is a paradox with fashion as self-expression. Clothes serve as a means to project our identity to the world; they are an extension of our personalities. It is a way to tell the world, “This is me!” without ever moving your lips. And yet, time and time again, we see people buying the same clothes as their peers. So self-expression morphs into nothing more than thoughtless conformity. But this is too simple to be the entirety of the scenario. And as much as I may want to, I refuse to fully believe my own pessimism.

When I came to college, I never thought I’d become friends with my roommate. His demeanor, mindset, and style are the polar opposite to mine. He is Biggie and I am Tupac. He is country music and I am trap music. He is Nantucket reds and pink polos, and I am Stan Smiths and gray T-shirts. I thought he was the lamest-dressed kid I’ve met, and now, I find myself marveling at the ingenuity of his outfits. At a formal event we both attended, he rocked the Nantucket reds with a sock tie, and I realized the error in my thinking.

I’ve realized that it’s arrogant of me to believe that I have the final word on self-expression. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and regardless of how certain I am that my opinion is correct, it is actually irrelevant. Irrelevant because fashion, appearance, and perception are so culturally rooted that I can’t make a fair analysis of anyone. Irrelevant because clothes do not make the man.

My attack on Bean boots may be legitimate, but it is not righteous. We all want acceptance; I should not knock people for trying to get it. Actually, I sometimes wish I could be more blatant in my search for acceptance. With time, my tastes have changed, so who’s to say others’ tastes are worse because they are different than my own? Although I doubt it, maybe one day I’ll wake up and believe that Bean boots are actually the best boot on the market. Hell, maybe one day my closet will be filled up with vibrant colors like my roommate’s. Right now, as I open up my closet, I still see predominately minimalistic colors, but if I look close enough, I can see the Nantucket Reds I got for Christmas.

Jamie C. Stewart ’18 is a philosophy concentrator in Dunster House. His column appears on alternate Tuesdays.