219: P.J. O’Rourke and John Hughes: How to Tell a Homo

from “National Lampoon” February 1980

Ah, the trends of yesteryear. Side parting in the hair, moustache, plaid shirt, straight leg jean, web belt - no, I don't think we shall ever see that look come back. Of course the jeans really ought to be tight Levis, but this particular illustration makes it look much more like a standard fashion plate and less conspicuously sexual. The joke behind all this is that at the end of the ‘70s male sexual identity is all screwed up. That homosexuals are now appropriating the fashions natural to a rugged manly lifestyle is even more ridiculous when the typical manly men of the 1970s have become more sensitive and therefore almost indistinguishable from “homos”. And yes, again, P.J. O'Rourke and John Hughes are still quite happy to throw around the word "homo".