Men’s fashion is dreadfully boring, but one thing we used to have was a profusion and proliferation of different hats we could wear.

I know the m’lady meme and mall ninjas have forever cursed the fedora (as well as the actually, that’s a trilby crowd), but those memes postdate the decline of the hat by several decades.

Currently, we only have baseball caps and beanies in common circulation, with impractical-for-sidewalk-use cowboy hats being the only extant outlier.

Does anyone long for the return of the hat and/or have any insight into what caused their decline?

  • Hildegard (she/her)@lemmy.blahaj.zone
    81·
    17 hours ago

    Cars. Blame cars for the lack of hats.

    The car has a roof and climate control. Hats are much less needed for staying comfortable when moving around outside if you’re taking a car.

    Any type of hat that has a brim on the back cannot be worn in a car with headrests. Many cars lack the headroom for tall hats. You have to remove your hat to get in the car. Its enough of an inconvenience to cause its decline.

    The one kind of brimmed hat that is common today is the baseball hat. The brim is only in the front; the hat isn’t tall. You can just wear it in the car without thinking about it like most other garments.

    So unless you’re content being the “hat guy,” (you can definitely make the hat work) your only option is to abolish the automobile as the primary mode of transport. Good luck!