Melanie Sabol – Copy Editor
Fashion trends are constantly changing season to season. But keeping up with those fashion trends can be a daunting task for some and others not so much. In today’s society there are many different groups of people, but you still have to fit into that trend.
Now that we’re in college things are different. We are in that transition period of looking like teenagers to looking like adults, and for some of us that can be hard. We want to make sure that we look great in the office but we also want to look great when we go out. Both in the office and out with friends there is a pressure to look a certain way with depending on the people you are with. We feel that there is a need to impress whomever we are with.
Jen Hebert, a senior here at Southern Connecticut State University, feels that there is a pressure for us to look a certain way. “The majority sets the standards on how we should look.” Yet Hebert believes that in college there is no major pressure to look a certain way. “In high school there was a lot more pressure to look a certain way but at the university level there is no big pressure to look and act a certain way.”
“There are more people on a college campus so if you want to stand out you can,” said Hebert. “However, there is always a way that you can blend in, that’s just by dressing how others are dressing.” You can either follow the crowd or not, but more times than not there are still glares and hushed comments that are made about people not dressing the way the majority of us dress.
Bill Soss, a junior at Southern Connecticut State University, agrees with Hebert that there is a certain pressure to dress as he does. “As a college student I feel the need to hold myself up to a higher standard”, said Soss. “I feel my social life is so complicated that I have to be prepared for anything, even my sense of style.”
Though Soss says he doesn’t feel as if he gives into social pressure, he feels he cares more about how he looks physically. “Men are absolutely more concerned with their physical shape,” said Soss. Even though Soss’ outfits consist mostly of sleeve t-shirts and jeans on a regular basis, he feels that he looks his best when he is in a pastel shirt, skinny jeans, and Converse sneakers on. “My best style is preppy but depending on who I am with my style will vary,” said Soss.
So who do we really dress for? Do we dress in what makes us comfortable or do we dress for our friends? I think more often than not we are dressing for our friends and the ones that we’re around. Unless it’s that pesky 8:10 class and everyone who’s up is in sweats, we otherwise would care what we looked like.
With the pressure to fit in, the pressure to look like your peers has become more evident. I don’t see that change going away anytime soon. We have to remember that when we are dressing for the people we are around, since that’s the way it seems to be, that we don’t lose ourselves in the process. There are always ways to tweak outfits to make the cookie-cutter world we live in our own. There is no need to always fully give into the social desire to look as everyone else does.
