Carol’s Column

Men's lib could start with a little chiffon

I CANNOT bear to watch such suffering I thought to myself as I watched my husband fit his size 42-sport-with-extra-long-arms into a pair of tailored tight pin-stripe pants and a high-collared blue silk shirt with underarm vents for summer-time breathing. Slowly, agonisingly, he wrapped his tie around his neck and executed a modish half-Windsor knot.

Then came the finale. Resignedly, he pulled on his matching double-breasted jacket and patted his errant hairs into shape.

In the heat he looked not unlike a bursting Christmas cracker before it's been popped.

Crazy, I pondered to myself. It's all wrong that in the heat of Africa men should dress so ridiculously. Logically, men should wear skirts. If you consider the basic male design, complete with protuberances, trousers have to be the most absurd garment of clothing ever created. And the tie is even worse.

I guess one could argue that trousers perform a function in that they provide shelter and refuge for the lower body. But the tie?

My good friend Betty agreed.

"If you think about it," she said, "women should wear trousers, after all, we're far more neatly planned, and men should wear skirts."

"I've got a brilliant idea," I suggested, inspired. "We will design a special range of skirts for prominent men and then market the idea."

Betty nodded sagely.

"Some famous men already wear skirts," I added, "look at Nobel prize winner Bishop Tutu."

"Perhaps we could call it the Tutu Personality Range," murmured Betty, also inspired.

Ideas filled my head as I envisioned well-known men about town wearing outfits created especially for them. Of course, each one would have to be stamped with the personality of its wearer.

I could see P W Botha in filmy white chiffon with a gently gathered skirt, something delicate and soft with a little netting and perhaps a flower or two. Something flowing, ethereal and free to capture the spirit of reform.

Naas Botha I would put in a polka-dot mini skirt with his great, magnificent, tree trunk thighs left exposed so that they might be admired, while General Magnus Malan would look grand in a flashing sequinned puffball skirt.

For my favourite man, Clive Weil, I'd create something special.

Perhaps something fluffy with a longish skirt and ostrich feather trim, crimson and blue, to contrast with the yellow-walled and silver-trollied background of his many TV appearances.

Stunning. This could be the start of a whole new career, and, the idea could even be patented if it caught on. Why not?

"So what do you think?" I asked the kids at dinner. My spouse, looking like a Vienna sausage in mourning, had taken himself off to a formal dinner. "Don't you think your father would have felt happier and looked better in a simple, elegant A-line dress?"

"Definitely," said Barry immediately. "There's no question about it, I'd far rather wear a skirt, it's more natural."

Jamie agreed. "Trousers and ties are a health hazard," he stated categorically. "They both cause strangulation of vital parts and, if you look at the further ramifications, the population growth of South Africa is seriously threatened. It has been proved that trousered men are severely hampered. Indeed, in dire cases, they can become sterile. Nations who skirt their men, such as the Arabs, Indians and Chinese, are far more prolific breeders."

That settled it. The thought of my husband suffering and being penalised as well, was unthinkable.

Which is why, for Christmas, I've made him the most beautiful draped silk flared skirt.

I can't wait to see his face, and the rest of him, when he unwraps my little surprise.

I am also working on my personality range which could revolutionise South Africa. To use an expression currently in vogue.

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