The Girdle, Ugh

We've worn girdles before, and we didn't like them. We sat here, bored, watching television, and wondering who the hell came up with the idea of sucking in a woman's curves in such a restricting, painful way? We think that it had to be a man, because certainly no woman would want to have her guts squeezed and pushed all this way and that.

We decided to do some research. We found out that the whole mess started with corsets, and probably in ancient Greece. According to WikiPedia, "A corset is a garment that girds the torso and shapes it according to the fashionable silhouette of the day." 

We guess that some man told his wife that he liked the way another woman's curves worked, so  she decided to get the same look. We see that all the time in our culture, everyone wants Angelina's lips and J-Lo's (or Kim Kardashian's) butt. So, monkey-see, monkey-do is kind of understandable in this age of keeping up with the Joneses, so it stands to reason that they'd be like-minded back in the day.

Originally, corsets were made from cotton sateen and twill, and laced up the back, then they moved to putting bone in them, largely whale bone, to maintain that beautiful hourglass shape. Corsets have become a fashion statement these days, and women are wearing them as parts of their outfits (not to mention those folks who wear the pretty latex ones and get to beat people for a living. Did we just type that outloud?)

But, the girdle. Where did that come from?

The word girdle originally meant belt, worn around the midsection. They were hugely popular in the 1900's and were made from rubber or elasticized fabric. The had hook and eye closures. Today they're made from powerful elastic and can be pulled on, zipped up or closed with hooks and eyes. We women are even blessed with "power panties," girdles that can be pulled on and worn like underwear.

But why do we wear them?

Well, we wear them to hide our flaws and suck all our fluffiness into someone else's preconceived idea of the perfect shape. We wear them to look like someone else. We wear them so that we can fulfill someone else's expectations of what we should look like.

Personally, we think girdles bunk. We shouldn't be ashamed of our figures, we should be proud of them. Ladies, there is no "perfect" shape. We are who we are and we definitely shouldn't be afraid to be us. (Heck, we don't even wear slips, what are they going to see? Legs?)

Mark this one down as a "no" for us, even of Oprah does swear by Spanx.