I *Do* Need the Badges: A Brief Word on Uniforms
So how does that magic work?
By Alexa Day
I had an encounter with several members of the law enforcement and first response community a while back. I’m not going into the details here. Let’s just say I didn’t touch any of them, and we’ll leave it at that.
Anyway, while I was involved with these folks, I couldn’t help but notice that a great many of them are hot.
What? I couldn’t help it. It’s my job to notice.
The firemen were hot. The police officers were hot. Perfectly professional, of course. But undeniably hot.
I had to wonder — and I promise that I was quietly wondering this out of harm’s way — what causes that. Certainly there must be average-looking police officers and paramedics and firemen out there somewhere. I mean, it’s not UPS, where I honestly believe they only hire hot people.
Do these particular clothes make the man … sexy?
I’m not altogether sure. But I think that when the allure of the man in uniform works, it works for a particular set of reasons.
The uniform is practically designed to exploit the male body. Piping lengthens legs. Epaulets draw out shoulders. That jacket seam goes all the way down the center of a man’s back. And the belt. A policeman’s belt makes it easier to watch his hips move. (The same principle applies for a belly dancer’s belt, by the way, except that my costume belts served few other purposes.) How often do we get to watch a man’s hips move?
Not often enough, my friends. Not nearly often enough.
I also wonder if the uniform causes a man to carry himself a little differently. I once ran across a gaggle of firemen hanging out on the sidewalk near an apartment building. They were all dressed fairly casually for firemen, in their fire department T shirts and leg-lengthening pants, waiting for some of their colleagues to finish testing the alarm system. But they were still hot, even without the turnout gear. (And if anyone has a better collective noun than “gaggle” for my purposes here, I’d love to hear it. Seriously.)
A uniform also comes with a built-in grant of authority. It identifies its wearer as the person in charge. He flies the plane. He catches criminals. He saves lives. He fights evil. And right now, he pays attention to you. That’s pretty heady stuff. I think it lies at the base of the uniform fetish, just before it blooms into a healthy appreciation for smooth, soft leather, shiny buttons, sharp creases, and all those hard, unyielding angles. I think the uniform sends a clear message about who is the boss of whom.
Most importantly — and least superficially, just to prove I can do that — there’s the fact that a man has to earn a uniform. If we see him out and about in uniform, we know right away that he’s done something to set himself apart from the rest of us. He’s done something important. He’s done something you needed done. He’s done something not everyone is able to do.
And the great part is that this facet of sexiness — the admiration — translates equally to women in uniform. All the pride, all the appreciation, none of that pesky desire for inappropriate touching. Everybody wins, right?
So right now, what I’m gonna need you to do is follow Lady Smut. That’s right. Just click the button over there, and we’ll take it from here, okay?
