Some of you may remember the fashion week controversy and the minor, though entertaining, role that I played in it. Well, shortly after the whole thing, I was briefly interviewed by Toronto Life’s Bert Archer.

His article has appeared and a friend was good enough to send me some scans because I’m too lazy and indifferent to even go to the corner store to see if I’m in a major publication.

I’m not. Thank God.

I was actually surprised to hear from anyone and I did hear from a few people after this. There were emails congratulating me on my dubious bravery and strange men recognizing me at shows. At parties, pretty girls, who I didn’t know, would tell me that fashion needs my voice. It was all a bit odd. And I failed to leverage any of it into sex.

Or print.

Mr. Archer either realized that I’m just a malcontent in a suit, who doesn’t have anything to do with anything, or he figured out that I don’t make good copy. So he did his job well there. I also approve of his portrayal of Ms. Robin Kay as a drug-sodden, manipulative cow who is tottering on the edge of being an outright sociopath. I have no idea if she is one but I like that she comes off that way. It amuses me.

So while I obviously don’t belong anywhere near Toronto Life, I like to think that calling the media lazy also hurt my cause. Mr. Archer actually proved this accusation correct by only asking one question: “Why don’t you tell me what you think and why and maybe we can go from there?”

Seriously? One question? And that question? What do I think? Could a person possibly be any more vague than that; could a question be any more insipid? I already had two posts up and a letter that said what I thought and why. He should have just read the posts. Then we could have just gone from there to nowhere.

And that, friends, is why I say the media is lazy. They are.

But, I’m even lazier. I replied with whatever came into my head and sent it off. Really, I should have been lazier and just sent him the links. If I had of been a bit smarter or a bit ballsier, I would have told him that I was “Anonymous.” Just to see what happened.

And since no one should ever be denied any of my thoughts for even a moment, even when the quality of the writing and thinking is pre-coffee, here’s what went down:

Bert: Why don’t you tell me what you think and why, and then maybe we can go from
there?

Ryan: I agreed with a lot of the original letter’s points but I thought that Robin Kay was not as much to blame as the structure itself. She may be a tyrant but that’s all something like L’Oreal Fashion Week can offer.

Things like L’Oreal Fashion Week and Scotia Bank’s Nuit Blanche are nonsense. They’re just vehicles for corporate advertisement and they have a fundamentally parasiitic relationship with the arts and fashion communities. Designers do the hard work, they make the clothes and what does L’Oreal or Scotia Bank offer? Nothing. They build tents.

Then they paste their logo over all over the place. I can see how they benefit and I can see how the media benefits (they’re lazy so all they have to do now is go to a tent) but I can’t really see how designers or artists benefit from this. I think it will hurt them.

In their most basic form, humans are a pack hunting predator and, as such, they find hierarchy very important. Even if the hierarchy is useless, they still have a need to climb it. L’Oreal fashion week creates a hierarchy — a useless one that does not even result in sales. People then act according to their nature. They attempt to climb it and, even worse, base their judgment of themselves upon their success in doing so. Everyone would like the alpha –in this instance, Robin Kay– to pat them upon the head. Those who do not get a pat, fight over the scraps. The result is that, all of a sudden, L’Oreal is dictating style. Scotia Bank is telling us what art is. Robin Kay is just a tool.

We might as well adopt a Soviet style censor.

So I supported the original letter, though I did not think it went far enough. I was, however, extremely disapointed with their decision to remain anonymous. Anonimity denies our enemies the chance to prove us right. It was cowardly and I thought the issues involved were too important to be cowardly about. If one wishes to take a stand, they should take it.

But the people who wrote that letter were afraid to do that. They were not, however, afraid to distribute the email address of everyone who signed their petition. This irritated me because they were now asking people to take risks that they were unwilling to take. There’s a stink of the general sitting in his tent while other people die for his cause. That really bothered me.

So I decided to make a bit of my own stink. I believed — and still do– that, whether it was a mistake or not, their always dubious anonymity had become completely untenable. If they wanted to retain any credibility at all, which I wish they did, they would have owned up to their words. They did not. I doubt their seriousness.

[Then I sent him a follow up email.]

And I just wanted to add that, I really do believe that art and style are a product of an individual’s ruling faculty dealing with reality. Once that ruling faculty is substituted with the voice of an alpha –or even the voice of the masses — and reality –or even the
marketplace– is substituted with an imaginary, corporate advertising scheme – it’s over. Nothing good will come of it.

I would really hate to see Toronto’s fashion community, which is just starting to become interesting, get murdered in its crib. If they’re going to sell out, they should at least get paid.

I don’t think Fashion Week pays. I think it takes.

And that was that. Never heard anything else from the chap. So some sort of good sense prevailed in the end. Now, if we could just get Robin Kay’s head on a spike and bankrupt L’Oreal, all would be well.