A few thoughts:
1. Fragrance manufacturers are big advertisers in the NYT. It is conspicuously in the NYT's interest to create enthusiasm for this utterly unnecessary and really expensive product.
2. Who's buying this stuff for kids? Their mother? Is this part of the inane female activity of dumping time and money into the most superficial ways of endeavoring to make their kids better than other people's kids?
3. Are there any fathers in the picture, you may ask. Yes, we hear about 2 boys, ages 12 and 10, who "use their father’s collection of more than 70 colognes to create 'scent of the day' videos for a parent-run account on TikTok." How much money do the parents make off the children's work? Are the children scripted? Are their interests protected? The NYT says nothing about that but just seems delighted that these boys say things like "This has notes of vanilla, caramel and tonka" — as if the boys had discovered this on their own and out of genuine intereset.
4. If any young kid really is interested in fragrance and sets about researching and learning the terminology and developing a sophisticated sense of smell and appreciation for artistic packaging, that fine, but the NYT is not showing us anyone like that.
5. It's good that young boys feel an urge to become more sophisticated and mature, but let's think more deeply about how he becomes a good man.
6. Most people don't want to smell other people's perfume. Imagine a classroom of 14-year-olds who are all competing at the olfactory level.
7. Are you getting ready to write a comment that uses the word "grooming"?
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63 comments:
50s cartoon, one kid to another.
"It's good. It tastes like worms."
Not grooming; more like idiotic rich kid behavior.
What is wrong with these parents? I’d bet Big Money that 90% of the parents are libs.
Kant's theory of aesthetics was based on disgust, which is what he ran into when he ran out of ideas and was disgusted by anything without a theory.
One more step along the path to Societal Hell.
"this utterly unnecessary and really expensive product"
Truer words were never written by Ann Althouse.
Most men using cologne went out of fashion 30 years ago. Dave is right.
At 14 my grandsons (now 24 & 20) were always more interested in the smell of perspiration generated by lifting weights and playing LAX. Of course, they didn't have TikTok and their only "sleepovers" were associated with camping trips.
Cologne is for babies. Molton Brown Bath and Shower Gel is what high schoolers wear…
Speaking of grooming, Megan Hunt is a Nebraska state Senator. She has a daughter, who at one time, thought she wanted to become a boy. A conservative group called her a groomer on Twitter. Hunt sued them for libel. Hunt lost on First Amendment grounds. What was interesting to me was that her so-called lawyer said that calling someone a “groomer” was libel per se because grooming was supposedly a crime. Well, it isn’t although there is a reference to grooming in the statutes governing schools.
Nebraska passed a law against sex changes for minors. You may recall the meltdown on the Unicameral floor by one Dem state Senator over this.
What is super interesting to me is that Hunt’s daughter has apparently changed her mind about the sex change. But no admission of error by Senator Hunt.
“ 6. Most people don't want to smell other people's perfume. ”
POTUS exceptionalism
Great anLysis, as usual. You’re most vital point is #5.
Boys have always been eager to become men. But they have to be taught; if they’re left to figure it out for themselves, they’ll do dumb things like talk about the smokey scent of expensive french perfume in a bottle shaped like a porn star’s junk. But for generations, we have systematically undermined men, denigrated the process of making men, eliminated all cultural markers of transition from boyhood to manhood.
So we get this. We blame the mothers because they indulge it, but that’s only because they are thrown into a job they aren’t equipped for—being the father.
Meades Grooming Advice For Young People
Lesson #23: take a 3 min. cold shower morning,noon and night.
Axe products were the rage when my boys were in school. Axe claims to be a male grooming product. Fwiw.
Minor teenage fad. They will get over it. Everybody calm down.
Lesson #24: if there is a guy or gal you like who you hope will like you, 1. ask her for a study date, preferably at her house, when her mom and/or dad will be home. 2. Take a thorough 3 min. cold shower, apply no product whatsoever, put on absolutely clean clothes. 3. Run or bike to her house 10-15 min. at a high enough intensity to break a sweat. 4. show up exactly on time. 5. Smile, be cheerful and friendly towards her family members. 6. Study well enough to get an A on the exam. 7. PROFIT!!!
Part and parcel of the Progressive Ethos of destroying the Natural Order: turning men into women and women into men.
I wonder how many of the kids and families with dozens of fragrances at their home believe in global warming and blame the oil industry?
It takes one second on Google to find out that this NYT is utter junk and horrendous journalism.
The mother of the boy in the lede is a social media influencer—abbythebadassmom—with 59 thousand followers. Go here whose Instagram account revolves around cosmetics and, yes, perfumes and colognes. It contains links to press-related events.
The story is a total lazy scam.
There is no trend.
It's just one mother who has made her son think he should like this junk whose promotion she benefits from.
This is something the reporter had to have known about.
To follow up on my above post, the NYT is filled with useless, silly stories like this. Page after page, section after section, story after story about celebrities, fancy food, fancy houses, fancy fashion, and fancy travel.
No one edited that article. No one there asked the reporter any questions.
You have probably never ridden a band bus after the freshman boys discover the allure of Drakkar Noir and Nautica. Yes, it was that bad. Worse, actually. In our age it was a mix of Jade East, Brut, and Hai Karate.
In select venues, anosmia is a blessing. This will pass with maturity, like the scent.
Looking at my clothes drawer top via the Way Back Machine to 1967 I spy English Leather, British Sterling, Jade East, and a few others. All of them gone by early 1968 for a incense and Jamaican bud olfactory vibe for the hippie chicks...
Old Spice original or die
More wholesome than p0rn or drugs.
Also, you can't really learn about something that requires smell from TikTok (yet).
"I could have been a fragrance millionaire, Jerry!"
Ever have a group of 11-12 year old boys on a sleepover? The only fragrances they are obsessed with are farts.
Howard said...
“Old Spice original or die“
Sure. Especially if you want your grandma to find you attractive.
I remember when the girls wore Tabu and the boys wore Canoe (pronounced CAH-new-ay).
Meade's Lesson #24 is brilliant.
At that age I think we all had our requisite bottles of English Leather or British Sterling.
I didn't think men still wore colognes. I wondered how the companies kept going. I see now it's the yoots keeping the system working.
Living in Florida, in the summer heat and humidity, the last thing I'm thinking about is a fine perfumed scent wafting around me. It's hard enough to breathe when it's 96 with full Florida humidity. No reason to add gagging to the day.
@Temujin - yep.
Meade said...
Lesson #24... 3. Run or bike to her house 10-15 min. at a high enough intensity to break a sweat.
Ann Althouse said...
Meade's Lesson #24 is brilliant.
Let the pheromones do the talkin'?
Stupid fad, but teenaged girls are, if anything, worse. We have 5 grandsons, now from about 14-22. #2, now 20, back when he was maybe 16, was really into colognes. Grandma (my partner) loved the scents. Luckily, she didn’t pick it up herself, or we wouldn’t still be together. In any case, Army Boot Camp pretty much cured him. He’s now old enough to seriously lift weights, and is filling out extremely well. My 46” sport coats (too big for me now) are getting tight on him. Definitely comes from his mother’s side - both his mother’s father and maternal uncle and grandfather were big and well built. Girls his age seem to prefer that to fancy colognes. His older brother is almost as big.
I am 68 and I have never worn cologne even once in my life. I don't know if that places me in the majority or in the minority of my gender/age cohort.
Meade's Lesson #24 is brilliant…3. Run or bike to her house 10-15 min. at a high enough intensity to break a sweat
So this was revelation to me fairly late in life. I was taught the pheromones of a person just stepping out of the shower was what was the attractor. Breaking a sweat brings out the offensive bacteria, or so say the experts that probably never kissed a girl. The women in my life say there’s more to it than that. They say this sitting court side at the basketball game close enough to the fellas to smell the sweat and Ben Gay but that was just a part of it. The whole…experience- the women really really liked that. Really…
I watch youtube videos - and also amazon prime stuff. Now with ads!
I see a ton of ads for Old Spice products. (soaps, aftershave, fragrance products)
The other day I was at a regular grocery store, and I happened to glace down the aisle with all the personal care products. There were three young men holding an old spice product taking turns giving it a whiff.
hmmm - ads must work, I thought.
Thanks Mr. O. Possum for doing a little digging for us.
Another story that isn't what it seems. Yet, we keep reading them, and they keep fooling us.
"OO7"
Smelled OK, tasted bad.
Don't ask me how I know.
I haven't used any scent, not even aftershave, since about 1972.
When I am out and about and smell a strong cologne scent, it's almost invariably wafting off a black guy.
I can't help but hear the boys talking in Bobby Hill's voice, from King of the Hill.
"hmmm - ads must work, I thought."
Indeed. That's why so much money is paid to produce and promulgate ads.
Many years ago when I was in kindergarten or first grade school overcrowding was an issue (I'm a baby boomer) and we had "split sessions" for the lowest grades. I was in the session that included lunch, so every day we kids brought sandwiches from home that we ate in our classroom. After a couple of weeks my teacher gave us a note to bring home. I didn't know what was in it, so I was nervous when I gave it to my mom. Upon reading the note, mom started to laugh. The note was a plea to not give us salami sandwiches because our teacher couldn't stand the aroma of a couple of dozen salami sandwiches that permeated the classroom on a regular basis.
Ann Althouse said...
“Meade's Lesson #24 is brilliant.“
Thanks. You’re pretty brilliant too.
I wore fragrance back in the late '80s and '90s. I dunno, I like it and it was a time when Esquire was still kind of an admirable magazine and Drakkar and Cool Water were what we semi-sophisticated young males were into. Trouble is, as with any scent, you become nose-blind to it. I have a bottle of Aqua Velva and put some on every now and then just to breathe in the nostalgic scent of the Real Men from my youth. I also use a cheap Gillette after shave because the scent reminds me of. . . .not sure what. Summers back in Wisconsin maybe.
I read once that our sense of smell is the most powerful at bringing back memories. Seems true.
For some reason, I love the smell of the old perfume 'Charlie'.
At 14 we were just trying to figure out how to cop a feel at the movies.
JFC our society has devolved.
Like with wine, all those descriptions are just bullshit pulled out of asses. What in hell does "evokes the back roads" taste like? I live here, I'll tell you, dirt.
Watching "Bottle Shock" should provide proof. It's about a double blind taste test with almost all the judges being of those snobs that use the effete descriptions for wines. The "low class" California wines swept the challenge despite the prevailing attitudes. In a second test (an attempt to redeem European wines) the same thing happened.
The descriptive language for both wine and perfume is just pompous preening and, as others have said, advertising PR. Anyone falling for it in either arena is gullible.
Robert Cook:
I am 68 and I have never worn cologne even once in my life. I don't know if that places me in the majority or in the minority of my gender/age cohort.
Minority, I suspect. I'm a little older but in that cadre as well.
Longtime commenters may sense olfactory envy
I have a 15 year old son, he and friends have been into fragrances for the last couple years and they don't read the NY Times. Axe body spray has been uncool for a long time.
Blogger Meade said...
Howard said...
“Old Spice original or die“
Sure. Especially if you want your grandma to find you attractive.
5/20/24, 7:44 AM
"Old Spice was launched as Early American Old Spice by William Lightfoot Schultz's soap and toiletries company, Shulton Inc., in 1937. It was first targeted to women, with the men's product being released before Christmas at the end of 1937."
Come on, man. What self-respecting Boomer doesn't have a spritzer of this in the back of the cabinet.
14 year olds? I remember 7th grade (1978-79) and the girls discovering perfume. We had the classroom windows open in January in Michigan, and that was a cold snowy winter.
My God, I agree with Howard. Old Spice original.
Now if you want to smell like a real man I suggest a layered mix of sweat, parts cleaner, and Lava/Zep, known as Frustrated Mechanic.
I'm not particularly upset about 14 year old boys wanting to try out fragrances. Though I think parents need to steer their children away from the $300 a bottle ones to ones that are reasonably more affordable. 11 year old boys however seems a bit too young. Speaking of advertising to children I recently saw a video about young girls (around 10 or 11) going to Sephora to try out skin care products. The premise of the video was about how these girls trash the samples and create 'experiments,' but buried in it was talk about how a lot of these girls seemed to get the idea about skin care routines and the products from social media influencers, particularly on Tik-Tok. Apparently the girls really care about a brand called Drunken Elephant.
Blogger Meade said...
Lesson #24
Feats of strength like lifting a heavy object or opening a tightly sealed jar of pickles can help too.
Pickle jars:
1 Remember to remove the plastic strip around the top of the har.
2 When all else fails tap a hole in the top of the lid to break the vacuum. Remember to cover the hole with a piece of strapping tape when closing the jar again.
rehajm,
"I was taught the pheromones of a person just stepping out of the shower was what was the attractor."
Whoa! What evil, misanthropic person *taught* you that? Upon stepping out of a shower, you've washed off all this scents, good and bad, all the ready pheromones, End of basically starting over from scratch. That's what the short bike ride is for.
Le Male is some gross shit.
As a guy who used Aramis in the 1980s, and have several colognes gifted me by my son stored in the guest bath medicine cabinet for one and all to use, I stand here in my glass house, just admiring the view. Not even thinking of bending over, let alone picking up a stone to throw.
The Vault Dweller said...
Blogger Meade said...
Lesson #24
Feats of strength like lifting a heavy object or opening a tightly sealed jar of pickles can help too.
That’s covered in Volume III, which is exclusively for 18 year-olds up to 118 year-olds. After 118, there are no rules.
I do have one bottle of scent the name of which I do not recall (I received it as a gift). The only thing I use it for is to add a bit of scent to my handkerchief, and the only reason I do that is so I can hold my handkerchief delicately over my nose to mask environmental smells that are particularly offensive.
My limited interest in perfume aside, there are worse things young boys could be into than learning about and sampling perfumes. Probably not especially widespread, but I vaguely recall some of my classmates talking about body sprays and scents when I was a young teenager. So perhaps it is a thing -- boys with the wet earwax gene will really start to stink as they go through puberty, so it makes sense they would become more conscious of scents around that time.
Pickle jar:
Run hot water across the lid heating the air inside and removing the vacuum.
If that doesn't work, someone cranked it down on purpose.
Blogger Oligonicella said...
Pickle jar:
Run hot water across the lid heating the air inside and removing the vacuum.
Is that how it works? I thought the heat caused the metal lid to expand slightly and thus loosen it up a bit.
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