The Power of Fashion and The Golden Globes 2018 Red Carpet

Image from PopSugar.

Yesterday was the 75th Golden Globes, and we saw the red carpet turn into a sea of black as women and men wore black in solidarity and support of those who experience, and have spoken up about, the sexism, discrimination and harassment faced by women in the workplace.



There is a history of fashion and protest aligning, including wearing a singular colour to represent a movement or political statement. For example, the suffragette's wore purple, white and green to represent their goal to achieve voting rights for women. Even on the red carpet itself, this is not the first time fashion has been used to make a political statement. At last year's SAG awards, gowns and lapels were decorated with safety pins to show support for minorities who felt threatened by the recent U.S. election results. Ribbons to support a variety of causes have always been an accessory on the carpet - from awards shows to the Met Gala. Even yesterday saw many lapels and dresses accessorised with a black, rectangular pin displaying "TIME'S UP" in support of the recent organisation launched at the beginning of this year to speak out against the inequality and injustice in the workplace across all industries. 

Since the decision to wear black was announced in December, critics had been speculating whether the dress code will be an effective move or not. Some arguments said that wearing black will make women invisible on the carpet. However, I was all for the decision. As someone who has been watching red carpets every awards season since I was 13, I have seen that the red carpet has long had an issue with sexism. The red carpet is not inherently sexist - designers, stylists and the people they dress don't put in hours of work to be sexist. What I mean is, the media will be more interested in filling their short interview time with women attendees questions of what they are wearing and how long it took them to get ready, instead of asking deeper questions such as, what were their creative process of the roles they are nominated for? Aka, questions that their male counterparts more regularly receive. The #AskHerMore campaign in 2015  challenged reporters to move beyond asking questions purely on what women are wearing. While there has been some improvement since this movement started, reporters still haven't moved beyond the questioning the female attendees for details of their outfit.

Image from Forbes

I was excited by the concept of an all-black dress code because I felt it will take the #AskHerMore campaign one step further. If everyone is wearing the same thing, then there is more room to focus less on discussing what they are wearing but rather, why they are wearing it. However, this was not what completely happened. It is true that there was less questions about what the women were wearing, and E! (the biggest red carpet coverage) did make an effort to forego "what are you wearing?" with "why are you wearing black?", but there still wasn't much conversation around why they were wearing it. While a few women did steer their interviews into talking about why they were wearing black, and the inspiring activists they brought as their dates, a lot of interviews still didn't move past talking about their acting work. 

Despite this, yesterday's blackout at the Golden Globes was a major moment of showing the power of fashion. The decision to wear black came with a symbolic meaning and even if they weren't talking about it as much as they should have, everyone understood why the colour black was being worn. Even if the call was to wear a different colour, all women wear suits, or even showing up in jeans and a t-shirt - the statement could not have been made as strongly without fashion. Don't get me wrong, I am not diminishing the power of words. You can definitely bring up the issue with words alone. I look up to everyone who can coherently speak up about a cause they are passionate about. I am also incredibly happy to see Nicole Kidman, Reese Witherspoon, Laura Dern, Seth Myers and Oprah reminding us of why we were all wearing black and continuing the conversation. Oprah's speech had me in tears! However, considering how the rest of  interviews and acceptance speeches didn't mention the cause at all, having the support of the wardrobe communicating the message of solidarity made the moment a lot stronger. Without it, the impact would not have been as large. The power of fashion is that when words fail, fashion is there. 

I hope that there will be more action beyond this one day. Is anyone else speculating how the rest of the awards season is going to go? I sure am! 

Love from Australia,

Grace.