I have often heard jokes about the fashion police. I’ve even tried to make some, though my jokes usually don’t work well. But when I see some poor man who has no fashion sense at all who finds himself the unlucky object of a paparazzi's lens, I would know enough to call the fashion police. Please. This is probably not shot in Florida so not DeSantis's goons arresting a drag queen.
Is someone being arrested, the guy in sloppy blue shirt should be for his own well being and ours.
In Italy beginning in the early Renaissance until about the middle of the 17th century, there really were fashion police. The Sumptuary Laws attempted to control what people wore. For example, priests did not always dress in black as they do today, but in the 15th century it became regulated, I think first in Florence.
But laws were enacted in Florence, Siena, Milan, Venice and I presume Rome, which restricted things like jewelry, furs, leather, gold, sleeves. It seems to be an attempt to reinforce a social hierarchy, nobility keeping the upwardly mobile merchant class in its place, the women of the upper classes attracting husbands of means, etc.
I’ve researched some of the history of the fashion police.
This is apparently an Neapolitan woman being arrested for wearing too much refinery in public.
This is also a picture of a very well dressed man making some kind of advances on a woman.
But then Google took me in another direction with regard to the Italian fashion police. I got sidetracked into a survey of the current state of Italian police fashion, and it is quite a statement in itself!
I think that it is probably not good to run afoul of the law in any country. But if you want to be arrested by well dressed police, Italy's the place. They do take fashion seriously.
