The first metrosexual ticket?

I think Washington Whispers is onto something. Kerry and Edwards represent America's first metrosexual ticket.

"They talk about how good their hair looks, they pat each other on the cheek and butt, both wear expensive suits, and the top guy on the Democratic presidential ticket gets his nails done," says the Whispers report.

I'm all for a fellow taking care of himself. A man who dresses well and carries himself as a gentleman projects a quiet dignity. But the metrosexual carries it to the point of obsession.

Metrosexuals, says the New York Times, are straight urban men who are willing, even eager, to embrace their feminine sides. They wear designer jeans, fashionable tops and have long conversations about thread counts. And have their nails done, as does Kerry.

Which got me to thinking. Metrosexuality is the most important issue of this campaign.

On the Republican side are a couple of straight-talking tough guys. They aren't pretty or delicate. They're men of action not words. They may make mistakes and ruffle feathers, but they're decisive, focused and they get things done.

But on the other side are two smooth talkers. Like Clinton, they're able to say what any crowd wants to hear. Every hair falls perfectly in place on these pretty boys' heads. Edwards even said he and Kerry have better hair and he's right. Bush's weathered, sneering mug is topped with a wiry backwoods brush. Most of Cheney's hair is in his bathroom sink. But who has time to worry about hair in the middle of a war? The metrosexual male, that's who.

See, when Bush wipes out on his bike, as he did, he gets back on the bike and rides another dozen miles while chuckling and picking gravel out of his face. But when metros such as Kerry take a spill on their bikes, they blame the road or say a secret service guy cut them off or that the bike malfunctioned. Then they have the bike towed to a shop and hire their wife's lawyers to sue the bike manufacturer.

Edwards' metrosexuality doesn't trouble me as much Kerry's. At least everything Edwards says and does is natural. Which is why I don't trust him. He successfully smooth-talked a number of juries — comprised of people unable to get out of jury duty or, to be more precise, Democrats — into awarding vast sums to his bank account.

Which brings us back to Cheney. What can you say about Cheney. He wears the same frumpy suits he did during the Ford administration. He's a man of so few words, he even burps one syllable at a time. And when he speaks, he gets right to the point. Just ask Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont.

In these challenging times, do we want our next president to be left brained, focused and hard charging or do we want a new-age sensitive male who is afraid to offend anyone, because it might affect how he is perceived?

Do we want our enemies to face men of fortitude and action or a couple of guys who will be getting fitted at Brooks Brothers or enjoying a Mary Kaye rubdown when the next terrorist incident goes down?

It's clear to me. We're at war with a bunch of wacko-terrorist religious fanatics. This is no time for Barry Manilow. We need John Wayne. We don't want to be switching horses in the middle of the stream.

Even if the new horses are wearing Bruno Magli saddles, diamond-studded Tiffany spurs and Cristophe-coifed tails.

metrosexual (met.roh.SEK.shoo.ul) n. An urban male with a strong aesthetic sense who spends a great deal of time and money on his appearance and lifestyle. —metrosexuality n.

Example Citations:

At dinner the other night, my date listed the calorie count of the main entrees, raising an eyebrow at my chicken Alfredo selection after he had ordered a salad. I saw him check his reflection in the silver water pitcher three times. During dessert, he looked deeply into my eyes and told me he thought what we have together is very special. It was our third date.

It was then that I realized why my dating life has been as mysterious as the Bermuda Triangle since I arrived in Washington. This city, unlike any other place I've lived, is a haven for the metrosexual. A metrosexual, in case you didn't catch any of several newspaper articles about this developing phenomenon (or the recent "South Park" episode on Comedy Central), is a straight man who styles his hair using three different products (and actually calls them "products"), loves clothes and the very act of shopping for them, and describes himself as sensitive and romantic. In other words, he is a man who seems stereotypically gay except when it comes to sexual orientation.
—Alexa Hackbarth, "Vanity, Thy Name Is Metrosexual," The Washington Post, November 17, 2003

The typical metrosexual is a young man with money to spend, living in or within easy reach of a metropolis — because that's where all the best shops, clubs, gyms and hairdressers are. He might be officially gay, straight or bisexual, but this is utterly immaterial because he has clearly taken himself as his own love object and pleasure as his sexual preference. Particular professions, such as modeling, waiting tables, media, pop music and, nowadays, sport, seem to attract them but, truth be told, like male vanity products and herpes, they're pretty much everywhere.
—Mark Simpson, "Meet the metrosexual," Salon.com, July 22, 2002 Notes:
A metrosexual is a clotheshorse wrapped around a dandy fused with a narcissist. Like soccer star David Beckham, who has been known to paint his fingernails, the metrosexual is not afraid to embrace his feminine side. Why "metrosexual"? The metro- (city) prefix indicates this man's purely urban lifestyle, while the -sexual suffix comes from "homosexual," meaning that this man, although he is usually straight, embodies the heightened aesthetic sense often associated with certain types of gay men.

Mark Simpson invented this term in 1994 (see the earliest citation, below), and it drifted slowly from one media source to another throughout the rest of 1990s and early 2000s. Then Simpson wrote another article about metrosexuals in the online magazine Salon.com on July 22, 2002, and the term took off. Since then it has been picked up by thousands of media outlets, has made numerous TV appearances, has spawned at least a couple of books, and has been dropped in untold numbers of cocktail party conversations. There is no escaping the metrosexual.

The second example citation gives Simpson's succinct description of the metrosexual type from his Salon.com article.

Earliest Citation:

The promotion of metrosexuality was left to the men's style press, magazines such as The Face, GQ, Esquire, Arena and FHM, the new media which took off in the Eighties and is still growing (GQ gains 10,000 new readers every month). They filled their magazines with images of narcissistic young men sporting fashionable clothes and accessories. And they persuaded other young men to study them with a mixture of envy and desire.

Some people said unkind things. American GQ, for example, was popularly dubbed ''Gay Quarterly''. Little wonder that all these magazines — with the possible exception of The Face — address their metrosexual readership as if none of them were homosexual or even bisexual.
—Mark Simpson, "Here come the mirror men," The Independent, November 15, 1994

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