A long time ago, a guy had a vision. It could have been a girl, actually...I'm not sexist. This vision was that you could take a plain old t-shirt, put a design on it, and people would laugh. Just like that, funny tees were born. The transition of these shirts into something that everyone owns was a pretty fast one. It was probably somewhere within the social revolutions of the 1960's that saw the birth of these shirts and their surge into the main stream.
In the baby days of funny slogans, the designs were pretty basic. If you have eyeballs, then you have seen the classic "smiley face" t-shirt from the late 60's. This shirt got immensely popular and it represented what people thought a funny shirt should be like. It was simple, and lots of them were home made. It wasn't until someone started producing them professionally that the design became super popular.
The 70's and 80's were dominated by music. Rock and roll was everywhere, and the clothing had to reflect that cultural obsession. Bands started using the common t-shirt as a medium for revenue and advertising. If you loved a band, then you had to have the t-shirt that they sold. It wasn't enough to listen to the music and attend the concerts. You had to now prove that you were a loyal fan by sporting the band's logo everywhere. There was not enough room for the tees we know today during this time, but many bands did have shirts that were pretty hilarious.
This saving grace from being turned into a corporate medium for the music industry did not make funny t-shirts better. Every backwater idiot with a heat press or screen printer started designing shirts for mass sales all over the east coast and southern states. These shirts all had grotesque versions of women, references to drugs, and/or drinking to excess. The humor would only go so far as saying things like, "Hey! I like women! You like women too? Neat!" These were a huge embarrassment to the industry that funny tees would one day become.
The funny t-shirts of today have mellowed out quite a bit. These new tees mostly seem to have some true wit behind them, and they deal mostly in the humor of pop culture. Whether mocking it or emulating it, pop culture has infused the world of funny clothing completely. While we still see many shirts that are inspired from other periods in the process of evolution (including the horrible examples of the 90's), the market has expanded to include some very innovative and cutting-edge design work and humor.
Hopefully, the world of fashion will not be dragged down by the sins of the past and continue onward in this way for many years to come. When I wear humorous t-shirts now, the sharpened wit of these shirts transfers over to me. People think I am much more gregarious, witty, and cool than I actually am because of the shirts I wear. I guess, in a way, I deserve some of that credit because I did pick the design out, of course.
In the baby days of funny slogans, the designs were pretty basic. If you have eyeballs, then you have seen the classic "smiley face" t-shirt from the late 60's. This shirt got immensely popular and it represented what people thought a funny shirt should be like. It was simple, and lots of them were home made. It wasn't until someone started producing them professionally that the design became super popular.
The 70's and 80's were dominated by music. Rock and roll was everywhere, and the clothing had to reflect that cultural obsession. Bands started using the common t-shirt as a medium for revenue and advertising. If you loved a band, then you had to have the t-shirt that they sold. It wasn't enough to listen to the music and attend the concerts. You had to now prove that you were a loyal fan by sporting the band's logo everywhere. There was not enough room for the tees we know today during this time, but many bands did have shirts that were pretty hilarious.
This saving grace from being turned into a corporate medium for the music industry did not make funny t-shirts better. Every backwater idiot with a heat press or screen printer started designing shirts for mass sales all over the east coast and southern states. These shirts all had grotesque versions of women, references to drugs, and/or drinking to excess. The humor would only go so far as saying things like, "Hey! I like women! You like women too? Neat!" These were a huge embarrassment to the industry that funny tees would one day become.
The funny t-shirts of today have mellowed out quite a bit. These new tees mostly seem to have some true wit behind them, and they deal mostly in the humor of pop culture. Whether mocking it or emulating it, pop culture has infused the world of funny clothing completely. While we still see many shirts that are inspired from other periods in the process of evolution (including the horrible examples of the 90's), the market has expanded to include some very innovative and cutting-edge design work and humor.
Hopefully, the world of fashion will not be dragged down by the sins of the past and continue onward in this way for many years to come. When I wear humorous t-shirts now, the sharpened wit of these shirts transfers over to me. People think I am much more gregarious, witty, and cool than I actually am because of the shirts I wear. I guess, in a way, I deserve some of that credit because I did pick the design out, of course.
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