Truly Religulous

I'm tired of hearing how our wasteful behavior could save a child in Africa. Well except for this case. Take Rwanda; a country made popular by their brutal use of machetes and Don Cheadle. Let us take a look at their GDP per capita. Hold on, I need to Google...ahh, $360. Now let me check the price of a pair of True Religion jeans: $312. Now including taxes, that is, if you live in California, and you're talking $350. Somehow this doesn't make sense.

Now I'm not saying that someone who spends $300+ on a pair of jeans would actually have the decency to send the money to someone in need, but you catch my drift. The gap between the West and the developing world is still staggering, and I feel this is one of those real world examples of just how disgusting it is.
What's more, none of these people can actually give you any real reason as to why they are paying this amount of money for what amounts to a pair of jeans. $50, ok. $100, and I might still see the light. But $300? Surely the quality can't be exponentially better? Can it?

Let's for a minute pretend you do get an answer. Invariably it goes one of two directions. First of all, someone will likely point to the wash and distressing. You know, each pair is extremely unique. But if you really think about it, the combinations aren't really that endless at all. Between, light, medium, dark, or black, there aren't many other choices. And just as there aren't really as many choices as we are lead to believe, there isn't really that much difference between them either. Save for the asshole who wears them.

Another "factor" in the high price of some denim is distressing. For anyone not familiar with clothing, keep in mind that distressing is a fancy way of saying, "I am paying a premium for something that is already broken". Apparently the time it takes to uniquely distress each garment allows the company to charge an excessive price.

Let's for a moment leave the vacuum that is designer denim and move into another arena, automobiles. Specifically automobile salesmen, clip on ties, and 10,000 mile warranties. All the good shit that comes with buying a new car. Oh and new car smell. How could I forget new car smell? Anyway, how would you react if you went to a dealership, saw a car you liked, but it was smashed and dented? Now consider your reaction when the salesperson told you that said vehicle would cost a premium because it was "distressed". I'll leave it at that.

A more informed consumer may remind you that the denim is of higher quality, and that is made in the USA, which actually would make sense in raising the price. That is if you actually believe that it is made by American union labor. I'd like to leave the denim vacuum once again in order to move to another seemingly unrelated field, agriculture.

Now besides being the greatest state in the Union, California also provides the rest of the country with delicious produce such as strawberries. These are grown and picked in the California. California is one of the fifty States. So by definition they are "products of the USA". This of course ignores the fact that these strawberries are picked by illegal laborers from Mexico, whose wage is so laughable they probably wish they were being paid in peanuts.

Now what makes you think that the manufacture of denim products in the USA is any different? For some reason I just don't see blue collar Americans performing sweat shop style labor, even if Jimmy Hoffa and the Unions' agreed to high wages and great benefits.

I'd like to leave with you some parting thoughts about all of this. First of all, I think it is important to keep in mind that this trend really began to take hold in Los Angeles. Knowing this has probably restored your faith in humanity and given much more sense to what would otherwise be a completely perplexing phenomenon. Then again, unchecked greed, unnecessary spending, and rampant materialism apply not only to LA, but America as a whole. But in this case, feel better about yourself and do what we do best, put the blame on someone else. Let's just leave it with LA.

And finally, the next time you are thinking about putting some jeans on your credit card instead of paying off your student loans, or buying groceries, or anything else that actually warrants $300 expenditure, remember that you can still get a good pair of Levi's for $40.