The mystery of the noose around your neck

What is the unspoken belief about the tie?

Why not the bowtie, or the cravat? Or a certain type of jacket, the hanky in the top pocket, the flower in the buttonhole, or the fob watch in the waistcoat pocket, and the gold chain across the tum: all of which now seem so old fashioned? The bowler hat used to signify you were some kind of quality city businessman. But it never had the clout that the tie has always had. And bowlers now seem to have gone the way of the dodo. Top hats were all the rage a while back, which assured the hoi-polloi that you were an established gentleman. But you rarely see them anymore, except on the occasions when the toffs and royalty go to the races.

All fashions tend to change with the seasons. But it has never changed for the tie. That choking piece of apparel has endured for way over 100 years. Why is that? What is behind the unstated belief that gives the impression that a man is made decent by wearing it? How does wearing a fancy piece of cloth made into a pretty rope around the neck make one more eligible to enter a club? The biggest crooks and conmen may be those wearing the tie, yet a decent bloke without one is refused entry into certain establishments.

As kids at school, we were forced to wear this livestock noose all day long, even in sweltering heat. How happy I was to rip it off outside the school gate every afternoon as soon as I left. For me, it was a symbol of imprisonment. I felt like a dog pulling on a choking collar. Even girls in their classrooms were forced to wear the tie. Who was the miserable indoctrinated soul who ordered that? And why was it so universally accepted?

After leaving school I always avoided any job that required me to wear a tie for an interview, and I have never worn one again for the rest of my life.

And other such sartorial anomalies that piqued my incomprehension were the turn-ups on trousers and the knife-edge crease that was demanded down the front of trousers. Why was it unthinkingly and universally adopted as a well-dressed requirement? And where has it gone today?

I discovered that at least turn-ups had some semblance of reasoning behind them. When roads were unpaved or badly made, men used to roll up the bottoms of their trouser legs to avoid being splashed with mud by passing traffic. That practice resulted in turn-ups on smarter trousers as a nod to this convention. However, turn-ups served no purpose whatsoever, other than receptacles of fluff and grit.

Disliking the pointlessness, I had my new trousers made without turn-ups, causing some ridicule from my more conventional acquaintances. And how happy I was when the Prime Minster of the day, also began to sport trousers without turn-ups, to which I pointed out with satisfactory glee.

Relief

It is with huge relief I notice that these days the tie is beginning to lose its psychological grip on society. Maybe the mass-mind is finally catching on to some hidden symbolism? Or is there a silent protest against the tie being subtly promoted by non-conformists in society around the world? Many TV presenters and interviewers are now appearing in open-neck shirts without a tie.

Yet curiously, there now seems to be an unspoken and mysterious conformity as to how they display their open-neck shirt lapels, which are tucked inside their jackets. It seems more attractive to me to place them outside. But I’ve yet to see anyone that does that. If there is no mandatory rule about it, why have I never seen anyone with lapels overlapping their jackets?

Such are the conventional sartorial mysteries for which I have no explanation.

However, it is noticeable that it’s those types who wish to dominate the population of the world, such as presidents, CEO’s of huge companies, royalty, and all those shadowy characters that yearly assemble secretly at Davos to discuss how they intend to rule the world, all slavishly stick to the tie.

Is it that having such an uncomfortable noose around your neck

shows that you are a willingly compliant conservative animal?

I wonder how we could have possibly known who was a respectable person before the tie became the symbol of respectability?

Do the fat-cats of the Establishment promote the prolongation of the tie as some sort of sacred symbol? Is it a way of discovering each other like a secret Masonic handshake? Could it be a symbol of conformity subtly mandated by the Illuminati?

I am not paranoid. But the extraordinary mind-set regarding this pretty rope-around-the-neck really makes me wonder.

I’m convinced there’s more to the tie than meets the eye.

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British mystic, author, psychotherapist, spiritual counsellor, mantra yogi, fine artist and illustrator, theatrical set and costume designer. Founder-editor of Gandalf’s Garden magazine and Community in the London Sixties, and 3 years as columnist for Yoga Today magazine, BBC 4 Scriptwriter, author of four spiritual self-development books and two storybooks for children. 

Muz Murray