Clearly, a man carrying a purse encounters obstacles a woman with a purse does not:

For the second time in the last six months or so, I have been forced to check my bag. The first time, I was at a Yankees game and they told me I couldn’t bring my bag into the stadium. I complained as I saw women carrying similarly sized bags through the gates with no problem. When I asked a security guard why I couldn’t bring my bag in, he explained that purses are allowed but bags are not. I told him my bag was a purse and he asked if I was a woman. “If being a woman means I can bring my bag in, then yes, I am a woman.” That didn’t work.

Purses yes, bags no: A rule designed to dance delicately over the issue of . . . necessity. In other words, do you really need to have that stuff with you — in case of some, you know, personal emergency? But Matt Jacobs, AKA Capn Design, is a bold social adventurer, and deftly teases out the internal contradictions that dictate this imbalance in the battles of the sexes and their purses.

In this age of metrosexuality, why can’t a man carry a murse (man purse) around with him? Is the fact that I lack the need or ability to menstruate enough to keep me from having my books, magazines and iPod at the ready? Clearly, I think not. It’s time for equal bag rights. I want to keep my bag at my side and you don’t need to know why . . .

Oh yes we do, Mr. Jacobs. Open that thing up right here so we can poke around in it for any forbidden or embarrassing items.

• Unhand My Man Purse [Capn Design]

This entry was posted on Monday, February 6th, 2006 at 11:48 am and is filed under Bag Contents, Commentary, Man Bags. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.