My, What Clean Boots You Have

Camo, Carhartt, and Conservatism

Nora Hitchcock

Like many other country-kids-turned-big-city-college-students, I was confused when everyone started wearing camo clothing and cowboy boots. After I thought I had escaped the Midwest hellhole farmland I had spent my childhood in, I was greeted with a cultural shock all over again. 

But those wearing this clothing now aren't who you would expect. Watching students in distressed Carhartt jackets walk into their “student luxury apartments” has certainly been an odd sight to see. And don’t even get me started on my friend's sorority sisters with their spotless white cowboy boots and camo sweatshirts. Perhaps what makes me so curious is that I don’t know where these people came from, what their backstory is, and why they selected that article of clothing to wear that day. But it might be time to reclaim this blue collar attire again, as manual labor does go largely unnoticed in the academic world. As an art major, it makes sense why many of my peers and instructors wear coveralls and work boots on the regular — quite a bit of our work does require protective clothing. It’s also important to note there has already been a historical reclamation of these aesthetics among the blue collar workforce and marginalized communities — take the original cowboys or punk movements for example (both deeply rooted in queer/BIPOC culture). But why did it become an aesthetic all of a sudden?

This might just be part of the cultural shift to conservatism. Take for example Ron DeSantis’s cowboy boots, JD Vance’s jeans, and the infamous red hats. We may not be able to stop the rise of conservatism, but there are connections to be made with the actual decent blue collar folks out there (I can promise you there’s more leftists working in the trades than you may think). Reclaiming the camo and the Carhartt may be a way of “taking back” the working class, as we are all more connected than we realize under the oligarchy of the (un)United States.