A generation ago, I had the opportunity to speak with an executive officer at Bike (Russell at that point, but Bike was held as an autonomous trademark). Using the metaphor which became the title of a movie, the executive described "the perfect storm" which effectively wiped out the several generations of our understanding, familiarity, and comfort with jockstraps and locker rooms in general.
Relying upon the depiction in "Father knows best" and "Leave it to Beaver", the bequest of a jockstrap was a "rite of passage" between a father and a son. High school sports programs sent home check-lists for gear, and "athletic supporter" was prominent. Until the mid-1970s, American youth faced the real possibility of entering military service in which jockstraps were likewise issued/required.
Jockstraps were quintessential in sports and the military, and many of you will concur that when we were mowing the lawns or riding bikes in the neighborhood or swimming, the first thing on and the last thing off was a jockstrap.
The executive then dramatically swept his hand as if to brush all of that aside. He said that starting in the 1990s, divorce was diminished in its social taboo. More and more households were single-parent and mostly single-Mom. The executive opined that jockstraps were part of the "male preserve", and consequently, with more mothers now responsible for parenting in total, there was less emphasis - indeed, he used the word "squeamishness" - on the part of Mom-oriented homes. Apparently, stereotypes aside, while Moms had kindly washed jockstraps for Dad and sons for the generations before, suddenly Moms were reluctant to actually initiate the purchase of a jockstrap.
Bike quickly shifted focus to what is now called the "compression short". The executive said that after the marketing department had conducted its meticulous research, Moms were more comfortable buying a garment which resembled boxers, rather than the jockstrap which clearly is designed to protect masculinity. Compression shorts could be laundered and dried just like regular underwear, and within a short number of years, jockstrap sales plummeted though compression short sales increased.
The next proverbial shoe to fall was based upon a series of incriminating news articles. While many people hear about paedophilia in the context of the Roman Catholic Church, statistically, priests are actually near the bottom of the list in terms of molestation of young boys. The number one culprit? Yep, high school football coaches. The fetish "I'll do anything to stay on the team, Coach" is based on a very sad and violent reality. The difference in the 1990s is that high school and college programs were quick to pay out cash settlements, so that the revenue-generating varsity programs would not be compromised.
In response, locker rooms and locker room behavior were radically changed. The "gang showers" that so many of us used in sports and in the military were now replaced with individual showers and shower curtains to protect the student's privacy. The often maligned "jockstrap inspection" was surreptitiously prohibited. Coaches were not allowed to enter the locker rooms as the students were changing before or after practice.
And the next issue was funding. In the aftermath of the "Title Nine" findings, many sports budgets had to be significantly adjusted to now apportion equally funding to both girls' and boys' athletics. The inventories of jockstraps as well as other physical education kit and gear were eventually depleted as the budgets were reapportioned. In theory, Americans respect equality, but in reality, it was a death-knell to the equipment room inventories of many boys' and young men's athletic departments.
Some of the gentlemen who visit jockstrap websites are my contemporaries, having been raised with open locker rooms, jockstraps by the bin-full, coaches wandering through the benches, and that bottom drawer in your older brother's dressing chest. I will never say that we must now bask in just memories.
Instead, I will continue to pound the drum that while there may have been a "perfect dark storm" a generation ago, then it is up to all of US - yes, all of us! - to create a perfect, proactive and beneficial movement to (re)-introduce and (re)instate jockstraps to our children and grandchildren's generation.
There were a few articles printed in widely circulated journals, and the authors were definitely opposed to jockstraps. With all of the talent among all of YOU, Gentlemen, why are we smiting our breasts (among other repetitive physical actions) when we should be countermanding those few articles which seem to have fed into the anti-jockstrap sentiment today?
How many bona fide (yes, every pun intended) doctors of medicine read these websites, who could prepare upstanding, medically-verified articles to emphasize the sports medicine reasons for wearing an athletic supporter? Protective cups have their function to block direct impact, but regular jockstraps also function to reduce fatigue, to minimize scrotal injury, and to regulate sperm-killing heat.
Like so many of you, I commend the moderator, John Taite, for not only creating this website, but for establishing such an important company through which we are able to purchase jockstraps. How can we help John to increase his sales ten-fold, and how can we (re)store the main sporting goods purveyors with a full wall of jockstraps?
I remain convinced that unless and until we, as a group, challenge the mainline media with articles which show the medical importance of strapping on a jock, and yes, to find the financial wherewithal to have prominent athletes publicly promote (either through advertisements or through interviews) their use of jockstraps (think of Joe Namath back in the day, with the Bike logo prominently showing through his unlaced football pants!), then these pages on the website will sadly remain in a nostalgic loop.
I, for one, would prefer that millions of young athletes be properly jocked.
What are your thoughts?