CULTURE/SOCIETY: Men Wearing Pink Shirts

This was in my work's newsletter and I just found it interesting. Can't say I would comfortable wearing a pink shirt. :) - OlderMusicGeek

Pink Shirt Guy (alias to hide where I work) issues the pink shirt challenge

Pink Shirt Guy, programmer/analyst in System Support Services at (business name removed), encouraged his male coworkers in Information Services to step outside their comfort zones last week.

With permission from IS management, Pink Shirt Guy invited IS employees, but males in particular, to wear pink shirts on August 10. “For most guys, wearing the color pink is a big no-no,” he wrote in an e-mail to IS. “For others, it’s a sign of confidence in one’s self.”

Recently, men in IS had been discussing whether they would wear pink, and many said they never would. One of those employees was Tech Support Analyst II. Then he lost a weightlifting bet to Pink Shirt Guy, and his end of the deal was to wear a pink shirt to work. The day Tech Support Analyst II wore the pink shirt, Pink Shirt Guy and Technical Support Intern were wearing pink shirts, too. That’s when Pink Shirt Guy got the idea to propose a pink shirt day to all the men in IS.

Pink Shirt Guy hadn’t been a fan of the color pink until someone bought him a pink shirt, and he made the bold move of wearing it to a job interview. One of the interviewers commented that his choice of attire conveyed confidence. Pink Shirt Guy was later offered the job. “It makes you stand out when you wear a color you don’t usually wear,” he said.

Pink Shirt Guy noticed there were a lot of first-timers Friday, including a few who said they never would wear pink. “As the saying goes, ‘real men wear pink',” he said.