Fashion is Less Important Than Literature

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Over at Jezebel, Katie J. M. Baker is angry that the New York Times profiled the female-founded New Inquiry in the Style section and the male-founded Jacobin in the Books section. I don’t blame her. But then we get this rote bit of defensiveness:

This is not to say that fashion is less important than literature.

Fine. I’ll say it. Fashion is less important than literature. That’s why the Times shouldn’t natter on about fashion and flirting when they profile cultural magazines founded by women but focus on ideas and hard work when they profile similar magazines founded by men. There’s no need to pretend otherwise, and it’s no insult to fashion to place it somewhere behind Shakespeare and H.L. Mencken.

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