A Man's Guide to Undershirts

One day last week as I was driving home from work listening to my usual sports talk radio station, one of the hosts began to make fun of one of the interns because he was wearing an undershirt under his polo. Yes, you read that correctly, he went on for about 5 minutes about how this young innocent intern had on a 100% white cotton undershirt underneath his polo shirt. I was amazed that he was serious. Granted this host hails from Philadelphia, but sir, if you are going to move down to the south and enjoy our sweet tea and eat our grits, you are going to have to abide by the undershirt rule as well.

He was calling it a “frat boy thing”. Au contraire my Yankee friend, I am about as far from frat boy as they come…I have never called another male cohort “Bra” nor have I ever done a keg stand, yet every morning that I get up, I routinely put on my trusty white undershirt without ever even thinking about it.

Until this errant co-host started spouting off like he knew what he was talking about when clearly he was in the wrong. This got me to thinking, is there a faction of men out there who don’t know the unwritten rule of the undershirt? Are there confused males out there who do not know that the undershirt is part of the 5 staples of men clothing attire? There must be, or surely this man would not be employed to speak his opinion as a career and be making fun of this individual who clearly did know what he was doing. Well, never fear men, I am here to provide you with a dummies guide to a man’s undershirt. Finally, the unwritten rules shall be written.

You don’t know where you are going if you don’t know where you started, so we’ll start at the beginning, with the previously mentioned 5 staples of the male wardrobe.

1. Pants –Includes jeans, khakis, or shorts. Above all, this is first and foremost on the list. A male can be seen in public without a shirt, but his pants are a requirement.
2. Shirts – Includes t-shirts, polos, or button-ups.
3. Shoes – Men should own 3 pairs of shoes, no more, no less – one pair of casual, one pair of dressy, and flip-flops
4. Undershirt – 100% white cotton, Hanes or Fruit of the Loom will do just fine. There is no need to waste you money on the Tommy Hilfiger or Polo brand undershirts. Undershirts are like all you can eat Chinese buffets, you are looking for quality for cheap, why pay more when you accomplish the same thing for less?
5. Boxers – Last on the list because these are not a requirement, preferred, but not a necessity. Also, please remember what your mom told you; always have on a clean pair because we don’t want the ER nurse cutting your clothes off of you to see that you have on holey underwear.

Sorry for the long introduction, but I had to make sure you understood the basics and knew where I was coming from. I have been rocking the undershirt since I was in about the 6th grade. That is about 11yrs of undershirt experience, so I consider myself somewhat of an expert. I have compiled a short list of five of the most important rules pertaining to undershirts that every male should know. I tried to condense it so anyone who desires can print it out and duct tape the list to the back of the closet door.

Without further a do:

Rule 1: Always, always, always wear an undershirt. No one wants to see your man hair sticking out of the top of your shirt. No matter how good you think it looks, it doesn’t…really, it doesn’t. I have also noticed that a lot of men who like to sport their chest patch for everyone’s viewing displeasure, also think a gold chain accents it nicely. Again, it doesn’t.

Rule 2: You can never err with the white undershirt. I have noticed more and more here recently, that a few explorative young males are venturing out with different colored undershirts. This is getting into a grey area. This color coordinating of the undershirt, suggests that maybe a little too much thought went into your attire for the day. This effectively turns what you are wearing into an “outfit” and “outfits” should be reserved to the women and children only.

Rule 3: Know when enough is enough. Just like all men have our favorite boxers, we will eventually develop a favorite undershirt. One that feels like silk from the many washings, one that molds to the folds of our man gut just perfectly, one that you know doesn’t do the annoying “undershirt becomes untucked, outer shirt still tucked causing everything to look all bunched up” thing. Unfortunately, all good things must come to an end, and eventually your prized undershirt will, no matter how great of a detergent you use, become yellow and will either have to be thrown away or used to wash your car. What do you think the guys from Coldplay were singing about? Obviously, one of the band members had just thrown away his favorite undershirt and penned this little number.

Rule 4: Know your size. The size of your undershirt can make all the difference in the world. Too big, and it results in the much dreaded bunches. Too small, and you feel constricted all night, leaving you self-conscience that your man gut is on display for the world to see. Another issue with it being too big, you have shreds of white cloth peeking from underneath the sleeves of your polo, resulting in a very sloppy look. However, when you are fitted with the appropriate size, you put your undershirt on and never think twice about it is, looking debonair all the while.

Rule 5: Actually an exception to rule #1 – When not to wear an undershirt. For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven (Ecc3:1), and this also includes a no undershirt season. I’m sorry if you do not agree with this rule, but as you can clearly see, it is Biblical, so no arguing it. There is only one time no undershirt is acceptable and that is when you are wearing your favorite t-shirt. As talked about on the site Stuff White People Like, your t-shirt must be tight-fitting, therefore deeming an undershirt virtually impossible. You would constantly be getting bunched up everywhere resulting in a very unpleasant evening.

I hope these 5 simple rules will be found useful to you.

I have one more, but not sure if it qualifies as a rule. If the 5 undershirt rules were laws, this would merely be a bill. A bill that never quite gets passed to become an official law, but is in the running year after year. The bill: A tank top, also affectionately known as a wife-beater, does not constitute as an undershirt. It fails to pass certain criteria that would rank it as a full fledge undershirt. The first and foremost cause of an undershirt is to cover the crass man patch that pokes out of the top the shirt. Due to the low cut neck of the tank top, we have failure number 1. The secondary job of the undershirt is to soak up excess sweat as to not offend co-workers or passer-byers, which leads to failure number 2 of the tank top. The tank top has way less material than your normal undershirt and, more importantly, no material at the sweatiest part of the body, the armpit. As you can see, the tank top clearly pales in comparison to that of the trusty white undershirt, so please save them for emergencies only.

If you have questions or need more clarification, please feel free to ask. Until next time, Men, keep rocking that undershirt proudly.

Author's note: Please check out my other man blog www.gotmanswers.blogspot.com. It is a joint adventure with fellow blogging friend Bull to try to inform the world of all things manly. Read his explanation of the site here.