Braveshirt
by Ken Myers

In her book, The Language of Clothes, Alison Lurie coined the very useful term, "legible clothing" to describe T-shirts or caps that contain texts, messages designed to impress and/or intimidate. We make ourselves walking billboards, identifying with some product or manufacturer, and thereby participating in and reiterating the fantasies promised by advertisers about the magical powers of some commodity. And every brand-name has a message.

Some pieces of legible clothing are not so much billboards as bumper stickers. T-shirts that say, "I Smoke and I Vote" or "Pro- Family, Pro-Choice" serve as warning shots for political positioning, while "Try Getting in Touch with Your Inner Grown-Up for a Change" combines incisive cultural criticism with a helpful curmudgeon alert. By their T-shirts you shall know them.

I haven't noticed any "Have a Nice Day" shirts lately. I have seen shirts with a lot more attitude. One company in particular specializes in legible clothing that expresses a very specific sensibility, an outlook that admits no smiley faces. The company even christened itself "No Fear," declaring in those two clipped and unambiguous syllables a kind of Nietzschean courage.

The slogans on the No Fear T-shirts are emblazoned on the back of the shirt, suggesting tht people may not hear you coming, but they'll sure know you've been there. And the messages on the shirts are certain. "Are you afraid to die? Or just afraid to live?" "Glorious in Victory, Miserable in Defeat." "Fear: the Thief of Dreams." One of the most triumphant reads, "You do not greet Death, you punch him in the throat repeatedly until he drags you away." All the slogans suggest at first the toughness of those who have been abandoned, who must make a way for themselves, and who must ritually remind themselves that they are bigger than what they fear.

The No Fear line is associated with the cluster of cultural phenomena that includes alternative rock bands (including groups with names like Chainsuck, Boneshelter, Shoveljerk, and Sister Machine Gun) and 'extreme sports" (such activities as street luge racing, sky surfing, 75 m.p.h. in-line skating, bungee jumping, and gonzo mountain biking, all the sorts of pastimes insurance agents like to know about before the policy is written).

The sensibility of extreme sports is that of the outsider, the essential nonconformist: teasing death and embracing pain in an intense quest for the next and better rush. Such daring may be defended as just an extension of the courage long encouraged by sports. But in cultures informed by Christian or even classical values, bravery is associated with duty: courage serves a higher cause.

"No fear" in this moral universe implies no trust, no humility, no submission. It is not simply the cherishing of courage; it also involves the eradication of love, since love does not insist on its own way, and is not arrogant or rude. One of the bands featured on a recent CD associated with an Xtreme sports marathon was called "Loveinreverse." It would seem that the fear of fear casts out perfect love.

Now admittedly, wearing slogans such as "Fear Nothing" is a kind of posturing, a form of youthful caricature, rather like weekend motorcyclists imagining themselves outlaws and pirates, before quietly closing the garage door on Sunday night. But the slogans we align ourselves with have a way of shaping the soul. The simple creed, "I will not fear death; I will delight in the attraction of danger" is probably not expressive of an achieved level of stoical bravery for most young people who sport it on their backs, but it is a dangerous spiritual alignment nonetheless. Fear of death represents the desire for life, and while it is a good thing to die for a good cause, it is not a good thing to die or merely flirt with death in order to demonstrate one's fearlessness, that is, to demonstrate that one is a god. Death is a signal of the justice of god, and our fear is a reminder that we need mercy. That natural fear of death is conquered justly only as divine love and life become the ordering dynamics of our existence. Overcoming fear through any other means will certainly lead to idolatry.

Consider Missy Giove, a heroine to many young rebels, the high priestess of extreme sports, the incarnation of the slogans of the No Fear line. Giove is a 24-year-old foul- mouthed and fearless mountain biker, whose downhill racing skills (at 60 m.p.h. on rough terrain) have made her a hot commodity for corporate sponsors, and a frequent visitor of orthopedic specialists. She looks barbaric, a silver ring in her nose, primal tattoos around her ankles, her temples shaved and the top of her hair writhing Medusa-like, and necklaces sporting small sea shells, bicycle chains, and a dead piranha. "She had road kill woven into her hair for a while," a friend reminisces.

Yet this fearless young woman has lately shown signs of reverence which seem at first to be out of place. "There were times when I was about to crash into a tree and I was somehow moved around the tree," she recently confided to reporter David Browne. "I didn't do it. Something moved me. That's the power and spirit of the mountain. I always give my praise and thanks to the mountain and give an offering. I kiss the dirt, wherever I go. I lick it and swallow.. I'm not crazy about eating it, but I eat it. You want the mountain on your side, because it'll take care of you, hopefully. And if it doesn't, it doesn't."

To paraphrase G.K. Chesterton, people who refuse to fear and worship God will not fear and worship nothing, they will fear and worship anything. The attitude of "No Fear" is finally false bravado. Created in the image of God, at some deep level, the toughest of spirits knows, in the words of Bob Dylan, "You gotta serve somebody."