Men are suddenly wearing shorts to work, with ties and dress shoes and everything! And also muscle shirts and panama hats! Judging by the pictures in the Times style piece on the matter, they tend to look quite awkward. Who should we blame for this degenerate flaunting of the irresistible hairy male leg? The media in general and, in particular, Vogue's Sean Avery and CNN's Anderson Cooper. They made it cool to flash some skin, along with that ultimate arbiter of cool, Barack Obama:

The willingness of men to expand the amount of skin they are inclined to display can be gauged by the short-sleeved shirts Senator Barack Obama has lately favored; the muscle T-shirts Anderson Cooper wears on CNN assignment; and the Armani billboard in which David Beckham, the soccer star, appears nearly nude.



...When the hockey star Sean Avery took an internship at Vogue earlier this summer, the work uniform that the fashion-besotted left wing chose included a shorts suit that showcased his athletic calves.



"Why go to work and be hot?" he asked last week... "Why are women allowed to do it and not men?"

The slideshow, by the way, is called "who wears short shorts?"

It's only getting hotter, so get used to it, I guess. And maybe open a waxing salon, those should take off!

[Times]