A good rule of thumb if you're a man and you want to wear a "dress shirt" is, you put on the shirt and look in the mirror, and if you can see your nipples and also you are suffocating, the shirt is too tight. Well, your wife thinks it looks great on you.

If you've been to [JOKE HERE ABOUT HOLLYWOOD/ NEW YORK CITY/ HIPSTERS] recently, you know that baggy, loose-fitting suits are "out," and tight, skinny suits and dress shirts are "in." But why? Because they look better? Guess what, that's what they said about the other stuff that is now "out!" We must look deeper, for a... deeper explanation.

Bloomberg's trend desk today, in a single story on the rise of slim-fitting shirts, posits the following explanations for America's newfound slim shirt trend:

-"the spread of social media"

-"actors, musicians, and athletes"

-"millennials"

Those things can be blamed for literally every trend in society in all areas. The more likely culprit, as evidenced by the quotes that Bloomberg dredges up: lying women. Says a designer:

"Now you get online, you see blogs, all sorts of people in pictures, and it is a more tailored and a more European look," he said. "When guys show it to their wives, their wives really think it is more flattering."

But what does a man picked at random by the reporter to represent The Average Man have to say?

"[My wife] would say, 'My God, you can fit four of you in this shirt,'" he said. "'It's not 1996 anymore!' Once she level-set me, I developed my own interest in claiming how I present myself."

There you have it: dudes were perfectly okay wearing whatever they had on the rack at JC Penney, and all of a sudden Mr. Tom Brady appears on the cover of your wife's magazine, and the next thing you know you're being sweet-talked into wearing a shirt with the same amount of fabric contained in the classic male handkerchief. Smarten up, American men. Are you "ripped" and "slim and trim" and a "fashionista" who has "someone important to impress" so you better wear a shirt that "fits you really well?" Statistically, it's unlikely.

[Photo: Getty]