Little Red Riding Hood: When Did We Become Posers, Too?

We all know the story of Little Red Riding Hood... Red is on her way to her Granny's house when she strays from the path and meets a wolf. The wolf asks where she is going and she tells him that she is going to her Granny's house. The wolf, sneakily planning to eat Red and her basket of treats for her Granny, runs to the Granny's house before Red gets there. The wolf eats Granny and dresses himself in her clothes and pretends to be Granny to trick Red. STOP.
The wolf, a made up character in a children's tale from hundreds of years ago, is dressing like someone else to get something that they want? Where have I seen this before?
People do this all of the time. I am guilty of it, too. We see something that we like or want, perhaps it's a celebrity or a picture in a magazine, that person looks good in something, and we want to be just like them, so we adopt their clothing and their attitude to become what we want.
In Identities Through Fashion, Maria Teresa Russo agrees, saying that that "individual relies more on appearing than on being and combats the fear of invisibility through the creation of a reflected image of oneself. The result is almost a confirmation of one's own real existence, framed in the simulacra sent by the media and by fashion. At this point, it becomes difficult to distinguish between reality and appearance" (pg 192).
When the wolf does it, it's bad, it's wrong, it's lying, it's evil. The wolf is portrayed as the antagonist for taking on Granny's identity and leading Red to think that he is really her Granny. It is not until Red takes a closer look at her "Granny" that she notices the bigger teeth, the eyes, the ears, and she realizes that her "Granny" is an impostor, a poser.
If it is so frowned upon that the wolf be posing as someone else, then why is it okay for society to do it? In that matter, is it actually okay for society to take on different fronts and dress to be like someone else? Has it become the norm? It seems as though no one is actually an individual. With websites like Pinterest where people can look on a fashion board and see what other people are "pinning", and Polyvore, where people also can create their "own" looks and share them on Pinterest, and TheHunt, the website that informs people of where to buy a certain garment or something similar to it, is anyone really unique? Even magazines show pictures of celebrities and then tell the readers where they can go to purchase the similar look, and they even tell the reader how much they can buy it for.

"Why is no one here to see how
beautiful I look when I wake up?"

It is no secret that we are inspired by what we see, and we should not be punished or ridiculed for that. But at what point do we stop being who we truly are, and become posers like the wolf? We put on fronts, just like him everyday. Women, by putting on make up, some women don't even take their make up to go to sleep! Are humans that vain and that worried about how we appear to others that we even need to look our best while we are asleep?
Each of our fronts show the world something different about us: We have the professional front, where we dress for work, men shave, and women wear hose and heels. We have the casual front, which can vary depending on the activity for that day. Am I going to see anyone important today? Should I wear a push-up bra, should I wear cologne? We have the social front, where we try to look our absolute best in the hottest clothing, some people even wear less clothing than is socially acceptable, but it's all for the sake of who sees us right? As long as we look like the person that we want people to think we are, like the wolf, then we have succeeded. 


My question is, when do we stop dressing to get what we want and to please others, and start dressing for the sake of dressing? Is it when others start to notice how big our eyes, teeth, and ears really are that we are exposed for who we really are?






Sources
Russo, M.T. (2012). Identities Through Fashion. Strong Fashion and Weak Identity: A Necessary Association? A. M. Gonzalez, L. Bovone (Ed.). New York, NY: Berg Publishers.