User:FEastman/Prepdom

Eugene Siler (June 26, 1900 – December 5, 1987) was a member of the United States House of Representatives from Kentucky between 1955 and 1965. He was the only member of the House of Representatives to oppose (by pairing against) the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution. That resolution authorized deeper involvement of the United States in the Vietnam War.

A self-described “Kentucky hillbilly,” Siler was born in Williamsburg, Kentucky, a town nestled in the mountains in the southeastern part of the state. Unlike most Kentuckians, he, like his neighbors, was a rock-ribbed Republican. The people of this impoverished area had backed the Union during the Civil War and had stood by the GOP in good times and bad ever since. Siler served in the Navy in World War I and two decades later as an Army captain during World War II. His experiences with the realities of war left him cold to most proposals to send American troops into harm’s way.

After attending Columbia University, Siler returned to Williamsburg to be a small town lawyer. A devout Baptist, he gained local renown as a lay preacher, eventually serving as moderator of the General Association of Baptists in Kentucky. He abstained from alcohol, tobacco, and profanity. As a lawyer, he turned away all clients seeking divorces or who were accused of whiskey-related crimes.

He began service as an elected judge of the Court of Appeals of Kentucky in 1945 and promptly refused his regular monthly allotment of 150 dollars for expenses. Instead, he gave the money to a special fund he set up for scholarships. Not surprisingly, Siler often quoted the scriptures from the bench. He did the same in his speeches as the unsuccessful Republican candidate for governor in 1951 earning him a statewide reputation as a “Bible Crusader.”

Siler consistently stressed social conservatism during his tenure in the U.S. House which began in 1955. He sponsored a bill to ban liquor and beer advertising in all interstate media. He said that permitting these ads was akin to allowing the “harsh hussy” to advertise in “the open door of her place of business for the allurement of our school children.” Of course, he was “100 percent for Bible reading and the Lord’s Prayer in our public schools.”

Like his good friend, and fellow Republican, from Iowa, Rep. H.R. Gross, Siler considered himself to be a fiscal watchdog. He disdained all junkets and railed against government debt and high spending. Siler made exceptions for the homefolks, however, by supporting flood control and other federal measures that aided his district.

As with Gross, Siler was a Robert A. Taft, or Old Right, Republican who was averse to entangling alliances and foreign quagmires. A consistent opponent of foreign aid, he was just one of two congressmen to vote against Kennedy’s call up of reserves during the Berlin crisis. He favored Barry M. Goldwater in 1964, but never shared his hawkish views. The people back home did not seem to mind. Sometimes, the Democrats failed to even put up a candidate.

Siler was an early, and prescient, critic of U.S. involvement in Vietnam. In June 1964, shortly after deciding not to run again, he quipped, half in jest, that he was running for president as an antiwar candidate. He pledged to resign after one day in office, staying just long enough to bring the troops home. He characterized the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which authorized Johnson to take “all necessary steps” in Vietnam as a “buck-passing” pretext to “seal the lips of Congress against future criticism.”

The worsening situation in Vietnam prompted Siler to come out of retirement in 1968 to run for the U.S. Senate Republican nomination on a platform calling for withdrawal of all U.S. troops by Christmas. He lost. Ernest Gruening of Alaska and Wayne Morse of Oregon, the only two U.S. Senators who voted against the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, also went down to defeat that year.

Current usage
The word preppie (or "preppy") has come to refer to people of a certain class, economic status, and ethnic origin. In particular, it is used to describe people from established WASP families.

More generally, preppies are people who attended elite college preparatory schools, often boarding schools. Interestingly, the prep school attended is sometimes given more weight than the college subsequently attended, however prestigious the latter. Nevertheless, preppies traditionally go on to some of the nation's top colleges and universities. It is worth noting that a school's eliteness or cost does not necessarily mean that is a preppy college. Preppy culture idealizes athleticism and sociability. The culture also emphasizes deference to tradition and ritual and, generally speaking, disapproval of ostentation.

Fashion-wise, the term "preppy" is associated not with dramatic designer fashions, but with conservative clothing and accessory brands such as Green Lobster, The Andover Shop, J. Press, Paul Stuart, Lacoste, Pringle of Scotland, Brooks Brothers, L.L. Bean, Polo Ralph Lauren, Vineyard Vines, Vera Bradley, Lilly Pulitzer, CK Bradley, Sperry Top-Sider, C&J Clark, and Patagonia. An example of preppy attire would be a navy blue blazer, button-down Oxford cloth shirt, cuffed khakis, and cordovan loafers.

Typical vacation spots include Newport, RI, Nantucket, Martha's Vineyard, Cape Cod, Kennebunkport and certain other East Coast beaches, often in summer cottages kept in the family for generations and situated between neighbors one has known for some time.

Slang usage
In recent years, young people have begun to use the term "preppy," often shortened to "prep" as a noun, as slang to describe those who appear clean-cut or strive to seem better off financially than others in a middle class environment. In most regions, especially amongst young people, this usage has virtually replaced the traditional meaning of the word. Used in this manner, "preppy" is often applied contrary to the term's mainstream meaning stated above, as the slang version most often describes "nouveau riche", publicly-educated people absorbed in the middle class hypermaterialistic pop culture pursuit of ostensibly quality-made goods sold at prices for those who can pay for the best and most fashionable, and are 'obsessed' with clothes and shopping. As such, teenagers often apply this slang label to popular clothing not characteristic of "prepdom" such as J. Crew, American Eagle, Aéropostale, Hollister Co., and Abercrombie and Fitch (prior to the original company's bankruptcy in 1977, it in fact was a prep staple).

In 1980, American Jewish author and private school, but not boarding school, alumna Lisa Birnbach notice wrote the Official Preppy Handbook, a tongue-in-cheek guide to what she termed "prepdom." Though intended as satire, it is widely adhered to as a guidebook to those who embrace the latter interpretation of preppy fashion.

Athletics
The following sports were cited in Lisa Birnbach's Preppy Handbook:


 * Fencing
 * Sailing
 * Rowing
 * Field Hockey
 * Lacrosse
 * Rugby
 * Skiing
 * Squash, Raquetball, Badminton, Pelota
 * Tennis
 * Horseback Riding
 * Soccer
 * Swimming and Diving
 * Water Polo
 * Croquet
 * Football (Soccer)
 * Surfing in Southern California
 * Golf
 * Volleyball
 * Scuba Diving
 * Cross Country

Drinks
The Official Preppy Handbook notes the bloody mary to be the favored mixed drink amongst preppies.

The following liquor brands were cited to be "preppy" in an unofficial sequel to The Official Preppy Handbook, Tipsy in Madras:


 * Gin (Gilbey's, Gordon's)
 * Rum (Mount Gay & Bacardi)
 * Scotch (Dewar's, J&B)
 * Whiskey (Jack Daniel's & Jim Beam)
 * Vermouth (Martini and Rossi's)
 * Vodka (Gilbey's, Smirnoff, Absolut, Gordon's)