The tag

Recently manufacturers have stopped putting tags in the necklines of topwear – you know, shirts. How wonderful is that? No more scratchy tags on the back of your neck. No more trying to fold the tag down in the drawer so it will learn that position. And most importantly, no more tag sticking up from your the back of shirt. No more small outcropping climbing up your neck that some person embarrassingly has to tuck gently in. Hooray. When Hanes started billing this on their commercials, it was as if they were touting a revolution. Viva la revolucion!

But we should have known better. Every advancement is a Faustian bargain. You gain something, you give something up. We lost the tags at the neck. But we were presented with the even more annoying tag on the lower left seam. It’s even worse than the neck tag. More annoying, more scratchy, more likely to make the wearer yell. It won’t ever show. That much is true. But it’s far worse than the tag at the neck. Part of the problem is that since the tag is not visible as you fold the shirt, you don’t remember to extract it. The thing elicits a constant absent-minded scratching of the left side until, filled with rage, you finally dash for the scissors – in the middle of a meeting, while you’re on the bus, at the opera – and cut the thing out. If this is the price for no tag at the neck, it’s definitely not worth it.