Quite honestly, I have only recently heard the term 'wife beater' used to descibe at type of muscle shirt

Question

Can anyone tell me why it's called that...I think the name is really disgusting?

Answer 1

Men can abuse women in three piece suits, polo shirts and Dockers, etc., but Cops and Jerry Springer have shown lower-class men arrested for "domestic disturbances" in those shirts, so the name stuck.

Some young feminist women call them "boy beaters" when they wear them. I don't like that, either.

I do love how they look on the right people, though...

Answer 2

"The desire to look trashy isn't hard to explain (they're sexy on the right body and showcase well-toned biceps). What's mysterious is how such a potentially offensive phrase managed to slip into the fashion lexicon so easily.

Mark-Evan Blackman, chairman of the menswear design department at New York's Fashion Institute of Technology, remembers hearing "wife beater" used when he was growing up in Brooklyn in the 1970s. It referred to the shirts worn by "pumped-up Italian guys in pizzerias," said Blackman. "The stoves were 150 degrees, these guys were lifting weights and they had a virile appeal."

"It's a reference to class," said Valerie Steele, curator of the museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology, who had not heard the term "wife beater" until a few years ago. "The subtext is that Stanley Kowalski and other working-class men are more sexy and physical, which may be why everyone wears them at the gym."

Answer 3

Many people have listed why they call it a wife beater but no one has told you what undershirt is truly a wife beater. In most stores, if you go to the mens underwear section look for the A-shirts. Those are wife beaters.

Answer 4

That term has come into being due to television and all the police shows. Inevitably, when they answer a domestic abuse call, and the male is the perpetrator of the physical violence, it is in a mobile home park, the guy is drunk, does not contain all of his own natural teeth, and is wearing one of the sleeveless undershirts. Calling it a "wife-beater" was so universally understood, that stereotype and thus the term must have had some validity.

Answer 5

A garment worn which enables the wearer to adopt a pseudo-action venear, extended only by stains, and possible incognito smells. However, if the wearer is a person prone, or tending to act in a less extrovert manner, then he can be seen as a slob, or likeness to the name 'wife-beater'. It's a stereotype, that states, men who wear this shirt beat their wives.

Answer 6

Hi Pal.

You're right, isn't it nuts? A "wife beater" is a plain white undershirt. No tank top or anything edged or colored, it's just the plain old Fruit of the Loom undershirt with the shoulder straps like a cheap tank top.

They call it that because supposedly, that's what the cheap trailor trash guys all wear. They are the ones who beat their "old ladies" to "keep 'em in line". It's all pretty low class, as is wife beating itself. See?

Supposedly these wife beating slobs just sit in their recliners in their undershirts, drink beer, and smack their wives around when they "need it".

That's how I understand it.....

Answer 7

You just heard of this term? They've been calling it that for years. I think it's stereotypically applied to working class men that wore those type of shirts. The term is rather disgusting as is the false image that comes with it.

Answer 8

The way it was described to me that shirt got nicknamed after a few movies that ran in the late 80s early 90s that would rerun on tv, and they would often depeict a drunk abusive husband that would frequently abuse and take advantage of his wife and make her life worse thatn it is. All while wearing a plain white "wife-beater."

Answer 9

It's called a wife beater because Marlon Brando wore one as 'Stanley' - an abusive husband - in "A Streetcar Named Desire". They are further called that because they carry the stereotype of being a low - class type of clothing.

Answer 10

Because on the show Cops everytime they would respond to a domestic violence call, the perp lol would have on the undershirt...no lie I BS you not....

Another story i heard was in the old movies they would show the guy slapping his wife around or something when he go home from work. He would always take off his shirt when he got home and would have on his undershirt, pants and what not.

Ha and i just found the link to prove it