If you’re a longtime 99PI listener, Avery Trufelman needs no introduction, and all you need to hear is: there’s a new season of Articles of Interest.
But for those who aren’t familiar, I guarantee, if you enjoy 99PI, then Articles of Interest is for you. It’s a spin off show created by Avery when she worked here, but it’s now completely independent. It’s a brilliant and compelling exploration about what we wear. Pockets, plaid, sunglasses, zippers – there’s a fascinating story behind all of them.
The latest season, “Gear”, is about the surprising intersection of the military and the outdoor goods industry. Brands you wouldn’t expect, like REI, Patagonia, LL Bean, and Eddie Bauer, all have their roots in military surplus and design. Although the civilian/military divide has never been bigger, the military is everywhere in our daily lives. This episode starts with Avery being invited by Buck Mason to their “militaria room.” Explores the deep entanglement of military aesthetics with fashion and culture, from luxury buckskin suits, once a form of Indigenous wear, to the idea that America is fundamentally a nation of shoppers.
In this new season, Over seven chapters, Avery explores how these two industries shaped so much of our attitudes about nature, and about our nation.
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I have been listening to 99% for virtually as long as you have been doing it
But I have to say this is the first time I have actually been scolded for being a “white man”
Many, many layers of disapproval are dripping because Avery seems to be angry that we wear clothes that derive from history.
The politics of this is why people get mad at Democrats.
Horrors
Alan Barrington (a citizen of the U.S.A.)
Long time 99% Invisible listener (my favorite episode is still #86 Reversal of Fortune), and I enjoyed this episode as well, for the most part. However, the description of a Prussian pickle helmet having “what looks like a butt plug spike” at 33:43 is so off-putting. What a gratuitously crass description!
I enjoy sharing 99pi episodes with my kids. Some of the boys in my son’s Scout troop even choose to ride in my vehicle specifically hoping for to hear a podcast on the way to and from a campout. (Many of those aired have been from 99pi.) Now due to this wholly unnecessary description I won’t be sharing this otherwise interesting episode with either audience.
The correspondents and editors at 99% Invisible would do well to consider the breadth of their audience.
You’re interested in this title, right? Guess what—YOU’RE THE PROBLEM!!
This piece opens like we’re about to have fun with the history of gear, and then—almost without warning—it drifts into a soft-focus revisionism that seems intent on making the listener feel mildly guilty for being interested in the subject at all.
The moment Theodore Roosevelt is portrayed as essentially childish is when the floor drops out. Avery might consider reading Doris Kearns Goodwin’s The Bully Pulpit to see how intricate, self-forged, and intellectually exacting TR actually was. Reducing him to a boy playing dress-up doesn’t illuminate anything; it just flattens a much more complex figure. It comes off like an attempt to sound “more radical” while reviewing clothes (see her Cut interview).
99PI usually leads with curiosity and delight. Here, delight gets replaced by a gentle scolding that assumes the audience is already on board. The tone becomes strangely airless.
Still worth listening—if only to hear how quickly a great topic wilts when charm and genuine inquiry are replaced by that posture. When the charm leaves, the story leaves with it.