Originally Posted by
flensr
That's pretty lame. Most, if not all, civilian pilots back in the golden age of flying wore leather jackets with warm fuzzy liners. Because it worked. Military experience and combat had not a damned thing to do with wearing a leather jacket when flying. Any pilot who might experience weather or temperature extremes will be well prepared if they're wearing a leather flying jacket. Because that's what those jackets were designed for. Flying. Not military flying, but *flying*.
Prima donna wanna-be fighter pilots trying to tell young pilots what to wear, I tell you what...
The traditional brown leather flyer's jacket is issued by military aviation communities as a organizational clothing for esprit-de-corps purposes (the modern functional equivalent is a green synthetic parka jacket of very similar design).
So a modern military member wearing one (depending on time, place, and context) isn't necessarily "douchy", might just be enjoying a bit of living history that was issued to him. Same for a civilian, although wearing one with modern unit patches around an airport might hint of attempted valor theft.