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Cities Cracking Down on Saggy Pants
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Two young men with low-slung, baggy jeans walk in Trenton, N.J., Saturday, Sept. 15, 2007. Wearing your pants low enough to show your boxers or bare buttocks in a small town in Louisiana could get you six months in jail and a $500 fine and Trenton is considering a law, where a first bust for low-riding trousers could soon mean an assessment by a city worker on where your life is going. (AP Photo/Mel Evans)
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- Public Discussion (66)
I'm offended by seeing extremely large women wearing spandex. Can we fine them too?
What a bunch of bull@!$%#.
- 37 votes
#1 - Sun Sep 16, 2007 2:46 PM EDTDUDE! SERIOUSLY!
I am not a fan of the bagginess but it's their right to wear whatever the hell they want. To remove that right is to set us back 100 years.
- 21 votes
The penalty is stiffer in Delcambre, La., where in June the town council passed an ordinance that carries a fine of up to $500 or six months in jail for exposing underwear in public.
I wonder if they do the same to a woman showing the back of a thong while wearing low-rise jeans?
- 3 votes
Proposals to ban saggy pants are starting to ride up in several places. At the extreme end, wearing pants low enough to show boxers or bare buttocks in one small Louisiana town means six months in jail and a $500 fine. A crackdown also is being pushed in Atlanta. And in Trenton, getting caught with your pants down may soon result in not only a fine, but a city worker assessing where your life is headed.
The puns are overwhelming...
- 13 votes
#2 - Sun Sep 16, 2007 2:49 PM EDTIs this the only thing are lawmakers are capable of thinking? My dear city of Trenton, you have far more greater issues to deal with than saggy pants. Lawmakers, do something productive for once.
- 14 votes
#3 - Sun Sep 16, 2007 3:07 PM EDTThis is positively Soviet-esque in it's silliness. Writing laws dictating how citizens can dress? Are they serious?
- 2 votes
#8 - Sun Sep 16, 2007 3:57 PM EDTWhat is wrong with people now a days. Who cares how anyone dress. I sure do not care. This world has enough things to worry about. Anyways, the article is well put together.
- 2 votes
#9 - Sun Sep 16, 2007 4:39 PM EDTAnother bite taken from our liberties. What a shame.
Anyone who stays up at night concerned about the way people dress should be made to wear a straight jacket.
- 1 vote
#10 - Sun Sep 16, 2007 4:47 PM EDTI drive buses for the public transit system in Santa Clara County in California...
I'll say this: The kids with the baggy jeans have never short changed me or asked for a free ride. They always have their buck fifty.
They're also the first the pickup on fare changes, especially when fares go down, but that's an entirely separate issue ;P
- 6 votes
#11 - Sun Sep 16, 2007 5:12 PM EDTLast I checked, public nudity was already illegal - so what's the point of this law? Oh - that's right - assimilation.
My boyfriend wears his pants baggy enough that they are comfortable and easy to move in (he's a skater), but not so his drawers hang out. I think the guys who do wear them that low look stupid, juvenile, and ridiculous. It's definitely a crime of fashion - but I want legislation against that as much as I do against wearing a hat indoors. Dumb.
Oh - and what about the little girls (as young as 13 - yikes!) that wear their jeans so low you can see their thongs in back and too much in front? I find that way more obscene than some gangster wannabe's boxer shorts.
- 11 votes
#12 - Sun Sep 16, 2007 5:46 PM EDTI quite agree, Miss Dev. Mainly for the issue of enforcing the highly sexual media image of women in this country. What do baggy pants do? Well, they enforce stereotypes. Neither is good, but which applies to more people?
- 3 votes
When I lived in Louisville, a new entertainment district opened and it had a dress code. You couldn't wear baggy pants, sleeveless shirts, or crooked ballcaps. It seemed pretty clear at the time that the dress code was racially (or culturally?) motivated however, the sexist implications were equally obvious as women could wear sleeveless shirts (and pretty much anything else they wanted to).
- 4 votes
I was standing downtown the other day when this HOT girl came by with really low cut pants, her thong plainly obvious. Plainly. When she saw me glance at her thong (yup, I looked, just couldn't help myself) she had the gall to look highly offended, and tried to pull them over her thong. It didn't work, as the pants were too low cut. I don't honestly know what she expected when she put them on. Did she expect that no one would notice?? Sheesh.
- 4 votes
@songbird - what bothers me more than the sexualization of women in the media is the sexualization if girls. It's more than just a double standard, it's terrifying. These are the messages I see the two genders putting out:
Young man wearing pants showing his boxers: "I'm a badass and I can do whatever I want."
Young woman wearing pants showing her thong: "Aren't I sexy? Don't you want some of this?"
What freaks me out is that I've seen girls as young as 12 or 13 wearing those extreme lowrise pants and I worry about their safety.
@merrydeath - don't you love double standards?
@Diabolical Things - I've seen that, too. If you put it out there, then expect it to be noticed. It's the same with women who wear tiny little tops with their breasts flopping all over the place, and they are shocked when people stare at their chest when they speak to them. I wear low-cut tops, but not to the point that my girls are all up in everyone's business.
I have a good friend who lives in Boulder, Colorado, and every spring she says is "Vagina Season." It gets warm out and all the little freshmen take out their tiny little miniskirts that sometimes don't even cover their girl parts, and it seems that every other girl is wearing one. It's really nauseating and far more inappropriate than baggy pants. At least the baggy pants cover the guy's junk (most of the time).
This is disgracing. Their woredrope is less revealing then a dress, and their shrits go down far enough like a dress.
This is a horrible law. Lets arrest and detain all these legistlators daughters and cohorts daughters who wear dresses.
- 2 votes
#13 - Sun Sep 16, 2007 6:00 PM EDTPeople do not get it. These city governments are not interested in 'punishing' anyone about their 'fashion' choices. They are trying to educate these youth that the emulating goofs and losers who are passing their time in the penitentiary is not a good way to go through life. The baggy drooped down pants style is a gang thing gone mainstream. It serves not an iota of useful purpose and in any objective, informed sense is ludicrous as a 'style'. You'all need to stop making excuses for these misfits.
- 5 votes
No, you people don't get it. I dressed in that style for years. I still do to an extent, but I've began maturing my style. I had my own way of dressing, just like you have yours. If I want to look like a "fool" for having my pants sagging, well you get the same choice to look like a fool with your belt around your nipples and your socks pulled up high.
If people want to be wierd, they should be able to. Since when is wacky clothing dangerous. Since when do we have a right to tell others what they can and can't wear. Back off, bud.
- 6 votes
Since when is wacky clothing dangerous.
I think you have to work in the "what about the children" angle there. From what I've heard from other asinine public bans, this seems to work the best.
Let's see.... we can't have baggy clothes because pant cuffs might drag on the floor and trip the children. No? How about we can't have baggy clothes because it would be a way for kidnappers to easily stash the children.
Wow. I mean, I think it's kind of a lame fashion trend, but do we fine people for other cultural quirks? As far as that goes, why not fine people for using a Bluetooth earpiece? That's very distracting as well. ("Are they talking to me? Or are they just crazy?" BAM! Lightpole.)
"Are they employed? Do they have a high school diploma? It's a wonderful way to redirect at that point," said Trenton Councilwoman Annette Lartigue, who is drafting a law to outlaw saggy pants.
Are you a racist? Do you have an issue with hip-hop culture? It's a wonderful way to demonstrate your serious problem with setting priorities.
- 2 votes
#15 - Sun Sep 16, 2007 6:41 PM EDTSongbird6, I can agree with you about the outlandish Bluetooth ear pieces. I find them just as distracting as exposed underwear. Both seem to shout "HEY, EVERYBODY! LOOK AT ME! AIN'T I SOMETHIN?"
As much as I'd like to get upset about this as a freedom of speech issue, I can't because it's strait up racist, not even disguised. Like Flavor Flav said "@!$%# you and John Wayne."
- 2 votes
#16 - Sun Sep 16, 2007 6:43 PM EDTLike Flavor Flav said "@!$%# you and John Wayne."
Yet another enlightned statement from the rap crap crowd.
- 1 vote
Yet another enlightned statement from the rap crap crowd.
Yeah, I know, I love Public Enemy too... Fight the Power.
- 1 vote
YES! Finally, lawmakers who are making good use of their time and really "cracking down" on those damn hooligans who wear... pants.
Jesus Christ, do something worthwhile and stop force-feeding your ideals on today's youth subcultures. There is no crime taking place here.
- 5 votes
#19 - Sun Sep 16, 2007 7:09 PM EDTI work on a Large HBCU(Historically Black Collegeor UNiversity) -for those that dont know what a HBCU is. DON'T laugh many dont know. Anywho I don't agree with making it law, but I think we are targeting the wrong group of individuals. Last I checked since I am a parent my son don't buy his clothes-I DO. Therefore if we want kids in school to stop dressing that way STOP buying them clothes like that as parents.
There is nothing wrong with self expression, as long as you understand and can define what your expressing and the expression is positve. I see guys on the campus every day with their pants sagged to the point it is really sitting below thir buttucks and on their thighs. and these are our future leaders
We must reteach our kids how to dress appropiately for success.
DO Parents explain to their kids the real numbers Your male child has a 1-10,000,000 chance of becoming a multi millionaire from a rap or music career. but they have a 1-10,000 chance of making millions in a lifetime with a career. These are the numbers we should be stressing and explaining that the you can't wear saggy pants to work and shouldn't wear them to school.
AGAIN it not the kids its the parents i grew up int he south where if i went to school with out a belt on, when i got home I GOT the BELT.
SOmeone said they are stereotyping, well it can only be stereotypical if only we are doing it. How many of us will complain when they target the mexicans or the arabsfor thing that they typically do. If we dont want to be targeted -Then DON'T do it.
BOTTOM LINE-----LAWS WILL NOT STOP THE SAGGY PANTS-- Or any other deviant behaviors- GOOD PARENTING AND COMMUNITY SUPPORT WILL
- 2 votes
#20 - Sun Sep 16, 2007 8:43 PM EDT"Are they employed? Do they have a high school diploma? It's a wonderful way to redirect at that point," said Trenton Councilwoman Annette Lartigue
What does that have to do with anything? is it now a crime not to have a high school diploma?
And in any case, you can see in the pictures, the underwear never shows coause they wear big shirts or jackets to match the pants.
- 1 vote
#21 - Sun Sep 16, 2007 9:03 PM EDTLartigue's point is that critics "redirect" conversation away from the Very Serious Issue of saggy pants by fingering the proposed law as a transparent salute to Jim Crow. After all, only white people are educable and employed. (...)
- 3 votes
This has been around for a long time...why the fuss now? Nothing better to do than make these kinds of laws? How about addressing substantial issues? Sheesh!
- 1 vote
#22 - Sun Sep 16, 2007 9:11 PM EDTWhy ban them when they get caught much quicker while trying to run away.......
- 4 votes
#23 - Sun Sep 16, 2007 9:39 PM EDTOK I am going out on a limb and saying good for them. Who the hell wants to see your underwear anyway. Imagine how uncomfortable it must be to walk around all day holding up your paints. Buying the wrong size clothing and a belt to keep them up does not make sense.
- 2 votes
#24 - Sun Sep 16, 2007 10:42 PM EDTSo you think the government should be in the business of regulating how people can dress?
- 3 votes
Buying the wrong size clothing and a belt to keep them up does not make sense.
And forcibly regulating what people can and cannot wear does?
- 3 votes
OK so maybe arresting or ticketing people is a bit overkill, but just like stores put up signs "no shirt no shoes no service". They can put up signs that say "If I see your underwear no service" not as catchy but maybe we can think of something together. Then the style make be forced to change.
- 2 votes
How stupid can our governments get!! Real crime is a serious problem, but what are law enforcement doing? Worrying about how someone is dressed. If someone wants to look like a slob; let them. What next. Requiring someone wear a shirt and tie to shop at Krogers? Law enforcemant needs to concentrate on real crime, not on a bunch of totalitarian intimidation.
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