Saggy Pants: Protected Right or Public Menace?

Damon W. Root | April 13, 2009

The New York Times reports that some young residents of Riviera Beach, Florida are fighting back against the town's ban on low-hanging pants:

Two assistant public defenders representing three defendants argued before Judge Laura Johnson North of County Court in nearby Palm Beach Gardens that the ordinance and its enforcement violated principles of freedom of expression and the right to due process. They added that enforcement of the ordinance has focused exclusively on young black men.

Mayor Thomas Masters, a Baptist minister, said in an interview that Riviera Beach voters "just got tired of having to look at people's behinds or their undergarments," but the public defenders argued that sagging pants were a constitutionally protected expression of identity.

Their star witness was Chelsea Rousso, a former New York fashion designer who is now a fashion instructor at the Art Institute of Fort Lauderdale.

Read the rest here. Contributing Editor Greg Beato denounces America's "misguided war on saggy pants" here.

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|4.13.09 @ 10:24PM|#

Mayor Thomas Masters, Baptist minister, needs to focus his anger at whoever/whomever is making him look at little boys butts.

|4.13.09 @ 10:38PM|#

Saggy Pants: Protected Right or Public Menace?

Why can't it be both

Dello|4.13.09 @ 10:43PM|#

I'm all for it. That way, when the gangs start shooting each other, none of them can run away...

|4.13.09 @ 10:55PM|#

I would totally test the selective enforcement idea by baring the boxers on chubby white ass. Except that I'm always a bit concerned I'll be murdered in Riviera Beach. I guess it's easier to enforce the pants thing than the murder thing.

Fist of Etiquette|4.13.09 @ 11:05PM|#

Misguided war on saggy pants??? Didn't Beato even bother to check the mayor's reason? Voters, apparently en masse, "got tired" of looking at what those saggy pants reveal.

If Greg Beato can come up with a better argument for any legislation, I'd like to hear it.

Next up: criminalizing pink lawn flamingos.

|4.13.09 @ 11:09PM|#

The fact that the judge even let the "expert witness" on the subject of the proper height of pants and boxers take the stand is mind-boggling. The testimony and the lines of questioning quoted in the article remind me of some of my crappier liberal arts classes.

|4.13.09 @ 11:18PM|#

What this ordinance is really about is providing cops with one more pretext to harass kids.

-jcr

anarch, in third grade, findin|4.13.09 @ 11:22PM|#

In the winter, a dog wears a coat.

In the summer, a dog wears a coat and pants.

Anonymous|4.14.09 @ 12:19AM|#

Why can't it be both

See, these are the types of answers that one could compile for an effective libertarian FAQ. It expertly exposes the conflation of "social good" with "public policy", and helps to hone a complete vocabulary about government action, as opposed to the newspeak that passes for communication in schools and media.

Hugh Akston|4.14.09 @ 12:56AM|#

Why can't it be both

Agreed. Most rights and liberties protected by the constitution have been attacked in some form as threats to the public good or social harmony.

There are going to be places where public good and individual good (or in this case individual liberty) clash. The kind of society we have is largely informed by which side of that divide we come down on.

Jennifer|4.14.09 @ 12:58AM|#

I was hoping this would be a story about a bunch of guys who got together and wore full-length spandex pants over their underwear and under their baggy pants. No such luck, alas.

|4.14.09 @ 1:12AM|#

They added that enforcement of the ordinance has focused exclusively on young black men.

Why does this argument seem tacked on by the wording of the article? In our self-loathing-white society, this is the most effective argument they can give.

Mad Max|4.14.09 @ 1:55AM|#

As I expected, Mayor Thomas Masters of Riviera Beach is black.

Whenever some community gets in the news with a baggy-pants ordinance, the sponsors who get quoted tend to be black. Perhaps the honkies are also anti-droopy-pants, but hesitate to take a leading role in a campaign which is being criticized as targeting young black men.

Why are so many black leaders trying to crack down on the droopy drawers? I believe that they don't like the behavior of these kids - sometimes their own kids, as with the defendant cited in the article. The low-hanging pants are believed to signal a whole complex of anti-social attitudes, and this interpretation is often right.

This is not to say that these laws are prudent or proportionate - perhaps they aren't.

Interesting that the public defender's office is going all-out on this one, finding a fashion expert to serve as an expert witness. Not all public defenders put in this amount of effort.

|4.14.09 @ 2:43AM|#

The funniest thing I've seen lately was three young black males crossing High St. ("between blocks") in Columbus(OH) last year.

They were all "sagging", and two of the three proved capable of holding their pants up while running. The third had his pants "literally" drop to his ankles, causing him to trip and "faceplant" directly in front of a COTA bus. In the right lane beside the bus was a Columbus Police car.

So, this 'yoot' was not only given a ticket for "jaywalking"... he was also charged with "indecent exposure" (the momentum of his 'dive' rolled his boxers even lower than they already were, thus providing "full-frontal nudity" for all of us witnesses when he stood up - including the cop).

Not to mention the "road rash" the kid got on both knees, left arm and hand, and most likely on his "dangling bits"...

We need more humor in this world- so I unequivocally support "sagging"!

|4.14.09 @ 3:05AM|#

People are still sagging? The trend is awful*, to be sure, but awful enough to warrant legislation? This is just going to make people want to do it more.

*by awful I mean completely impractical and aesthetically disappointing

|4.14.09 @ 3:14AM|#

@ me,

I'm a long-time Columbusite (CCAD grad) and Reynoldsburg High graduate. Where're you from?

jtuf|4.14.09 @ 3:18AM|#

A large part of the saggy pants trend is expressing solidarity with people in prisons. Considering what a large percentage of prisoners are in there for drug crimes and how ending up in jail for durgs depends more heavily on socio-economic factors than on actual drug use I can understand its appeal. The people who wear saggy pants could even argue that it is political expression.

Anonymous|4.14.09 @ 5:00AM|#

A large part of the saggy pants trend is expressing solidarity with people in prisons

Why can't the convicts just have buggery and plastic-razor-handle-colored tattoos and like it?

|4.14.09 @ 5:27AM|#

The people who wear saggy pants could even argue that it is political expression.

Best defense of sagging I've ever heard.

don\'t want to be associated w|4.14.09 @ 6:03AM|#

crack down on the droopy drawers

Thank you all the same, Mad Max, for a visual I could have done without this morning.

|4.14.09 @ 6:06AM|#

My wife and I are very white and between the two of us, 41 stone. She keeps saying that when folks like us take to 'saggin', the trend will die a quick death.

Nothing quite like fat middle aged white folk tryin to be 'down wid it'.

|4.14.09 @ 6:11AM|#

I have to say this. If a similar situation presents itself, it doesn't seem to offend my sensibilities nearly as much.

When I see the college aged hotty with the low ridin jeans, the tramp stamp and the thong showing itself in the 'handlebar' position, I tend to see it as a thing of interest. Offensive? ummm not so much.

|4.14.09 @ 6:27AM|#

Art-

I graduated from Hoo~~Wes~~terville South in 1982.

Now living in Groove City.

Anonymous|4.14.09 @ 7:28AM|#

Ah, yes, the tramp stamp. The only sure-fire indicator of STDs.

Riddled with syphilis!™

|4.14.09 @ 7:42AM|#

Saggy pants are like so 1999.

I think this is a stupid law that should not be on the books. Even if the idea behind it was good, it is impractical and impossible to enforce consistently. i.e. At what point does a pair of pants stop being merely loose and become sagging.

Then again, the defense is stupid too. Since when is there a "...constitutionally protected expression of identity?"

ed|4.14.09 @ 7:59AM|#

That photo is priceless. Dressing like a dwarf: the new cultural statement.

Xeones|4.14.09 @ 9:07AM|#

hier

She keeps saying that when folks like us take to 'saggin', the trend will die a quick death.

What are you waiting for, then? Do it! For the children!

|4.14.09 @ 9:07AM|#

|4.14.09 @ 9:10AM|#

xeones, that was absolutely hilarious, thank you.

The Angry Optimist|4.14.09 @ 9:13AM|#

Now living in Groove City.

Grovetucky!

I'm sorry, but I like to avoid going south of 70 as much as possible...'cause I'm a snob like that.

|4.14.09 @ 9:18AM|#

damn yankee

Sulla|4.14.09 @ 9:26AM|#

That one young man in the pic looks like a Wayans. Oh, and they look seriously silly.
But that's just my opinion. If they wanna look like morans, that's up to them. Seems to me to be just another way to hassle a brother. Does the minister get his back up at the silly bigass hats the ladies wear to church?

As someone who watched quite a bit of Yo! MTV Raps back in the days of Tribe Called Quest, Geto Boys and Black Sheep, I'm pretty sure that that is Kris Kross. Of course, I can't be sure because they're not Krossed out.

|4.14.09 @ 9:45AM|#

I wondered why they looked so familiar. Now I know. Thanks for the memory jar, Sulla.

I see saggy-pantsed fellas all around the neighborhood where I work. It's really funny to watch them holding their pants up in the rain.

It's a fashion statement, sure, but what is the statement saying?

I can't be bothered with pants that fit?
Belt, shmelt?
I'm so cool my pants slide right off me?
I'm too lazy to work these things when I have to crap, so I just let 'em fall?

|4.14.09 @ 9:48AM|#

...Riviera Beach voters "just got tired of having to look at people's behinds or their undergarments"

Yet they are on a frickin' beach, the purpose of which is to basically walk around in wet sandy underwear. Pwned.

Anonymous @ 12:19 AM: Good one, Dude(tte). Encourage you to pick a proper handle and post here more regularly.

BTW, law-and-order types should actually be encouraging sagging and bagging since as "me" pinted out at 2:43, da yoots mit der baggy pants is more likely fallin' when chased by the police. Heh.

Telly|4.14.09 @ 10:10AM|#

Shouldn't be against the law or anything, but god damn, that is stupid looking. I like laughing at dumb people.

|4.14.09 @ 10:37AM|#

IANA-cultural anthropologist, but since this is a ghetto fashion, it's possible that the saggy-baggy look is supposed to convey the impression that the yoot is wearing hand-me-down or thrift-store clothing where obtaining a good fit is not always possible.

I remember a similar ghetto fashion trend with overalls with only one shoulder strap worn the other hanging loose. Middle class blacks I knew were appalled when their kids started dressing like this -- they'd worked too hard for too many generations to be able to afford for their kids to not dress like farm hands...

So, yes, this could be driven by non-ghetto parents wanting government to do the hard work of parenting for them...

creech|4.14.09 @ 10:42AM|#

Time to bring back the see-through blouse look.
More artificially enhanced attributes these days, too, then back when that fashion was in style.

|4.14.09 @ 10:59AM|#

For those of you who don't know, Riviera (pronounced Riveera) Beach is a holdover from Jim Crow days when blacks could not go to many beaches in Florida.

More to the point were extremely limited as to where they could buy property. This was a place where well to do blacks who could be chased out of places like Miami beach and Palm Beach could either live on the ocean or vacation.

As a side note to this, there used to be luxury hotels in Liberty City in Miami where entertainers like Nat King Cole could stay while they were in town to entertain the white patrons at the Eden Roc and the Fontainbleu.

Its population is still almost 70% black and incomes are low, especially since the well heeled blacks who once lived or vacationed there are now able to go to all the places that once shunned them.

It is now being targetted by developers who want the city to use eminent domain to take properties for marinas and resorts and the like.

After all, what was anyone ever thinking letting negroes get that amount of oceanfront property? Oh, well the connected developers will soon set that right.

Tonio, saggy pants are prison fashion. It's an imitation the affect you get when they take your belt away so you can't hang yourself with it.

Paul Simmons|4.14.09 @ 11:03AM|#

Do you have a right to show your undergarments or plumber's crack in a public space? We're in the realm here of third party effects.

|4.14.09 @ 11:21AM|#

Saggy Pants: Protected Right or Public Menace?

Why can't it be both[?]

Indeed. According to RC'z Fourth Iron Law:

4. You aren't free unless you are free to be wrong.

|4.14.09 @ 11:24AM|#

That picture is all wrong. Baggy pants and work boots?

|4.14.09 @ 11:28AM|#

I say let 'em wear low pants and untied shoes. Makes it easier to catch the little criminals.

economist|4.14.09 @ 11:54AM|#

"Nothing quite like fat middle aged white folk tryin to be 'down wid it'."

This is how I hope to kill rap music, once and for all.

economist|4.14.09 @ 11:55AM|#

Then again, lots of people think I'm Hispanic, so the stereotype might hold.

But I'm fat and middle-aged, which is probably far more relevant.

|4.14.09 @ 12:17PM|#

Juaquin Phoenix is doin his part.(probly spelt wrongue but I to lazy to look it up)

|4.14.09 @ 12:43PM|#

Maybe the lil patnahs will like this, then:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tBsahlCXntY

|4.14.09 @ 1:31PM|#

Thanks Isaac, that also explains the unlaced shoes.

|4.14.09 @ 2:01PM|#

Sumofthemtrytorhymebuttheycan'tflowlikethisonesumofthemtrytorhymebuttheycan'tflowlikethis Sumofthemtrytorhymebuttheycan'tflowlikethisonesumofthemtrytorhymebuttheycan'tflowlikethis
CuzI'mthemiggidtymiggidtymiggidtymiggidtymackdaddy
CuzI'mthemiggidtymiggidtymiggidtymiggidtymack
CuzI'mthemiggidtymiggidtymiggidtymiggidtymackdaddy
CuzI'mthemiggidtymiggidtymiggidtymiggidtymack

mi coño es su coño|4.14.09 @ 2:10PM|#

If you're saggin', you're faggin'.

mi coño es su coño|4.14.09 @ 2:12PM|#

"See, these are the types of answers that one could compile for an effective libertarian FAQ"

When is someone going to put that FAQ together and post it?

mi coño es su coño|4.14.09 @ 2:20PM|#

"That photo is priceless. Dressing like a dwarf: the new cultural statement."

My concern with paggy pants pertains to public transportation.

When a sagger sits on the bus, it his boxers that make contact with the seat.

Skid-marked, pecker-tracked, crack-sweating cum-stained boxers.

Not to mention crabs and stuff.

Deshawn|4.14.09 @ 3:29PM|#

"Saggy Pants: Protected Right or Public Menace?"

Nigger pathology.

B|4.14.09 @ 4:00PM|#

"They added that enforcement of the ordinance has focused exclusively on young black men."

In other news, immigration arrests in Arizona seem to focus on latinos and prostate cancer studies exclude women.

Outside of Kevin Federline, no white person wears baggy pants.

B|4.14.09 @ 4:01PM|#

The above sentence should read "Except for Kevin Federline".

|4.14.09 @ 8:16PM|#

TAO-

I'm sorry, but I like to avoid going south of 70 as much as possible...'cause I'm a snob like that.

Because it's simply easier to find a crack-whore in Linden or the Short North.

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