Eating lunch with a group of friends yesterday, I witnessed a phenomenon seen quite often: A girl in front of me was mooning me.
Ok, she wasn't playing a practical joke -- she wasn't mooning me on purpose. Rather, her pants were so low that half of her butt, G-string and all, was hanging out for the entire world to see.
What has happened? When did exposing your back-side become so popular?
Low-rise jeans, called hip-huggers, gained popularity in the late 60s with the dawn of the hippie counter-culture. Rock 'n' roll greats such as Jimi Hendrix and Jim Morrison helped make the style popular, and by the 70s the pants went mainstream.
The 80s marked a time of conservatism, making low-rise pants obsolete. Hip-huggers reappeared on the fashion runways in 1995, and by 2000, Britney, Christina and Jennifer Lopez brought the hip-hugger style to the street.
We now have a new definition of low-rise. A standard pair of jeans has a rise (crotch-to-waist measurement) of 10-12 inches. We haven't seen this style since Jessie Spano on Saved by the Bell. The average pair of low-rise pants has a rise of 7 inches.
Now, however, we see low-rise pants with rises as low as 3 or 4 inches.
Gasoline, a Brazilian denim company, recently came out with a style of pants called Down2There jeans, in which the wearer can pull a bungee cord up or down, adjusting the rise of her jeans as she sees fit.
What is this, a window and a pair of Venetian blinds?
It usually takes a couple of months for a certain fashion to disappear after a powerful, widely-read fashion magazine has declared it to be out of style. Although declared over by Vogue in 2002, low-rise pants are as popular as ever. Lots of people wear them. I see tons of girls wearing incredibly low pants to class, to the gym, out on the weekends, everywhere.
These pants do look cute, especially after hours at the gym doing crunches and working your obliques.But are such intensely low pants really comfortable?
The problem with really low-rise pants is that they are impractical. One can barely sit down without mooning the person behind you (unless you find a chair with a convenient covered back). Dropped your pencil? Too bad. There's no hope of bending over to get it unless you have mastered the "low-rise lunge." Back straight, head up, hips perfectly positioned, you may be able to pick up that pencil while maintaining a semblance of dignity. Another problem with low-rise pants is that as you walk, they repeatedly slide down, resulting in a never ending battle between you and your pants. You try to hike them up as you're walking, but that looks weird, so you just let them slide down, once again, mooning people who may or may not want to see your booty.
These incredibly low-rise jeans are deemed uncomfortable and impractical by many wearers, and have been declared out of style by popular fashion magazines. So, why is everyone still wearing them?
For one, lots of girls think they look good. There's also the allure of showing some skin, maybe even allowing members of the opposite sex a glimpse of underwear, perhaps moving their thoughts to (gasp!) certain, uh, fantasies?
It could be that the pants are a feminist out-cry, a liberating experience. It could just be comfortable to let your belly hang out. Maybe stores are only putting out low-rise style pants and women have no choice but to buy them, creating a false sense of demand.
Or, perhaps most on target, the style hearkens back to an era that has come around again. Hip-slung jeans were popular in the 70s, a time much like ours in which the economy is bad, we are entrenched in an occupation abroad, and many mistrust the government. Wearing hip-slung jeans may just be a way of rebelling against society and government restraints.
We definitely don't need to be wearing super high pants belted up to the rib cage a lá Katherine Hepburn, but we also don't need to be exposing ourselves to every person walking or sitting behind us. Moderately low rise pants are best, for both comfort and style.
P.S. To my readers: Being the fashion guru that I am (ha!), I would love to answer any of your style questions. If anyone, girls or guys, has any questions about style/fashion (clothes, accessories, hair, makeup
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