aTypical Joe: a gay New Yorker living in the rural South
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
Baggy pants and sports bra ban in Atlanta?
Atlanta officials agreed yesterday to continue to debate whether the city should regulate baggy pants and exposed underwear:
Council members expect to create a 10- to 12-member task force soon to further the debate and decide whether Atlanta should—or can—pass a law to control fashion.
Can’t wait.
According to Wikipedia, “‘Fashion police’ refers to ... an imaginary police force that makes sure that people dress according to fashion.” Now Atlanta City councilman C.T. Martin no longer wants the fashion police to be just “imaginary.” He has proposed fining men and boys who wear baggy pants that show their underwear and women and girls who show the strap of their thong or wear sports bras in public. One of the comments on the Atlanta Journal-Constitution Web site said it’s “like banning stupidity.” I disagree. Banning stupidity might make more sense. [...]
In all fairness to Councilman Martin, he isn’t just concerned with fashion. He feels that the clothing he’d like to ban is representative of what he thinks are bad aspects of the hip-hop culture, which has its roots in African-American communities. Martin, an African-American, believes that young children see their hip-hop heroes wearing clothing like this, emulate it, and then believe that “half-dressing is the way to go.” He added that baggy pants are becoming “an epidemic” throughout the country. If that’s true, I don’t think the vaccine for that epidemic will be a “baggy pants ban.”
