Why you see so many men wearing their pants so low despite controversy

So many men and often some women are seen styling ‘sagging pants’ - but did you know the look is rooted in controversy, with some states of America once trying to pass a ban that would see you do jail time for wearing them?

First things first: sagging pants are just trousers worn below the waist, intentionally revealing one's undergarments.

Famous faces like Justin Bieber, BLACKPINK, and Rihanna, as well as rappers Tupac and Soulja Boy have all touted the visible boxer waistband, prioritising both comfort and style.

But it isn’t just celebrities who love sporting droopy draws, with Prada once ushering supermodels down the catwalk in all their baggy beauty.

Hugo Boss also put Gigi Hadid in the combo to showcase the brand’s collaboration with Russell Athletic at Milan Fashion Week back in 2021, and who can forget Miu Miu pairing micro-skirts with the sagging staple for their spring/summer 2022 fashion collection?

When did the sagging pants trend start?

Celebrities like Soulja Boy often sport the 'sagging pants' style, which first became popular in the United States (John Parra/WireImage)

The ultra low-waisted style may have made a comeback recently, but its roots are deep in the 1990s and early 2000s.

According to authors Susan B. Kaiser and Maxine Leeds Craig, the saggy pants look has continued to remain relevant for three decades because 'people persist in wearing a style with which they strongly identify’.

“The panic displaces the blame for social inequality onto youths’ stylistic choices while it implores youth to signal, by pulling up their pants, their allegiance to institutions and a dominant culture that have failed and rejected them,” they wrote in their book, The Persistence of Taste: Art, Museums and Everyday Life After Bourdieu, as per The Washington Post.

What is the controversy around sagging pants?

While both men and women have reclaimed the boxers-and-baggy-jeans look in the 2020s, the trend wasn’t always so favourably looked upon. Men, especially Black men living in the US, were previously criticised for sporting sagging pants.

Various cities in Tennessee, Louisiana and Texas even campaigned to enact laws so saggy pants wearers could be punished with fines and penalties, as per Smithsonian Magazine.

In fact, there was once even a proposal for young men caught in low-waist styles to spend up to three years in state prison as punishment.

Sagging pants were quite controversial, and some people even tried to get it outlawed (Raymond Boyd/Getty Images))

In 2013, The Atlantic wrote that Massachusetts officials called the style choice a ‘behavioural health issue’ affecting both people in ‘neighbourhoods and communities’.

Dr Omar Reid, the President of Black Mental Health Alliance, campaigned to have sagging pants outlawed and actually encouraged people at the time to ‘take a collective stand and tell our young men and boys to pull those pants up’.

Did sagging pants ever actually get officially banned?

A federal law against low-riding jeans was thankfully never enacted under the Massachusetts ‘open and gross lewdness and lascivious behaviour’ law (Section 16).

Political figures like Barack Obama called the implementation of such laws a ‘waste of time’, but that didn’t stop him from advising young men on how to wear their jeans.

Justin Bieber is a fan of the trend, too (John Parra/WireImage)

“Brothers should pull up their pants,” the former US President said in 2008, as per CBS News.

“You are walking by your mother, your grandmother, and your underwear is showing. What's wrong with that? Come on. Some people might not want to see your underwear. I'm one of them."

Despite the controversy, both men and women continue to wear sagging silhouettes, including for comfort, to apparently rebel and as a symbol of masculinity, as per apparel brand Guangzhou Zuoce Clothing Co.

You'll also sometimes see men putting their hands down their sagging pants - but that's for a whole different reason!

A content creator called Elianna Arvizu, who was 25 at the time, told The Washington Post that she opted for the look so she could run worry-free errands around Los Angeles.

“You don’t have to worry about, like, … I don’t know, anything hanging out,” she explained.

So, if you’ve been wanted to try out these sagging silhouettes and channel the likes of Bieber - then let this be your sign.