Sad sack droopy drawers

This of course comes from the famous South Pacific by Rodgers and Hammerstein.  However, the latter part refers to boys and their shorts (or pants).  It would seem that the older or darker the kids are, the lower the shorts.  There have been many times I have had to tell them to pull the shorts up.  Of course, just like runners in the hall continue when the teacher is out of sight, the shorts will come back down as well- I’m realistic.  But I tell ’em anyway.  I recall one black student who had his pants down past his buttocks.  He had to have a belt buckled tightly or they would have finished the journey down unhindered.  I have had another student tell me it was okay to wear his shorts so low because he was black.  But of course it isn’t just black students, but as I said older students like to do this as well, as I witness in eighth grade especially and some of the high school leaders in church.  In fact, during the camp meeting a few weeks ago the camp (and high school) director flatly said the shorts stay up or he will give them a rope to hold them up.

I have gotten softer on this lately and will usually tell them if they want to wear them low, they have to compensate with a long shirt.  Basically, as long as I can’t see what color their underwear is I’m happy.  The problem is when they sit.  The amount the shirt covers is a lot less than when they are standing, so I constantly have to say thing like, “I’m pretty sure I’m not supposed to know you are wearing red plaid underwear.”  They usually take the hint and pull them up.

This fashion I am told started in prisons, where guys would show they are “available,” if you know what I mean.  How this got out of the prisons and to our youth I have no idea, but sadly it shows why black boys tend to do it more as they are vastly over-represented (by demographics) in jail.  It can’t be comfortable.  I certainly know how uncomfortable it feels when I forget to put on a belt and my pants are just a bit loose.  I suppose they do it for the same reason adolescents do most thing adults don’t like- because the adults don’t like it (“heh, heh- I have to live in the old man’s house following his rules, so I’ll get him back by doing stuff he hates!”).

Then there are the younger boys.  Usually there is no problem with them, but today I ran into the opposite case.  I was in a very low LD class today and one of the students had his shorts pulled up as high as possible.  This is often seen on more, ah, senior men (covering up the tire- I have been tempted to do the same, which I resist by picturing what I would look like to others if I did!) but not so much on kids.  Perhaps part of what made it look odd was that the shirt was tucked in, another rare occurence among our youth.  In any event, I didn’t say anything as no one had a problem with it and at least the shorts pulled in this direction didn’t reveal what was underneath.

Another trend I’ve noticed is age affects the size or length of clothing as well.  With the girls the clothes get smaller (see this picture for an example that is sort of an analogue to this topic- it shows undergarments by year, but the outerwear by age follows the same trend…) and with the boys the shorts get longer.  Girls seem to want to reveal more as they get older (and they wonder why teenage sex is a problem) while the boys want to reveal less.  I think this was true in the eighties too.  Some I know didn’t wear shorts at all no matter the heat.  My brother was one of them.

Well, I think I will stop here.  Some of you are already wondering about me, a guy, writing about something like this.  Yes, I’m done.  Definitely done.

Derek