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| Yes | 14% | 9 votes | Total: 64 votes | |
| No | 86% | 55 votes |
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Add to FavoritesClothes are a major part of any society's culture. A person's right to wear sagging pants for some people is like losing one button that keeps their pants together. A person losing the right to "sag" beckons the question: Is "sagging" pants that iconic to destroy hip hop?
How do we define hip hop culture? The easiest response to define hip hop is simply music. However, that is like suggesting that pants only need one button to stay closed when it is typically designed with a zipper, more buttons, or either a elastic waist band to be worn. Hip hop culture is more complex than just the music, it involves a community of people, persons' behavior and emotions. It is a culture heavily influenced by trends that are started and ended by purchasing power and social influences. The community that fosters a culture can start and end its own culture by eliminating the trend that catapulted it from the fringes of society into mainstream.
Consider what would happen if the "sag" was replaced by "skinnies"? Rockers are historically tethered to slender, fitted jeans. The punk rocker, the soft rocker, and the indie rocker have continuously recycled a trend wearing "skinnies". If the skinny jean was not recycled over and over again then the sincerity of the rock enthusiast's commitment to rock culture may actually be called into questioned by other members of the rock community. Rockers young and old have all worn a pair of "skinnies." Every generation since the 1950s has supported wearing "skinnies" as a personal homage to the rock culture.
Now consider the hip hop enthusiast. His commitment to hip hop culture is questioned by his cultural group because he no longer"sags" but rather rocks the "skinnies". If one hip hop artist was to stop wearing "sagging" pants due to the "sagging" pants ban then that may mean one lost music fan. A hip hop artist who wears "skinnies" has fans who have supported him over the past several years and albums may not still support him due to his clothing style change. In addition, the authenticity of music this artist performs may be questioned . One botched fashion style can end an artist's music career due to scrutiny of change of his personal style. Changing an artist's personal style may invite the artist to be labeled not a hip hop artist but a popular artist (e.g., pop music).
Hip culture has less to do about music and more regarding identity when collectively teenagers, young adults, "gangstas," and somebody's grandma has enough purchasing power and social mantra to halt the support of a specific genre of music produced in the music industry. If the "buyer" or "believer" of hip hop culture no longer relates to the hip hop artist in a physical, behavioral, and emotional manner like clothing style (i.e.,"sagging"), then hip hop is dead.
Learn more about this author, A Kyles.
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No
First off, let me say this. I am not a fan of the sagging pant trend. I've never understood the appeal, and likely never will. But, I don't believe that the government should have the authority to determine a person's clothing choices. As long as they aren't nude, what a person chooses to wear, or not wear, should be left to their discretion. If we start letting them interfere in something so mundane as what we wear, where will it stop? Besides, considering the state of the economy, I would like to believe that our government has far more important things to be concerned with.
Having said that, I also do not feel that 'banning' sagging pants would destroy hip- hop culture. Why? Because hip-hop culture is far more than a genre of music, and it is certainly far more than a pair of sagging pants.
I'm not saying that sagging pants didn't find its roots in hip-hop. There are still several male hip-hop artists that like that fashion statement. But even so, sagging pants is hardly the defining element of hip-hop culture. In fact, I'd be willing to wager a bet that a large majority of the people wearing sagging pants today probably have never listened to a hip hop album in their lives. And furthermore, you'd likely find just as many hip-hop fans living and working in corporate America, not one pair of sagging jeans in sight.
Hip-hop has produced some of the music industry's most influential artists. Beyonce, Mary J. Blige, Jay-Z, Kanye West, and T.I just to name a few. Are we to believe that their success and popularity was based on something so trivial as the type of jeans they wear? I would hope not. And in the case of Mary J and Beyonce, it would be entirely untrue.
Facts are facts. Clothes are clothes. People dress the way they want to, listen to the music they love, and one doesn't necessarily have anything to do with the other. Assuming that placing a ban on sagging jeans will kill the hip-hop culture is idiotic.
Hip-hop is about people. No matter their race, gender, or sexual orientation, hip-hop manages to reach all types of people. Young, old, black, white, and every color in between. And in doing so, hip-hop will continue making an impact on the world far more powerful than any pair of pants, sagging or otherwise, could ever hope to do.
Learn more about this author, Marcquita Brown.
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