On Amreica's ban on sagging pants
On April 16th, 2013, the Daily Trust published a story - ‘Town in the US bans sagging pants’ culled from the nydailynews.com. According to the story, a certain Lousiana town ‘wants to prohibit people from sagging, or wearing pants below the waist and exposing their underwear.’ The ban was to set fine as high as $50 for first offence, $100 for a second offence and $100 plus 16 hours of public service for each sequence of offence on violators.
Historically, two reasons account for the emergence of
sagging practice originally from America. One, in American prisons, sagging was
practiced by the inmates because prisoners were not allowed to wear belt and
other strings because it was one of the most popular weapons that inmates used
to commit suicide or even murder their colleagues either by hanging or
strangling. As a result inmates whose
trousers were oversized had them hanging loose below their waist. It wasn’t a
fashion.
Secondly, there is a strong association of sagging with
homosexuality. In the prison, male inmates were isolated from the female
counterpart, and nature being what it is, the inmates felt sexually starved.
So, there had to be away to assuage this cravings. Consequently, homosexuality
grew among the male inmates, and so they used sagging to indicate sexual
alertness or readiness.
Unfortunately, this practice continued and persisted even
after the prisoners were freed; and perhaps more unfortunately, the
dehumanizing practice filtered into the society as people copied them
passively. Consequently, the trend got even more popular as famous musicians
and artistes began to wear them for stage performances which enjoyed media
publicity. But the musicians did not wear sagging pants to formal occasions or
in the street.
Now, America seem to have began to end what they started by
imposing a ban on sagging pants. For those of us who hold stern face against
the sagging trend, this is a welcome development. At least, we would have the
luxury of not hiding our faces against dirty under wears in the street; and of
course raise the hope for a moral society. But there are scores out there, who
believe the sagging ban is an infringement on right of citizens. But then, the
law is meant to be broken; discretion teaches us to know when to bend or break
the law. If we must fight for our right, then we must be wise. Helon Habila, in
his book ‘Measuring Time’ wrote that
“all wars are unjust except the wars against injustice.” To fight the ban
against sagging pants is unjust because sagging is great injustice against
moral society. But this is what freedom has brought us: a people reduced to the
level of dehumanisation.
As a continent, Africa has over the years been an object of
cultural imperialism, receiving virtually everything and idea that the western
world throws at them through the media. And this explains how weak our
orientation system is and how vulnerable we have become as a Third World
continent. In Nigeria, for instance, our rich culture have been grossly
bastardised, and we are collectively responsible. Think of it, in the real
sense, is the cloth not meant to cover the body? What is this madness about
running the street half naked or wearing something that exposes vital parts of
the body? Of truth, if you have the right mind and moral consciousness, a mere
sight of these sagging fellows nauseates and disgusts you. Yet some people take
pride in it, just because they want to be ‘fashionable.’ But this is highly
inappropriate. We can be fashionable without being vulgar, uncouth or incisive.
The colossal cultural infiltration is a function of both our action and
inactions – the things we have done and things we have refused to do.
Now that America has begun an attempt to sanction the
obnoxious practice, as expected, it has raised lots of interest from our own
part of the world. Since the practice came from them (America), we would not
clap for them yet, but we welcome it, some of us – the right thinking and
morally conscious minds. If the control attempt succeeds, then we wait for the
media – the cultural transmission agent – to join in the campaign; to
re-orientate the masses that the sagging practice is morally inappropriate. But
how long will it take before this happens, if it will happen; before the
unsightly figures of sagging fellows disappear from our streets and other
public places? We can only wait.
As a nation, we have copied virtually everything, especially
from America, probably because we wish to be like America. Yet the difference
between us and America continue to widen. The truth is that we can never become
America. We can only be Nigeria, Africa. As a continent and nations, it is
important to ensure originality, especially culturally. And on the individual
level, it is even more important to see yourself as original and not inferior
to any colour or race. So we maintain our culture. Sagging is an alien practice
and should be discouraged for its moral insensitivity.
However, we wait on our government, hoping that some day we
would wake to the news of a ban on sagging trousers with heavy fine. God bless Nigeria!
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