7-25-08, 9:39 am

They lasted longer than Bell-Bottoms (11 years), Zoot Suits (15-20 years) and if they are still being worn, you better believe it's for a reason other than fashion-related. The beginning of sagging pants (AKA 'bustin' slack') starts way back with a prohibition of belts in prisons where belts were confiscated to prevent inmates from hanging themselves.

Southern California gang members are also cited as originators. It goes without saying how this became closely associated with the hip-hop movement especially the 'gangsta-rap' culture and since the early '90's has shown no sign of slowing down.

A lot of Black youth have come to know of this history and it still doesn't stop many of them from wearing their pants in this manner. What many of them don't realize is the true reason behind gangsta or hard-core rap. It's one thing for me to say it, it's much more important when someone within the music industry explains it. Singer/songwriter Alicia Keys disclosed in a recent interview with 'Blender' magazine that: 'Gangster rap was a ploy to convince black people to kill each other' and that the feud between Tupac Shakur and Notorius B.I.G. was instigated by the government and media to prevent another great (Black) leader from rising.

Keys is right, originally rap was born from revolution. I've stated in past articles about the pre-hip hop rap groups; the Last Poets and Watts Prophets from the early '70's. Their songs awakened, informed and united blacks about the real enemy; White Supremacy and it's many branches. By the late '70's rap re-emerged as mindless entertainment; fun to listen to and non-threatening (Sugar Hill, Doug E. Fresh, Fat Boys etc.), until a song called 'the Message' hit the airwaves by a group called the Grand Master Flash and the Furious Five.

After that was a flood of politically conscious rap artists and groups putting out some great stuff. This went on for much of a decade until a Black heavy metal band called Body Count (led by Ice-T on vocals) released a song called 'Cop Killer,' and NWA came out with 'F--k the Police.'

After which much of White America really became outraged and record industry suits convened behind closed doors, lit their cigarettes and created what many of you call 'gansta rap': i.e. rap music meant to distract you from attacking the white power structure, by attacking each other. The visual effects; videos with big cars and big-butt women, were to make it look cool. Most black gang-members then had no clue what real gangsterism was and years later they still don't.

Sagging pants pretty much shares the same purpose as much of today's rap. Understand, the reason gangsta-rap was invented wasn't really to make the rapper act stupid. It's true value was/is to make the listener act stupid (the stupidity of the rapper is usually already a matter of record). So too with street gear designers. Most of them wear conventional suits and ties, their mission is for the buyer to look and act moronic (let the buyer beware).

Sagging pants' biggest victory is when designers actually custom-made pants specifically designed to droop down your waist. Every fashion design has a standard of behavior attached to it. I could go all the way back before my time and draw a comparison to Zoot Suits. According to the Wikipedia Zoot Suits were invented by Harold C. Fox; a big band musician, clothes designer and salesman. Also credited were Beale St. Taylor Louis Letts and Nathan Elkus. These outfits were a late '30's Harlem jazz culture phenom that featured a long coat and a key chain dangling from the belt to the knee (some had the chain hanging from the wide-brimmed hat to the knee) and back to the side pocket. Baggy-legged pants narrow at the ankle-cuffs were another feature of these suits.

In LA, California Black and Mexican youths were described as being at the 'forefront of the Zoot Suit subculture,' military even had their own DWZ program. On 6/3/43 11 sailors on shore leave were attacked by a gang of Mexicans. Later 200 sailors responded and chartered 20 cabs bound for where else but East LA, and thus began the 1st official Zoot Suit profiling. Mobs of sailors were joined by Marines and Army Soldiers as Hispanic Zoot Suiters were beaten and stripped of their Zoot Suits. This lasted for 2 days.

Bell bottoms were born out of the Counter-Culture era during the '60's. Eventually people of all walks of life wore them.

Sagging pants on the other hand, are profiled heavily. Atlanta has debated whether or not to outlaw them and yes some groups associate these efforts with racial-profiling. That's the problem, some of these groups are white liberal and If you allow them to have their way in everything, you'll have no prayer in school, no more religion being taught, and more school violence.

Oh that's right, this is already going on. The concurrent attraction and repulsion of sagging trousers has the same commonality; it's own absurdity. And whether young African Americans and Hispanics want to hear it or not, White American fears your large numbers and your potential, but grown men adopting such infantile looks and mannerisms associated with sagging pant are a threat to no one but themselves and each other. That's why the white-owned fashion industry keeps them in style 20 years later. --Chris Stevenson is a columnist for the Buffalo Challenger. Contact him at