Nice capris, boyfriend

By Jim Cook

Published: July 13, 2008

Great news: After years of struggle and oppression, men have finally penetrated the fabric ceiling and can enjoy the same rights as women to wear uncomfortable, confusingly-sized scraps of clothing.

I speak, of course, of the recent launch of a line of capri pants for men.

The miracle of men’s capri pants was brought to my attention by Saavy Reader Les Perault of Ozark, who spotted a story about it in the Eagle. (Little Known Fact 872: Journalists don’t actually read the paper. After working around news all day, we’re sick of it by the time we go home. It’s sort of like why people who work at Papa John’s or Dominos can’t stand pizza.)

Men’s current choices regarding pants are so limited. It’s either pants or jeans. I usually make this choice by rooting around in my hamper and picking out the item that smells the least.

I look forward to being able to wear a pair of pants that will allow my friends and neighbors to enjoy looking at my pipe-cleaner legs and knobby ankles. I also welcome the opportunity to ditch the simplicity of standardized sizing which allows men to go to the store, pick out a pair of britches based solely on waist and leg measurements and be out of there in less than 15 minutes. I eagerly anticipate the chance to enjoy the same opportunity as women to try on every pair of pants in an entire store in order to find something that fits.

If capri pants for men take off, I suggest that the next women’s clothing item the fashion industry markets toward men should be the sports bra. This item comes with a built-in advantage with the male market, because it has the word “sports” in it. As evidenced by all the really gross-tasting sports drinks on the market, if something has the word “sports” in it, men will buy it.

This clever linguistic trick could be used to sell other clothing traditionally marketed toward women to men. Soon we could see men carrying sports purses and wearing sports blouses and sports thong panties.

In time, our newfound fashion equality could spread to our vocabulary. For example, today women can call each other girlfriend without anyone raising an eyebrow, as in, “My girlfriend and I went shopping to day,” or “My girlfriend and I were talking about that on the phone yesterday.” However, if a man were to say something like, “My boyfriend and I really dug that Celine Dion concert last night,” folks would find it a bit odd, and not just because someone actually owned up to liking Celine Dion.

I hope that one day, we’ll be enlightened enough where a conversation like this could occur here in the Wiregrass:

Bubba: Hey, that’s a nice pair of camouflage capri pants you got there.

Earl: Yeah, I got them on clearance from that new boutique, Dixie Fabulous for Men.

Bubba: You reckon you can hunt in those?

Earl: Welp, I figure if I’m wearing capris the deer won’t have that whole “fear of man thing,” because I sure as hell won’t look like one.

Bubba: Hey, do you think if this whole equality thing keeps catching on we’ll be able to get girls to buy us drinks at the bar if we let them watch us kiss each other?

Earl: You’d best shave first.

Male sports panty model Jim Cook can be reached at