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Comment by diiq | Hacker News Reader

Wasn't meant to be an attack -- they just solve a different problem for a different demographic. Like I said -- if you can wear cargo pants at work, then these pants probably don't mean much to you.

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I dunno, "fashion-as-pretend-occupation" feels like a negative connotation, sort of a "stolen valor" for professions the supposed person imagines as more prestigious or moral than what they actually do, adventurer or craftsman vs, say, insurance claims adjuster.

> I dunno, "fashion-as-pretend-occupation" feels like a negative connotation, sort of a "stolen valor" for professions the supposed person imagines as more prestigious or moral than what they actually do, adventurer or craftsman vs, say, insurance claims adjuster.

I mean, the OG "fashion as pretend occupation" are just pants in general. The purpose of pants is a piece of clothing that lets you ride horses comfortably. Everywhere people started riding horses (and hence wearing pants), it became fashionable for non-horse-riders to wear pants as well.

The world is full of people who own objects that help them project an image, essentially the essence of jewelry.

IMO, that's not really a bad thing (unless your highest value is authenticity) it's just what people do.

This isn't to say that there aren't people who actually use the objects for their intended purpose. But what percent of people who drive trucks regularly haul stuff or drive off-road?

What were the non-horse riders wearing prior to pants? Tunics?

> What were the non-horse riders wearing prior to pants? Tunics?

I'm not an expert on clothing history, so I don't want to give bad info. I'm sure there are good resources out there if you're curious enough.

I'd assume, though, that it varied by latitude.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hose_(clothing) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunic

Yeah, when I have a moment I'll rewrite that section. I clearly missed the mark tonally.

At least I know folks read all the way to the end, I suppose.

Yeah, it’s a bit intense. I’m a licensed professional engineer who works what is traditional described as a white collar job yet wear cargo pants about every day as I’m regularly in the field supervising and inspecting work. My wife is The winemaker at a small but well know boutique biodynamic winery overlooking the ocean here which is a job many people glamorize, yet likewise she wears cargo pants for work everyday (except for events of course).

By all means cargo pants for a pure coder who doesn’t tinker is sensible, but when I’m hacking away on electronics projects at home they come in handy to hold tools and parts.

In your defense I’ve found the recent trend of wealthy, highly fashionable Women wearing skin tight ancient camo patterns from the mid 20th century equally as deplorable as you speak about cargo pants here, and for all I know there is someone who can disagree with my opinion quite reasonably as well.

EDIT: The little runway video on this link about perfectly sums up everything I feel is wrong. I do not understand anything going on here - all stars with loose camo pants and a denim carhartt jacket? SMH

https://www.mrporter.com/en-us/mens/product/carhartt-wip/clo...

I don't think you missed the mark. Some people just like military cosplay a lot and get offended when you call out what they're doing.

Perhaps, but there are also a lot of people with not-pretend jobs that can and do wear cargo pants (and shorts!). The implication as originally written was that if you can or do wear such clothing at work, you don’t have a ‘real’ job.

That’s patently ridiculous. Heck, some of my highest earning years of late had me working with customers where I’d be more likely to see flip-flops than a collared shirt.

I'll agree cargo pants are military cosplay if you'll agree that denim jeans are cowboy cosplay.

Blue denim jeans pretty much are cowboy cosplay. That’s why they got popular and why they remain popular. The close association with Marlboro Man rugged outdoorsy “masculinity” is an enduring part of their appeal. Even if people aren’t consciously aware of that association driving them when they appreciate a pair of blue denim jeans decades of advertising has undoubtedly inserted that stereotype firmly into the commmon (sub) conscious. Even the premium Japanese denim brands play with the semiotics of denim as “honest” or “rugged” or “no nonsense” or “not fancy” all of which are tropes drawn from the mid-century American ideal of cowboys as a picture of perfect masculine achievement.

Better comparison: trousers are how middle (and upper middle) class Americans cosplay as their millionaire (and billionaire) CEOs.

Yeah, okay. That was easy.

And some people just like having lots of pockets and don't care how it looks.

And some people don't think tight pants look good.

For the people who want a ton of pockets on their pants, cargo pants are pretty much the only option. Do you earnestly believe that all of these people "just like military cosplay"?

Edit: Or maybe I'm wrong, and there are other kinds of pants with many pockets.

How are you defining cargo pants?

These have ten pockets. https://shop.bluffworks.com/products/ascender-chino-regular-...

"Some X are Y" does not imply "all X is Y"; I held the former while you infer I hold the latter.

Fair enough, but I inferred the "all X is Y" bit from the first sentence, in which you said "I don't think you missed the mark" regarding a paragraph which, IIRC, did essentially imply that cargo shorts are by nature deceitful.

I'm not sure cargo pants themselves are "cosplay". A lot of male fashion comes from military - peacoats, bomber jackets, parkas, trench coats, pretty much any boots, etc. And a lot of it comes from jobs - trucker jackets, denim, engineer coats, boiler coats, etc etc.

It becomes kinda cosplay when you have guy in desert camo cargo pants with huge belt with multitool on it, in desert combat boots and beige t-shirt ... in an office, coding Java.

But I'm the guy who goes there wearing M65, jeans and Doc Martens so who am I to talk.

Also you can get slim and stretch cargo pants, which removes the biggest complaint fashion people ususlly have with cargo pants (OMG HUGE BAGGY) and are more techwear/streetwear than military. Unless you get them in camo.

Thinking cargo pants are "lesser" for being associated with manual labor is just disgustingly classist.

The article says that people who like cargo pants are unemployed idiots.

I'm currently at work (thank Pomodoro for HN breaks, curse Murphy for causing everything to fall apart at the same time on a Friday). I'm a college-educated, homeowner, married, father of one, controls engineer. I spend my days at work between my office programming and designing industrial automation equipment, on the shop floor building it, and customer sites selling, upgrading, or maintaining it. I'm not a punk kid, nor am I a paratrooper, and I don't pretend to be nor do I look like either of those things.

I'm currently wearing cargo pants (Columbia Flex Roc). I typically wear Levi's 541s. The Columbia pants do happen to have a side-seam welt pocket that that meets all your requirements. They're comfortable both in a customer conference room or if I'm on the plant floor inside a machine.

I think the reason people are offended by your characterization is that they wear 'cargo pants' but we are not in a different demographic. My Columbia pants solve the exact problem you have and are worn by people exactly within your demographic. (Not to mention physically closer than you think, after a bit of stalking your website, I'm 20 miles north of you, we probably have some of the same clients).

Though it's also possible that they're not cargo pants, maybe they're dad pants. That.... might be the case. And perhaps you're rebelling against becoming one of 'those' middle-aged men. Just give in to it. Have you tried carrying your multitool in the side seam pocket? It's just so handy! :)

Columbia Flex Roc [0] are not really what I would consider cargo pants. Most people talking about cargo pants are talking about something like a G Star Raw Rovic [1] (which are about the slimmest fitting ones I can find).

Another commenter mentioned fitting a notebook & pen in pockets - I'd struggle to fit them in your current pants.

[0] https://columbia.scene7.com/is/image/ColumbiaSportswear2/179...

[1] https://www.g-star.com/en_gb/shop/men/trousers/d02190-5126-2...

As someone shocked how many of the commenters here are wearing cargo pants, I'll admit those gstar ones look pretty good and modern. That said, I think you're being very generous by suggesting this crowd is on the cutting edge of cargo pants fashion with slim fit and modern silhouettes.

This seems more likely: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=Dork+in+cargo+pants&t=fpas&iar=ima...

I was trying not to search along those terms, but yeah that's pretty much what I was thinking. Even as modern as the g star ones are, they are still substantially bulkier than say levis 511s-

[511s] https://www.very.co.uk/levis-511-slim-fit-jeans-black/160011...

I'm really not sure those Columbia trousers are cargo pants at all, they're certainly not what I believe the article author was referring to anyway. (Quite like them though - didn't expect HN to be a place to find clothing recommendations...).

Could be.

But the only demographic I named was "people who can wear cargo pants to work", so you kind of set me up for a "no true scotsman". There are events, and clients, to which I wouldn't wear cargo pants, therefore we're in different demographics :)

It is a little disheartening to spend so much time talking about cargo pants, when I relegated them to a postscript and only mentioned them to say "I am not talking about cargo pants".

But nice to meet another michigander! Hopefully I'll see you at some meetup or event once we have those sorts of things again.

I think the reason people are spending so much time talking about cargo pants is that they recognize, even if they don't articulate, the logical error on your argument. You spend a good amount of the post talking about how there is a lack of innovation in the fashion world. Instead, changes tend to be incremental. You then claim to have created your own innovation, a new kind of pants pocket. Yours is a new product. "But," your audience rightfully says, "don't pockets like that already exist in some pants?" You respond that the existing pockets are on casual pants, such as cargo pants, and that your pocket is a different product because it is on dress pants. But moving a pocket design from one style of pants to another is exactly the sort of incremental change you that you say shows the absence of innovation in fashion. We're drawn to your cargo pant statement because it is demonstrably false.

> It is a little disheartening to spend so much time talking about cargo pants, when I relegated them to a postscript and only mentioned them to say "I am not talking about cargo pants".

But that is totally your own fault for denigrating cargo pant wearers in the initial version of the post.

He didn't denigrate cargo pants wearers, he just said this design isn't for people who wear them... And then cargo pants wearers decided that was reason to complain even more.

He said that people who wear cargo pants just do it dress up like their "pretend job".

Edit: It appears that this was unintentional on the authors part and he has since edited it. Which is great!

> Cargo pants are fashion-as-pretend-occupation — when not at work, wear a fancy chronometer to suggest you’re a pilot or a diver, or camo to suggest you’re in the military. Cargo pants are a paratrooper costume. Cargo shorts have giant external pouches so teenagers in the 90’s, trapped in school, could say (sartorially) “I go out into the world and do adventurous things!” even though the things they stored in those pouches were doritos and portable cd players.

> I am discussing clothing as it might be worn by people while doing their real jobs, not their pretend ones. If cargo pants are appropriate for your real job, you definitely don’t want or need my side-seam welt pockets; and vice-versa."

You did it to yourself by saying cargo pants aren’t “for the office”. This is a site filled with SWEs who work in offices where a dress code that didn’t allow cargo pants is so laughable it would be a reason to quit.

It’s just standard West-coast backlash against fashion snobbery. You might as well have said that anyone not wearing a 3-piece suit isn’t fit to go into the office.

My interpretation was precisely that: dad pants. Personally, I find cargo pants (and shorts my god) incredibly unflattering. Additionally, the proliferation of pockets is a bit silly for many people since phone, wallet, and keys are fairly easy to fit even in skinny jeans. If you need more than go for it and if you like the look, go for it!

It looks like Columbia calls the side seam pocket a "Knife pocket"? https://www.columbia.com/mens-flex-roc-pant-1792581.html

Certainly sounds like an attack. As if someone can't wear cargo pants simply for their utility or, god forbid, find them actually aesthetically appealing.

Lots of jobs do come with a sartorial difficulty level above absolute zero. Not all jobs, but many. Particularly for women (which would be a whole new can of worms we better shouldn't open here)

A widespread low-but-definitely-nonzero would be that you can absolutely wear what you like, but half of the informal roles that are within the scope of your job description are effectively closed unless you dress the part.

Why would that be defensible or desirable?

The blog author comes across as fetishizing that shallow, expensive, your-opinion-dictated-by-fashion, world.

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