Gay Men — and Everyone Else — Have the Right to Judge Yoga Pants

As a semi-professional opinion-haver, I've come to understand a few general rules to sharing those opinions. First, never read the comments on your articles, not because it'll ruin your self-esteem, but because you'll want to strangle the people who only read as far as the headline before they posted. Second, choose your words wisely; there's a big difference between "people of color" and "colored people." Finally, make sure the opinions you have are a hill worth dying on. Some opinions are best kept to yourself lest you incur the wrath of those who really think it's not only a hill worth dying on, but warrants burning your city to the ground and salting the earth. One man discovered that sharing an opinion can draw a disproportionate response.

Last week Alan Sorrentino wrote a letter to the editor in Rhode Island's Barrington Times that took a less than favorable position on the wearing of yoga pants outside of the yoga studio. That's an odd opinion, since everyone knows that 90 percent of the time, workout clothes are worn aren't in a gym. Well, this opinion, which he tried to explain away as a joke, brought on a rather strong response, with a protest and parade outside his home by hundreds of women wearing yoga pants. He explained the he was making a joke to break away from the seriousness of the current political landscape and that he owns a pair himself. However, it still resulted in a large parade and claims of death threats. Why a gay man would have any opinion about women's clothes ... wait, never mind, that answers itself.

Sometimes it's just better to keep your opinion to yourself, even if it is a joke. Look, I have a lot of opinions. Arguing, debating, and writing long-winded diatribes is actually a hobby of mine, but I know to keep some to myself. Good opinions are complex and can't be summed up in a tweet or a meme on Facebook; they require a lot of nuance, complexity, and reflection on everyone's part. Sometimes you just know to keep them to yourself because the reaction you're going to get will make defending them more effort than it's worth. It's not merely that they are controversial, it's just that some people will take the smallest, most trivial things and turn them into a crusade that would impress Richard the Lionheart. He was a king during the Crusades -- go look it up.

What really gets me, though, is how heated people can get over the stupid stuff, and yes, fashion choices are stupid things to get worked up over. Oh, they are, they totally are. If you don't believe me, wear black shoes with a brown belt. You could be on your way to get the Nobel Prize for curing cancer and someone is still going to side-eye you. Don't think you're above it while you walk across town in your yoga pants protest; you still judge people by what they wear. You're going to go to get in an elevator later on with a guy who's dressed a little too trashy and you're going to hold your purse just a little bit tighter, even though you're on an elevator. What, is he going to snatch your purse and start hitting that useless "open door" button? Think about all those guys you see wearing a trilby that you immediately think have bad hygiene and are going to greet you with a "M'lady." Yes, the hats are called a trilby; fedoras are completely different. Those "bros" wearing cargo shorts and baseball caps that you immediately think are all fratboy douchebags? Look, cargo shorts are practical because of all the pockets and baseball caps keep the sun out of your eyes; besides, you don't seem to have a problem with lesbians wearing the exact same outfit. Additionally, let's talk about capri pants. They're neither shorts nor pants; it's like you have commitment issues. It looks like you're wearing your daughter's clothes. Yes, even I judge people by their clothes. For example, don't trust a hipster who talks all about feminism while wearing facial hair from a time when women couldn't vote.

If you really, truly didn't care about what people think about what you wear, you would wear sweatpants to job interviews and baggy T-shirts to weddings. Of course, this is a bad opinion because it's calling out a hypocritical double standard we have. We talk about how slut-shaming is bad, but we think you shouldn't dress "like that" at the office. It's been proven time and again by psychologists that we trust someone wearing a suit far more than we trust someone "sagging." We see an adult wearing a McDonald's uniform and we judge them a loser. When I say the word "muumuu" you probably think of a poor, morbidly obese woman waddling around Walmart. As human beings, we don't have feathers or swollen baboon butts to show off who we are, so we wear clothes to substitute. Our clothes mark our class, our culture, our age, our jobs, and give off an image we want to convey. That's why we wear serious business clothes to the office, fashionable sexy clothes to the club, and rugged outdoor wear to ... probably not actually go anywhere in the woods, but make people think you do.

Yes, men judge women based on the clothes they wear, but women do it too. I know you're wanting to talk about patriarchy and the male gaze to me now because this is the hill you've chosen. It's a bad hill, though, because judging someone based on their clothing is something you do both consciously and subconsciously no matter your race, gender, politics, or sexuality. It's not an opinion that's very popular because it causes all sorts of hurt feelings that have less to do with clothes than with the other problems in our society. So this whole kerfuffle about clothes and people's opinions on them is one of those times it's really just better to keep your mouth shut on. You can't criticize someone's clothing choices because now you're emblematic of a thousand other social ills, nor can you defend your fashion choices in good faith because you're just going to be a hypocrite about judging others. Sometimes it's just better to walk away from that stupid hill.

AMANDA KERRI is a writer and comedian based in Oklahoma City. Follow her on Twitter @EternalKerri.