TikTok users predict baggy jeans will stay in style for 2024, especially ones reminiscent of 90’s and Y2K JNCO brand jeans. While shopping vintage can be extremely pricey, many TikTok users curb this obstacle by thrifting massively oversized jeans for the trendy baggy look. The only caveat is that “oversized” has now become conflated with making plus-sized clothes inaccessible in person at thrift stores or online.
In 2022, one TikTok video went viral for joking about wearing extremely large jeans so large that the person’s belt was around their chest instead of waist. Other users have flexed wearing jeans “10x” too big for them, finding the “biggest jeans ever” and making outfits out of size 30 jeans and 5xl shirts.
There lies two problems with thin people actively searching for, and bragging about, exceedingly baggy jeans.
First, glamorizing huge clothing against slim bodies as a joke perpetuates shame onto plus-sized people for whom “huge” clothing is normal for. Secondly, plus-sized people have an even harder time finding economically accessible clothing when thin people choose to buy the few large sizes available in an array of small sizes on thrift store racks.
60% of plus-sized women already have trouble finding attractive clothing in their size.Watching skinny people deem their clothes the “biggest” they’ve ever seen not only puts guilt upon plus-sized people for being a size 30+, but also adds salt to the wound by conveying a thin person casually hoarding this size of clothing in an insensitive and privileged manner.
One TikTok user even goes so far as to claim shopping for jeans is “easy” because one can simply buy clothes in bigger sizes for the baggy trend they seek. It begs the question: easy for whom? Certainly not actual plus-sized individuals who don’t have the privilege of sizing up or wearing “baggy” jeans, as their normal sizes are considered “baggy” to thin people already.
Some of the most entitled and privileged fashion folk who sport oversized clothes make a living out of it, scrounging around Ebay for rare clothing staples at sizes 6XL or 56 when they obviously don’t need it. The TikTok account @baggyclothesaremything is practically a slap in the face for plus-sized people searching for similar Y2K and 90’s trends with little luck.
Deeming plus-sized clothes on the market as simply “baggy” allows thin people to avoid accountability for unnecessarily going to the extreme for oversized fashion, as they can easily find baggy clothes tailored to their waist measurements in a plethora of stores. Baggy trends in and of themselves aren’t problematic when sourced within one’s size range. There are many popular stores such as Hollister, American Eagle and H&M that sell baggy clothes tailored for slim bodies, and shopping two sizes up isn’t as detrimental as shopping five sizes up.
Throughout all the systematic bullying, harassment and discrimination plus-sized individuals face, clothing should be the least of their concerns. For this reason, slimmer people should listen to plus-sized voices and re-consider the ways in which language and entitlement isolates slim people from plus-sized individuals who want to equally enjoy fashion.
