Febraury 16, 2021
A generational war has been playing out on TikTok for some time, although anyone over the age of 24 might be oblivious to the millions of “Millennial vs. Gen Z” videos that have appeared on the social media site in the past year, The Guardian reports.
But now the kids—also known as Zoomers—have turned their sights on something that Millennials apparently hold close—maybe too close: skinny jeans.
In scenes reminiscent of the OK Boomer meme that divided the generations in 2019, the videos are shining a light on how those in Generation Z—broadly defined as anyone born between the mid-90s and 2010—identify themselves in contrast with the generation(s) that came before them.
Since January, there have been 274,000 videos tagged “no skinny jeans” on TikTok and 8.3 million millennial v Gen Z videos. Earlier in the month the male supermodel Luka Sabbat told Esquire: “Skinny jeans don’t look as flattering nowadays.”
Indeed, a video made by TikTok user @momohkd instructs her 410,000 viewers to throw their skinny jeans away, set them alight, or cut them into something new. Like other users she says Millennials should stop wearing them to look youngerthe Guardian notes.
Skinny jeans became mainstream in 2005 after featuring in the Dior Homme autumn/winter collection, as overseen by Hedi Slimane. The size of the jeans—27 inches—was considered tiny—especially in contrast to the price tag: about £200 (US$238).
“Slimane’s skinny jeans were significant for their cut, but also for the bodies he showed them on —incredibly skinny bodies, both of male and female models,” says Emma McClendon, the author of Denim: Fashion’s Frontier. “This changed the marketing and styling of jeans advertisements away from the more sensual look that had dominated the market for bootcut, low-rise jeans to a more androgynous and impossibly thin figure.”
But, the Guardian reports, they never really went away: FLOTUS Jill Biden recently wore a pair on Instagram and they also became a distinguishing feature on the four lads in jeans meme.
What’s changing? There has been an increased focus on body inclusivity in fashion in recent years. In September Versace cast three plus-size models for the first time, and the plus-size model Paloma Elsesser was on the cover of U.S. Vogue in January..
On TikTok, Gen Z users have advocated for baggy jeans instead of slim-fit—eschewing the prescribed idea that thinness is attainable. According to market research company Edited, sales of men’s relaxed-fit jeans have increased by 15% and women’s wide-legged jeans are up 97%. The skinny v baggy online debate not only exposes a generational divide but other socioeconomic truths, too. “This is about issues of ‘taste’ but they intersect with issues of class, age, location, gender,” says McClendon.
The skinny jean, however, may prove hard to get rid of. Last month, Levi’s CEO Chip Bergh told investors he did not “think skinny jeans are ever going away on the women’s side of the business”, despite a clear trend towards “casual, looser-fitting clothes in general”, according to Business Insider.
McClendon added that they “always have a way of bouncing back. They are an extremely versatile and adaptable garment that carry such a multitude of cultural meanings that they will never be irrelevant.”
