Phase Seventeen of “appropriate behavior at the gym: the do’s and don’ts, according to a guy with an opinion about anything and everything.”

Piggy backing on the last entry I am going to write about one more personal inquiry that I felt needed to be thrown out there and established. Once again, this isn’t a do or don’t and it does not really effect anyone else, for the most part. This week I am going to bring up the “dudes with the short shorts.”

Who Wears Short Shorts

I don’t think I will ever quite understand why men feel the need to where these things to the gym. It is one thing (and this is a stretch), if you are older and you wear some questionably small running shorts. I have no beef with that and you are not who I am talking about. I am talking about dudes in their 20-somethings wearing specialized bun huggers, as what appears to be some sort of personal statement. What is the purpose of this? How does having your shorts end at the start of your thighs or having them exuberantly skin tight benefit you in any way as a male lifting at the gym (unless of course you are recovering from a hernia)? To me, you are definitely the dude at the beach rocking the leopard Speedo – WHY?!? And when I say why I am really looking for an answer here. I want to be able to understand what would possess someone to wear these things.
When I first noticed this I thought to myself “Ok this guy is a little out of place”, “That is odd”, and of course “Who does this guy think he is?” But then I noticed that he was definitely not some outlier on this skewed chart. An outlier tops becoming an outlier and joins into the category of a trend when it is no longer alone. I see a good handful of men wearing these things when I am at the gym – mainly at mainstream popularized gyms. Man, if that is your style than far be it from me to say anything about it, but please don’t ask me to try and understand its functionality if you cannot give me a completely logical explanation as to why you need them. Even at that I am still not going to agree with you, but at least I will be a lot more understanding. If you are a super gym enthusiast who treats lifting as a sport, then by all means, if you get some type of benefit by wearing these things go for it. But if you are the typical “hipster/mid-level frat boy (the two seem to be fusing these days) with the perfectly quaffed hair” that I always see rocking these things as some kind of fashionably sound joke, please refrain from doing so.

What happened to the good old gym/soccer/basketball shorts that we have grown to socially love and accept? When did guys stop going to “big five” to get things and start going to “American Apparel” for gym shorts? I am by no means an uberly manly man or some type of fashion guru but I still feel that when you go to the gym you should just be putting on some old crap that won’t upset you if you get it soaked in sweat. Maybe I am old fashioned (at 24)? I thought it would be worth while to throw out there because after having several conversations with both women and men alike at the gym about this particular subject I have come to learn that it teeters on between weird and unnecessary. What do you think? Once again this is simply my opinion, take it or leave it