Politicians, Dress Codes, and Losers #2, Plus Fashionable Fundies

SAGGIN' PANTS, CHASTITY RINGS - OUT!

CROCS-IN ( AND WITH PRESIDENTIAL APPROVAL)!
HIJAB & NIQAB - STILL DEBATABLE

The news this past week, threw me for a loop! Besides the numerous articles on saggin' pants and the niqab, what really caught my eye was this:

“Echo”: Hijab Related Problem in BP
Now, you'd think a savvy international company, one that's been around the world for ages would be a bit more tolerant, but according to Echo / Pravo:

Thus, number of information agencies informed that girl practicing Islam and wearing headscarf in accordance with her religious beliefs was dismissed from BP. Particularly, it is reported that it was Esmira Heydarova’s religious beliefs that caused her dismissal. She worked for Sangachal terminal “BP-Azerbaijan”. It is also reported that the dismissed was warned on the part of leadership to come to work without headscarf. In response, Esmira Heydarova, declared that her clothing is expression of freedom of religion that is why she can’t take off headscarf. In the end it entailed the cease of contract with E. Heydarova.

BP ignored the laws in Texas, where fifteen workers died; in Alaska they spilled more oil; they have a disabled oil rig, "Thunderhorse" in the Gulf of Mexico; and in the U.K. they tried to lie to the court so Lord Browne could hide the fact that he had an affair with a call boy, and allowed him to use his personal business computer; and now this, a blatant attack on a woman due to her dress. And that's not all:

Following information leaked out of independent sources, E. Heydarova was officially dismissed not for wearing hijab, but for some bureaucratic impediment puts on her way by the leadership of company. It is also reported that some women-workers of BP wishing to wear hijab don’t do it fearing to lose their job.

Here's the other news on Hijab, Niqab, Saggin' Pants and Chastity Rings. It looks like the out-of-touch politicians have decided to become fashionistas. Just as an Egyptian court ruled against American University of Cairo's rule against the niqab, I'm sure an American court will rule against the saggin' pants law coming out of a small town in Louisiana. As least in the States we have a myriad of legal excuses for the way we dress. As much as I would like to outlaw some of the biggest offenders, I believe in a free society. Besides, once you start outlawing one form of dress, the ball gets rolling and you can dictate what and what not to wear. Where does it stop?

Some of my personal thoughts regarding why the hijab and niqab are becoming more popular have been confirmed, at least by some of the news reports. Yes, there is a religious movement afoot, but identity seems to be a major motivating factor. Just as we Americans decided to flaunt the love of our country by flying a dozen gazillion flags off our cars after 9-11, the women of Muslim descent decided to show their heritage, as well. Someone is going to come in a scream at me for this, but I suspect in many of these cases, just as we no longer see many of those annoying flags on vehicles, this show of faith will be deemed a passing phase too. Besides whenever you tell people they can't wear a certain type of clothing, they'll revolt by doing just the opposite, and who do the hijab salesmen thank for this upsurge in the U.K.? Jack Straw - see below.

America was attacked on 9-11 and I was living in the Arabian Gulf at the time. When we returned to the States, a month later, for a visit, we were shocked by all the show of temporary patriotism. All of a sudden, everyone was a "patriot." Those of us who chose not to fly a flag off the car, or buy those magnetic "Support Your Troops" car symbols (because we suspected someone, not the troops, was making a shitload of money at the expense of the soldiers) seemed to be in the minority. This is what I suspect is going on with many women wearing the hijab or niqab, particularly after the backlash against Muslims. It's a reaction and somewhat of a natural one, but never ever-lasting. In the Sixties kids embraced Che. In solidarity with Che's ideals and the Cuban Revolution, the Venceremos Brigade started going to Cuba (illegally) to pick sugarcane, in defiance of the U.S. Kids still wear tees with Che's silhouette etched on them. But how many of these youngsters do we see signing up to go to war or even the Venceremos Brigade? How many women wearing the niqab or hijab, which is viewed by some as extremist, would blow themselves up? Or, as some Egyptians believe, prostitute themselves?

As I said before, no one has the right to tell a woman (or men) how to dress, whether it be in a skimpy outfit at Hooters (or practically nude at the Bada Bing) or in a niqab, hijab, or a burkha, if it's her choice. As for the saggin' pants, I'm not a fan. I have to say it just spells out S-L-O-P-P-Y to me, but read on, as it might spell out something else to others. It's a prison fashion. Do you really want to be a prisoner, advertising the fact that you're "available"?

Here's the other articles, follow the links for the full dose of news worthy comments. I've included only quotes that caught my attention and to summarize the whole article for the lazy readers out there. One item that surprised me was how a woman wearing the niqab in Egypt is viewed as a prostitute, but that would jell with the comments from young non-veiling women in the book, Muhajababes. (Again- see below.)



In Vogue, Hijab Style

The recent debate over a Muslim student banned from wearing a face veil at the American University in Cairo highlighted the East-West chasm over the much-debated Muslim attire.

The right to don a hijab, the Muslim head scarf, has created a storm in European countries such as France and Great Britain, pitting Muslims and non-Muslim against each other in the name of freedom.

In Gaza, the hijab has even become an issue of life and death. Palestinian female journalists have been threatened with murder if they continued to display a bare head.

But a hijab is not only a sign of religious fervency, and contrary to Western perception, not all religious Muslim women are dressed uniformly.

A more learned Muslim will point out the subtle differences between the abaya, the jilbab, the galabiyya and the chador; or between a regular hijab, a patterned one, a burka and a niqab.

Veil sales surge post Straw comments

Jack Straw's controversial request for Muslim women to remove their veils has led to an upsurge in sales of the religious garment, according to one of Britain's most senior Muslims.

And his views appear to be reflected in a dramatic upturn in sales.

Research for More 4 News and Channel 4 News Online has shown that there's been a dramatic rise in the number of hijabs being worn - and for the first time there are now more than a million hijabs distributed in Britain every year.

In an interview Dr Bari said: "The veil was never an issue in the Muslim community, only a minority wear it. But when he made those comments, and certain elements of the media picked it up, it turned into a storm.

"What's happening now is that young girls are feeling

that they have to wear it: it's a sort of rebellion, a form of protest or statement.

Yunis Sidat, manager of the Islamic Establishment shop in Leicester, said: "We're selling more veils; it's a bit like when the Koran sold out after 9/11.

"I think they are selling out because people are more confident about wearing them - and there is more awareness in the general public about why people wear them.

"I can't say exactly how many more we are selling - but there has been a definite impact on sales from Jack Straw's comments."



Muslims’ Veils Test Limits of Britain’s Tolerance

Some who wear the niqab, particularly younger women who have taken it up recently, concede that it is a frontal expression of Islamic identity, which they have embraced since Sept. 11, as a form of rebellion against the policies of the Blair government in Iraq, and at home.

LONDON, June 16 — Increasingly, Muslim women in Britain take their children to school and run errands covered head to toe in flowing black gowns that allow only a slit for their eyes. On a Sunday afternoon in Hyde Park, groups of black-clad Muslim women relaxed on the green baize lawn among the in-line skaters and badminton players.

Their appearance, like little else, has unnerved other Britons, testing the limits of tolerance here and fueling the debate over the role of Muslims in British life.

Many veiled women say they are targets of abuse. Meanwhile, there are growing efforts to place legal curbs on the full-face Muslim veil, known as the niqab.

There have been numerous examples in the past year. A lawyer dressed in a niqab was told by an immigration judge that she could not represent a client because, he said, he could not hear her. A teacher wearing a niqab was dismissed from her school. A student who was barred from wearing a niqab took her case to the courts, and lost. In reaction, the British educational authorities are proposing a ban on the niqab in schools altogether.

A leading Labor Party politician, Jack Straw, scolded women last year for coming to see him in his district office in the niqab. Prime Minister Tony Blair has called the niqab a “mark of separation.”

Some who wear the niqab, particularly younger women who have taken it up recently, concede that it is a frontal expression of Islamic identity, which they have embraced since Sept. 11, 2001, as a form of rebellion against the policies of the Blair government in Iraq, and at home.

“For me it is not just a piece of clothing, it’s an act of faith, it’s solidarity,” said a 24-year-old program scheduler at a broadcasting company in London, who would allow only her last name, al-Shaikh, to be printed, saying she wanted to protect her privacy. “9/11 was a wake-up call for young Muslims,” she said.

Other Muslims find the practice objectionable, a step backward for a group that is under pressure after the terrorist attack on London’s transit system in July 2005.

“After the July 7 attacks, this is not the time to be antagonizing Britain by presenting Muslims as something sinister,” said Imran Ahmad, the author of “Unimagined,” an autobiography about growing up Muslim in Britain, and the leader of British Muslims for Secular Democracy. “The veil is so steeped in subjugation, I find it so offensive someone would want to create such barriers. It’s retrograde.”

Many more Muslim women wear the head scarf, called the hijab, covering all or some of their hair. Unlike in France, Turkey and Tunisia, where students in state schools and civil servants are banned from covering their hair, in Britain, Muslim women can wear the head scarf, and indeed the niqab, almost anywhere, for now.

But that tolerance is slowly eroding. Even some who wear the niqab, like Faatema Mayata, a 24-year-old psychology and religious studies teacher, agreed there were limits.

“How can you teach when you are covering your face?” she said, sitting with a cup of tea in her living room in Blackburn, a northern English town, her niqab tucked away because she was within the confines of her home.

She has worn the niqab since she was 12, when she was sent by her parents to an all-girl boarding school. The niqab was not, as many Britons seemed to think, a sign of extremism, she said.

She condemned Britain’s involvement in Iraq, and she described the departure of Mr. Blair at the end of this month as “good riddance of bad rubbish.” But, she added, “there are many Muslims like this sitting at home having tea, and not taking any interest in jihad.”

The niqab, to her, is about identity. “If I dressed in a Western way I could be a Hindu, I could be anything,” she said. “This way I feel comfortable in my identity as a Muslim woman.”

No one else in her family wears the niqab. Her husband, Ibrahim Boodi, a social worker, was indifferent, she said. “If I took it off today, he wouldn’t care.”

Some British commentators have complained that mosques encourage women to wear the niqab, a practice they have said should be stopped.

One woman, Sajida Khaton, 24, interviewed as she sat discreetly in a Pizza Hut, said she did not wear the veil on the subway, a precaution her husband encourages for safety reasons. Sometimes, she said, she gets a kick out of the mocking.

“ ‘All right gorgeous,’ ” she said she had heard men say as she walked along the street. “I feel empowered,” she said. “They’d like to see, and they can’t.”

She often comes to the neighborhood restaurant along busy Whitechapel Road in East London for a slice or two, a habit, she said, that shows that even veiled women are well integrated into Britain’s daily life.

“I’m in Pizza Hut with my son,” said Ms. Khaton, nodding at her 4-year-old and speaking in a soft East London accent that bore no hint of her Bangladeshi heritage. “I was born here, I’ve never been to Bangladesh. I certainly don’t feel Bangladeshi. So when they say, ‘Go back home,’ where should I go?”

Behind the Veil

According to Newsweek:

An Egyptian court has ruled that universities can't bar Islamic face-coverings. But that's unlikely to stop the headdress attracting unwelcome attention on the streets of Cairo.

A special chamber of the court ruled on June 9 that the American University in Cairo (AUC) could not bar a female scholar who wears the niqab from using university facilities.

Egypt’s battle against the niqab has a long history. Authorities originally banned students from wearing it to school in 1994, saying that it violated security standards. Dozens of pupils were suspended in the decade that followed. In nearly all cases however, the court overturned the decision and allowed the girls to return to class...However, the American University stayed firm, refusing to permit even the niqab-wearing mothers of graduates to attend the commencement ceremony, according to some students.

Certainly, the concerns run the gamut from women using the face veil to cheat in exams—be it by stashing away crib sheets or trading places with other students—to young men using it as a disguise to sneak into the girls’ dormitory. Then there are the political concerns; across the region, the increasing influence of Islamic parties poses a viable threat to the old, Western- friendly boys’ club of Arab rulers.

Certainly, the decision is a sign of the times. Just 30 years ago, young women attended Cairo University wearing miniskirts and the latest Paris fashions. They strolled along the beaches of Alexandria in skimpy swimsuits. The hijab was often perceived as a social-status indicator; women of the upper and middle classes rarely veiled at a young age and those who did usually observed more fashionable interpretations of the religious head-covering.

All of that changed along with the politics of the region. The Iranian Islamic revolution caused a religious shakeup that leaked into the Arab countries to its west. Government crackdowns on Islamic parties grew fierce as the country’s poor turned more to groups like the Muslim Brotherhood for support. Recently, the war in Iraq set off a tidal wave of anti-Western sentiment across the region, causing millions to embrace their own traditions and beliefs more proudly than ever before.

Ironically, despite the conservative trend that has engulfed the nation, the face veil is viewed by many Muslims as an “un-Egyptian” tradition and in many places, the practice is shunned. In fact, one of the stereotypes that exist among some communities is an association between the niqab and prostitution. “Prostitution is certainly one of the stereotypes for both hijab and niqab—as though these women hide behind it,” says Pakinam Amer, a Cairo-based journalist. “However, many also associate it with extremism, as well as terrorism, even here in Egypt.”

Despite the obstacles and harassment, any casual observer on Egyptian streets can see that the number of women wear the niqab is growing. Nor does it seem to be confined to specific social classes or ages. Some women insist that it is nothing more than an “outfit.”

Court ruling favouring niqab stokes controversy

The court, however, obliged the student to lift the veil to have her identity checked by female or male security personnel on entering the AUC compound.

Veiled anchor on Egyptian local TV breaks the stereotype

CAIRO: Hala El-Malky, a presenter on Channel Five, will be the first veiled anchor to appear on a local Egyptian television station.

El-Malky was not allowed to appear on TV after she donned the Islamic headscarf. This led her to file a lawsuit against the station, which she won.

Regardless of whether we agree or disagree on the veil issue on principle, we all have to accept and respect the individual's right to decide her style of clothes, Gamal Eid, executive director for the Arabic Network for Human Rights Information, told The Daily Star Egypt.

"But we also have to accept unveiled women and not treat them with less respect than veiled ones," Eid added.

The style of dress of Egyptian women has been the subject of widespread debate as last year.

Last January, Minister of Religious Endowments Hamdy Zaqzuq expelled an employee from a meeting for refusing to remove her niqab (the full face cover).

Farouk Hosni, Minister of Culture, set off a firestorm last November when he criticized the veil and those who choose to wear it.

This trend of women covering after marriage has long been adopted in Egyptian society. Up till the last ten years, the veil was only adopted by old married women, and it was hard to find young veiled Egyptians.

However, recently the situation changed.

Over the past decade, Amr Khaled, a famous Egyptian televangelist, managed to gather many youngsters to his lectures and speeches in Cairo's most popular mosques in elite areas like Mohandiseen and Sixth of October City.

Khaled's speeches focused on the veil and as a result, lots of Egyptian girls adopted it.

British High Court Wrestles With Symbol of Premarital Purity

A 16-year-old evangelical Christian protested that her school has refused to allow her to wear a so-called purity ring, symbolizing a commitment to premarital chastity.

Hijabs and Muhajababes

Just as there is a division within Islam between Sunni’s and Shites, a fashion divide has splintered Muslim women into three factions. On one side are those Muslim women who are true believers. Around the world -- in hijab hotspots -- these traditionalists are fighting for their right to wear head scarves as expressions of their religious piety. Caught in the middle -- sometimes in the crossfire -- are Muslim women who live in countries with issues on what constitutes national identity. On the opposite end of the spectrum are a new generation of young Muslim women known as “Muhajababes,” rebels who cover up to be cool, but hide their true selves behind their veils.

Their stories may surprise you.

“Take sex before marriage,” said one candid Muhajababe. “I know it is haram (forbidden by Islam) but the veiled girls . . . they are all at it.”

School apologizes for demanding Muslim girl remove headscarf

Thirteen-year-old Issra Omer told her parents she was too embarrassed to show up for summer school classes at Seaside High School in Monterey County on Wednesday, the day after a monitor demanded she remove her hijab (hee-JAWB) to conform to the district's no-hat policy.

Issra explained that her scarf is worn for religious reasons, but she says the school employee still yelled at her.

In Louisiana town, wearing low-rider pants may cost you

Supporters say the new ordinance aims to curb indecent behavior while opponents say it infringes on freedom of personal expression.

DELCAMBRE, La. - Buying jeans three sizes too big, young men across America, many of them black, are taunting both the laws of gravity and fashion by wearing their pants below their behinds.

But if they won't heed the age-old mother's lament to "pull your pants up," will judges have to step in to enforce a general belt-tightening?

As states, cities, and activists across the country either outlaw or hold belt rallies to draw attention to the trend of "saggin'," Delcambre, La. (pop. 1,700) last week took the boldest step yet. Getting caught with one's pants too far down could now cost $500 in fines – or six months in jail – at least on this side of Bayou Carlin.

"It's just unbelievable what they do with their pants," says Carol Broussard, the town's mayor. "What's next? Are they going to take their pants off completely?"

To be sure, it's not the first time middle America has kvetched – and even passed laws – about fashions from bell-bottoms to G-strings.

"This isn't so much about comfort or carelessness or letting something fall where it naturally falls, it's a specific look and a statement which some people have to work hard to affect, sometimes seeming to defy gravitational laws," says Robert Thompson, a pop-culture expert at Syracuse University in New York. "It represents a certain attitude and style that people are very nervous about."

Taking cues from prison culture, where belts are banned, the trend has been around for several years, moving from urban hip-hop centers like Atlanta and New York out into the boonies, and emulated not just by blacks, but Anglos, Mexicans, and Vietnamese. Some kids say it's more for comfort than a statement, even though some take on a peculiar swinging gait to create enough thigh pressure to hold on. Others just hold them up.

An informal poll in the Lafayette Advertiser newspaper last week showed 79 percent of residents support the town's ordinance. Jet Magazine, known for black style, carried an article in May that was critical of sagging.

Moreover, civic organizers in Atlanta, Detroit, Nashville, Tenn., and Birmingham, Ala., are planning antisagging rallies, says Pastor Dianne Robinson of Jacksonville, Fla., who last week handed out 78 donated belts at a "belt rally." "This sagging of the pants is to me a defiant act, and it has all kinds of implications," says Ms. Robinson, who is black. "If you can't get up in the morning and pull your pants up, that says a lot about you, even if I don't know anything about you."

The chief legal issue, experts say, is whether wearing one's pants too low is indecent, especially if all that's showing is heavily branded underwear. "This is an effort to legislate taste and morality as opposed to any legitimate case that this is indecent exposure," argues Mr. Thompson.

Here in Delcambre, where life revolves around the church and the bayou, sponsors of the antisagging law acknowledge potential legal tangles. "We don't know if we can enforce it, but we're going to try," says Mr. Broussard.

Ultimately, residents say it might be hard to catch them in the act. "When they see the cops coming, they're just going to pull their pants up," says Mr. George.

Florida Senator Battles Sagging Fashion

Democratic Senator Gary Siplin Wants To Ban Low Riding Pants

In what may be the biggest waste of a state legislature's time since Texas congressman Edmund Kuempel fought to get guns in the hands of blind people, Orlando Senator Gary Siplin has finally dropped his "pull up your pants bill" but not before lecturing members of the gallery on the evils of low-riding trousers.

Under Siplin's proposed amendment, which he has proposed unsuccessfully several times now, students caught wearing their pants below the waistline, or with underwear peaking out, would be punished. First time offenders get a warning, "followed by a three day suspension for a second offense and a ten day suspension for a 3rd violation." If you think that's extreme, Siplin originally proposed jail time as a punishment though that disappeared, possibly because of cries of hypocrisy. You see, the state senator "is a convicted felon, who skipped jail time in favor of parole." Perhaps this is how he knew that "[w]hen a prisoner wears his pants below the waist he's indicating that he's available for the night," as he told the crowd of sixth graders.

Sagging Pants: Hip Hop Trend or Prison Trend?

...he turns around and the outfit and style go down the drain. I look down to see this boy/man's pants hanging under or in the middle of his butt. He pulls his pants up repeatedly because they start to drift down as he walks, and he's perfected that slow dip walk so they don't fall down altogether...Suddenly he's not so attractive to me and I walk away with a vicious eye roll.

But there is an even more obvious reason why pants are sagging in prison. If the pants are below a man's bottom, it is to introduce to other men that he is homosexual. As Eazy E once said about women in skirts, "For easy access, baby."

But when did wearing baggy pants have to be so exaggerated? Can't they just be loose fitting but still on the waist? How is it attractive for a woman to see some man's pants sagging so far down under his butt that it looks like there's a private party going on around in his knees?

This trend increased when new citizens came out of prison and were so used to wearing their pants this way that they continued on. You know America loves a bad guy; we can see that in movies and music everyday. So, many young boys and men emulated this seemingly hardcore status...Now how is it that the actual prisoners who were used to wearing their clothes this way are now wearing suits but the boys and men who'd never make it out of jail and would cry at the thought of going are so hell bent on representing this crew? Do women a favor, guys. Pull your pants up. Sometimes your outward appearance can represent something positive or tell a lot about you, such as the attractive man I spoke of in the first paragraph, but other times it can represent something that'll turn women away regardless of how attractive you may be. However, it might turn more men to you, specifically the ones that think they can get in your pants easy, literally. If that is your preference, by no means do I have the right to judge. But if it's not, you're sending out the wrong signals to women.

Louisiana Mayor Bans Sagging Pants


Not every one of our black sons is lost


Fight 'ghetto' as a mindset, author urges

Ghetto is no longer a place, says author Cora Daniels - it's a mindset. And it has traveled far beyond sagging pants on urban street corners, says the 35-year-old black New Yorker, who visited Cleveland this week to promote her new book, "Ghettonation: A Journey into the Land of Bling and the Home of the Shameless." (Doubleday, $23.95).

What is ghetto? Daniels defines it as a mindset that embraces the worst behavior instead of the best, a get-rich-or- die-trying mentality that can't fathom long-term goals and prefers immediate rewards. Her book is peppered with instances of how she, a Yale-educated writer who grew up in a Manhattan tenement, has had plenty of her own ghetto moments: She buys bootleg DVDs, for example, and has sneaked into movies at the cineplex.

Daniels, a former writer for Fortune magazine who said she felt obligated to follow the money, points out that corporations earn big profits from "ghetto" products like the toy company that markets a miniature pole-dancing kit for kids. "The most devastating part about ghetto is that it sells," she writes.

Corporate America is only doing what's natural, she said. "They're there to make money. They're not destroying their own back yard, they're exploiting someone else's." She finds it troublesome that blacks are willing consumers of the music, books and movies that depict them negatively. "We don't have to make it so easy" for corporations to make money degrading blacks, she said.

Her views sparked an introspective discussion Thursday during a book signing at Deuteronomy 8:3 Café in University Circle. One attendee said many people fear correcting the behavior of young people. "It's time for us to stand up. We are the grown- ups," a Cleveland teacher responded. "You can't say, 'I'm above it,' you've got to be in it."

Bakari Kitwana of Westlake, a nationally known hip-hop expert who attended the Friday luncheon, felt the book didn't accomplish much besides point a finger at poor people. "We continue to let the society off the hook," he said. "A much more powerful thing to do would be to challenge the industry. Instead of challenging the powerful, we're challenging the powerless."

Nixing name brands for better grades

There are a couple tricks to sagging your pants.

First, you have walk with your legs spread apart, as if on a horse. Your oversized jeans can’t fall all the way down. And when a teacher tells you to pull them up, go ahead and pull them up. You can just drop them again when you’re in the next hallway.

Cuevas keeps a few pairs of suspenders in his office, for the main offenders, but teachers are tired of dealing with it. It’s something he notices in his Hispanic students, and they do it to fit in, because they saw someone else doing it.

Hear Ye', Hear Ye' - For all those liberals wearing Crocs: Crocs Chairman hosted a fundraiser for the Virginia Republicans!

By Executive Order, Crocs Aren't Chic

Crocs have been given the presidential seal of approval but this is not necessarily a good thing.

George W. Bush was photographed recently in a pair of black Crocs -- Cayman style, $29.99 -- as he was heading out from the White House to ride his bike. He wore the clunky resin clogs -- which have ventilation holes and a heel strap -- with a pair of black shorts, a white camp shirt, a baseball cap with the image of an unidentified Scottish terrier and black bike socks imprinted with the presidential seal. He had the backstraps of his Crocs flipped forward so they rested on the top of the shoes -- turning them into slides. This subtle gesture -- coupled with the subdued color -- actually made the exceedingly unattractive shoes look tolerable.

Could they have been in a goodie bag at the May fundraiser for the Virginia Republican Party, which, according to the Associated Press, Crocs Chairman Rick Sharp hosted and Bush attended?

Crocs were created in 2002 and roared to ubiquity during the summer of 2006, just after the company went public. The company now manufactures about 4 million pairs of Crocs a month and last year had revenue of $354 million, says Mattson. Among the most enthusiastic early adopters were people who spent the major part of their day on their feet: hairstylists and nurses, for instance. They were perfect shoes for walking the dog. Gardeners found them both comfortable and functional.

Did someone say comfortable? Because this is a culture quick to justify wearing virtually anything in the name of comfort -- pajama bottoms as pants, sneakers as business footwear, leggings in lieu of trousers, Uggs with miniskirts -- Crocs now rival flip-flops as the most annoyingly omnipresent style of summer footwear. City streets are inundated with shuffling phalanxes of men and women with bright orange, yellow and red Bozo feet.

And now cold weather may no longer offer a reprieve from Croc-mania. The company has a new line of footwear: You by Crocs. The first collection, called High Spirits, will be in stores for fall. Priced from $149 to $299, the shoes and boots will have leather and suede bodies, but their platform and wedge heels will be made of Crocs's signature resin.