Terrible Trends: The Underbutt Disaster of 2013

Last weekend was chock-full of Canadian music festivals, from VELD to Osheaga to Boots and Hearts. We’re used to seeing certain sartorial terrors on the festival circuit; extreme fringes, crop tops and head-to-toe neon are all par for the course. After all, a full-on rave chic revival has been going on for years now. But nothing could prepare us for the horror of the newest festival trend.

At first it seemed like a terrible accident – maybe the offensive shorts were the result of sudden weight gain or an over-zealous dryer session. But soon it was clear: underbutts were everywhere, and it was no mistake. What we’re referring to as “underbutt,” and what we also like to refer to as “chapsless ass” or “reverse bleavage” is the phenomenon wherein a woman wears her shorts wedgie-style so as to rudely expose the bottom half of her lower cheeks (it’s “reverse” because regular bleavage is more of a plumber’s bum situation).

We polled a couple of guy friends – regular, beer-drinking, straight guys – to see if the trend is somehow being encouraged by positive male feedback. It doesn’t seem to be. Corroborating this evidence against underbutt attraction is Esquire UK, who ranted against “bum cleavage” in early July, demanding that women “buy some bigger shorts.”

The thing is, underbutt-exposing shorts aren’t super flattering. The vast majority of women (and we’ve spotted this trend on not-yet-women, don’t get us started) have at least a little cellulite, and the most common place for it to appear is on the upper thighs. Also, we’re talking about an area of the body that rarely sees the light of day. So it’s pale. After what was witnessed this past weekend, we suspect that these pantsless wonders didn’t actually turn around to look at the result of their wedgified shorts. How is one supposed to drink beer and eat hot dogs when the results of this behaviour are on such full display?!

It was necessary to get to the source of the underbutt, so we took to the interweb and found that this trend, like so many others, arose from Kiefer Sutherland circa 1987, formerly known as Miley Cyrus. Luckily, not all celebrities support this travesty! In fact, Chloë Sevigny called underbutt-exposing cutoffs “a little obscene” and added to our urban thesaurus of terms for the trend with the accurate if not creative: “denim underwear.”

Conclusion: We get it, festivals are sweaty. But that does not give you license to openly air out your swass.

More on the underbutt disaster of 2013:

Why underbutt is the worst trend of the summer

HIGH ALERT: We’re All Helpless Onlookers To The Summer of Butt Cleavage

The rant: Why bum cleavage has to stop

Underbutt is the new underboob

Do you hate underbutt? Love it? Call it out in the comments!

Images courtesy of: cosmopolitan.com, dailymail.co.uk, fanpop.com and veldmusicfestival.com.

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