Vinay Menon: Celebrities are supposed to dress to the nines — not the zeroes by boycotting pants

Finally, a celebrity trend that can save us money.

Forget ugly Christmas sweaters or sequined gowns for the office party. If you want to be au courant this holiday season, just don’t wear pants.

It’s only a matter of time until every celebrity is a nudist. That is the only logical end after years in which showing skin became a competitive sport. First, sleeves got shorter. Then necklines plunged. Then hemlines inched up like H2O levels in bodies of water ravaged by climate change. Then came the cut-outs and the anatomical peek-a-boos: Bare thigh! Bare back! Bare belly! Bare spleen!

Now the rich and famous have declared war on pants.

As the New York Post noted this week: “Fashion-forward celebs are making everyone see London and France by dropping trou — and wearing just underpants as bottoms. Fall’s underwear-as-outerwear trend runs the gamut from tighty-whities to bedazzled G-strings, with Kendall Jenner and Bella Hadid already ditching their pants to parade around in panties.”

The dispatch included a gallery to illustrate the trend.

Hey, look, there’s Kylie Jenner waltzing around Paris in a trench coat and … the white underpants my parents bought me from Sears when I was seven? There’s Bella Hadid, munching street food in a leather jacket and … the white underpants and tube socks my parents bought me from Kmart when I was nine? There’s Rita Ora at the Fashion Awards in London this month, in a red bikini and gossamer coverup from sternum to ankles as her eyes scream, “I need blanket.”

In one photo, Julia Fox appears to have arrived at the CFDA Fashion Awards after a runway mishap in which a propeller from a private twin turboprop accidentally sheered a Stonehenge circle in her dress, exposing her black bra and matching panties. No wonder the 32-year-old has grey hair. She’s gone from dating that antisemitic stooge known as Ye to hitting up Starbucks in her Underoos. She might as well have tattoos of her nipples on her forehead and be done with coyness.

Cosmopolitan recently endorsed this trend: “Kendall Jenner just went out wearing no pants, and it’s a huge vibe.” Huge vibe? Not sure about that, Cosmo. If the rest of us ran errands in our skivvies, Home Depot security might go with a phrase such as “What the hell are you doing? or “You can’t buy lumber without pants!”

This is the problem with celebrities. They inhabit a parallel universe. They are comfortably numb, believing we can never emulate their fashion kookiness. We can’t spring for a custom suit made from steak chops or AstroTurf. We can’t accessorize our skulls with satellite dishes. With inflation, the sticker shock of an Egyptian silk straitjacket and matching spiked collar is prohibitive.

But we can afford to sashay around town without pants.

And we should, to finally give these wacky celebs a retinal lesson.

Oh, it’s all titillating fun and games when model Georgia Fowler hits the red carpet last month at the GQ Men of the Year Awards in her pewter undies. But, celebrities, just wait until your 300-pound limo driver’s Speedo is making unpleasant noises on the leather seat as he ferries you to a junket in which middle-aged journos ask banal questions while scratching at their Calvin Kleins.

Will the no-pants trend be worth it when nobody is wearing pants? Do you want to make small talk with your grandma this month as she bakes Christmas cookies in her thong? Do you want to go on vacation as the tour guide prattles on about ancient Mesopotamia while doing lunges in frayed control briefs?

This is the greatest unforced error in the history of celebrity fashion.

The Jenner and Hadid sisters screwed up. They had an exclusionary thing going when they were twirled in designer duds that would cost mere mortals five to seven mortgage payments. Chris Tucker once told me a back story about the designer shirt he was wearing as I sat across from him in an off-the-rack blazer from the Bay. That’s how this is supposed to work. Fashion is two-tiered.

Celebrities wear clothes that are beyond aspirational for the rest of us. They pledge eternal allegiance to the bespoke and the inimitable. The bands on their watches cost more than our cars. Their walk-in closets boast a square footage to rival a Taco Bell. They are supposed to dress to the nines — not to the zeroes by boycotting pants. What’s next? Will Jennifer Coolidge renounce sweats?

Australia’s the New Daily jumped on the trend this week: “The fashion world is now embracing the no-pants look, with some of the biggest trendsetters and tastemakers debuting racy pantless looks on and off the catwalk.”

Come to think of it, why is this trend dominated by females? Should men not be allowed to live in a world where pants are optional? I demand equal rights. I have a dream that one day we will not be judged by the colour of our skin, but by the fact that so much of our crotch skin is visible during a PowerPoint presentation.

Join me. Unburden and unbuckle.

Or everyone please knock it off already with this creepy exhibitionism!

The no-pants trend is more proof celebs long to be caught with their pants down.

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