Early on, when zoot suits were first worn, in the eyes of white servicemen, those who wore zoot suits were "unpatriotic" because in those times of war (the late 1940's) where the cloth was scarce, wearing big and long clothing was an act of defiance. According to an article by Alice Gregory from the Smithsonian website, white soldiers and sailors would beat the Mexican-American men who wore zoot suits. Although it is said that the Zoot Suit Riots were not related to fashion and were driven by tensions felt between different racial and ethnic groups, mainly between white people and people of color, the zoot suits were dominantly worn by the Latino youth in the time that the Zoot Suit Riots broke out. So the zoot suits became a way to identify and racially profile minority groups.
Zoot suits have a history sprouting from a culture in the arts, a fashion sense that was unique and not seen in retail stores. They were mislabeled as costumes and uniforms, but in reality, as Harold Fox (a zoot suit originator, a famous trumpeter and someone who worked with clothes) stated, zoot suits, "...came right off the street and out of the ghetto." As said by the Smithsonian webpage, this fashion sense manifested from those who were looked over in society, making a fashion statement, like wearing a zoot suit, brought light to minority groups left in the shadows. Unfortunately, as I stated earlier, wearing zoot suits gave rise to misidentifying groups of people, and profiling a culture who used their creativity to have an identity in American society.
The police and servicemen enforced pressures that resulted in the distrust in authority figures, where it was further proved right before the LA Uprisings of 1992 when police officers were recorded beating Rodney King. The LA Uprisings of 1992 did not come out of nowhere when minority groups had been racially profiled. Police officers were responsible for the malpractice in their authoritative position, and have imposed stereotypical ideologies by being biased against groups of people.
- Esmeralda Argueta
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