They’re coming back: In defence of Crocs

I’ve decided to stand up to the onslaught of naysayers. The Croc haters, the people who call them condoms for your feet or say you’ll never get laid if you wear them are wrong. Crocs may have been out of style for a while, but they’re coming back in a big way.

lookin swanky as all hell, brotha

I’m not  going to go into how comfortable they are because it would be an easy argument, but take it from me, they are the most comfortable shoes I’ve ever worn. The reason I bought these was because I used to work in a restaurant in London and all the chefs (who spent 10-12 hours on their feet in a day) wore them.  They seemed comfortable and I thought to myself defiantly: if these burly Brazilian chefs can wear them proudly without irony, or anyone taking the piss, then so can I.

I wanted something comfortable which could take the abuse of the big bad world and they’ve taken some beating: I walked up Arthur’s seat in them, I’ve been swimming with them, I took them to a festival, skanking in both muddy rain and glorious shine. I am most grateful to my crocs however, for the moment they stopped a fuck-off three-inch thorn, which would have torn your flip flop to shit, going into my foot in Croatia. My EHIC card only partly covers healthcare costs in Croatia, and I’m glad didn’t have to find out what parts are meant by partly.

This Croc hatred is just a little bandwagon we like to jump on when there’s nothing else to be said. A boring and trite popular hatred just like Justin Bieber and twerking. Now,after a long exposure to the Croc and it’s appearance,  we’ve passed the anger stage and we should move on to acceptance. A Croc-naissance is imminent, and people will see wearing Crocs and socks as more irreverent than anything else you can wear because you have to give so few fucks to actually pull it off.

I hope when I’m a fourth year there’ll be as many Edinburgh freshers wearing Crocs as there are freshers wearing white Reeboks or Stan Smiths.

these boys know what the fuck is up

Ask anyone 10 years ago what they thought of bum-bags and I assure they would have spat a look of absolute disgust at you because what they were told is the right reaction to the bumbag. In case you’ve forgotten how poisonous the associations around bumbags were think back to ’09 when you saw Weird Al Yankovic wearing one in his video, “White and Nerdy” .

You probably sniggered like “lol who the fuck would wear a bumbag?”  but if any of you were at a festival this year you and your mates probably kept your keys, drugs and anything important in there. You looked like this and you felt like royalty. Why? Because having all your shit together in one zipped up place  you are aware of at all time is functional. And functional can be so much cooler than cool.

A similar thing happened with Birkenstocks and what was long thought to be the unholiest of matrimonies, socks and sandals. Read this article from just three years ago, it is clear this individual feels very strongly about Birkenstocks. Now,  people actually rate Birkenstocks. They’re old school, they’re German and the kinds of people who read fancy books wear them. My mum wears Birkenstocks which is not a bad thing. My mum is mad swaggy, she worked in fashion for more than a decade.

doing the lord’s work – wearing crocs to why not

Since buying crocs and taking on the haters, all my prejudice against them has melted away. Are they really so bad? Aren’t they just fucking comfortable? Aren’t they just so uncool it’s come full circle? Maybe it’s their time to rise out of the ashes of Croc hatred and join the Croc-naissance.