pick of the twitter

Boxers? Briefs? Boxer briefs? Let’s slip into the Twitter debate for National Underwear Day

By · Updated on January 26, 2024
Man in underwear putting on pants

August 5 is National Underwear Day, so it’s time to revisit the debate dividing our global society: Boxers or briefs? (Or neither?)

The boxers-versus-briefs question is often a matter of taste and comfort—except, perhaps, when sperm count comes into play. Jorge Chavarro, a fertility researcher at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health, told The New Yorker in 2018 that tight-fitting underwear reduces sperm production (though not out of the normal range, unless one’s sperm numbers are low to begin with).

For a long time, men were apathetic about their underwear, as Shaun Cole, author of The Story of Men’s Underwear, told i-D last year. And then came gym culture.

“In the ’80s, ’90s, ’00s and into the ’10s, men were in scenarios where they were taking their clothes off in front of each other, and so they began to think more about what they look like as they undressed,” Cole explained.

It was around then that boxer briefs took off in popularity, offering a happy medium between form-fitting briefs and comfortable boxers.

Related:

PHOTOS: 25 vintage male underwear ads & a brief history on undies

Did you know the first known pair of underwear can be dated all the way back to 3300 B.C.?

But here in the 2020s, men are starting to reject gender norms in underwear and looking beyond the boxer/brief binary. (Observe, if you will, the 60 percent spike in eBay searches for men’s lingerie after Rihanna popularized that option through her Savage X Fenty brand.)

So as we hit another National Underwear Day, here are Twitter users’ thoughts about boxer, briefs, and other options — as well as a handful of users of the app formally known as Twitter who are still on the fence.

Votes for boxers

Stripping Taylor Lautner GIF - Find & Share on GIPHY

Votes for briefs

Cristiano Ronaldo Underwear GIF - Find & Share on GIPHY

Third-party votes

Drink Water GIF by Box Menswear - Find & Share on GIPHY

Undecided voters

Related:

PHOTOS: Men are rocking skimpy bodysuits & they’re turning hot gay summer into an inferno

Speedos and thongs are so last year! This summer is all about the scantily-clad gays in skimpy bodysuits.

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