I first began to really understand how the world works when I heard people remarking “you can really tell who wears the pants in that relationship”. Most obviously, this expression is a comment on how there are often power imbalances in romantic relationships, but there’s more going on here than just that. It also dawns on you how many couples simply don’t own enough pairs of pants and are forced to fight over who gets to wear their precious only pair. Meanwhile, other couples, often unaware of their own privilege, blithely wear multiple pairs of pants as the whim strikes. But as you dig deeper, the questions begin to emerge and a chill creeps up your spine: what is so special about these pants that leads people to fight so bitterly over them? What is it about these pants that makes us manipulate and deceive and betray one another? Do we even need pants, or is it just a huge lie that we’ve been repeating to ourselves for so long that no one even remembers that it wasn’t always like this?