Certain clothing items are inappropriate for certain settings. Cargo shorts, outside of like a black tie event, is not one of them.
I wear shorts during our warm months when I’m not at work. Most of them are cargo. I like the functionality of them. Plus, I typically have to carry my wife’s phone when we are out so having the extra pockets is nice. I’m 52 and have never been fashionable or really care.
I used to wear shorts like that, many years ago. I think today they would be useful for causing my college-age daughter to throw up and have a heart attack at the same time. 
I am a 58-year-old cargo shorts wearer, and often pair them with t-shirts or Hawaiian shirts.
I’m 75 and have vertigo. When I walk around I look like I’m drunk anyway, so people are probably laughing at me anyway. I like shorts and sandals when it’s warm enough. Shoes aren’t all that comfortable. As far as ‘cargo’ shorts, or pants for that matter, I need the pockets for ll my ‘old fart’ stuff.
I don’t care what anybody else thinks.
I remember reading in old novels or stories of boys wearing short pants but transitioning to long pants at some point.
I wear shorts almost all year. My wife gets on my case when it’s cold out, but otherwise is OK with it.
It helps that I have good legs.
I will put on pants if we are going out to somewhere nice.
I’m not even entirely sure I own a pair of shorts for walking around (as opposed to working in the garden, or whatever). I stopped wearing shorts somewhere around the late 90s/early 00s. I was living in Hungary at the time, and I stood out a bit if I wore shorts, so I stopped, and haven’t gone back to wearing them since. It’s funny – we used to make fun of a high school friend who never wore shorts, but now, given the choice, I will pick jeans or slacks (or whatever) every time for going out in public.
I can’t conceiver of what is going thru the mind of someone who notices, let alone cares, that some other guy is wearing shorts/cargo */whatever.
This thread is timely. I’m going to a dinner at a high end restaurant. Today the organizer pointed out the dress code:
The dress code is business casual, and they kindly request no t-shirts, casual shorts, hats, or athletic attire
Which had me wondering if I can wear my business shorts?
I am older and I wear cargo shorts about 9 months out of the year. My wife wears cargo shorts. I do only wear Orvis shorts, however, some class there.
Shorts are standard attire during the hot months on the production line at my work… when I got the job, the first thing anyone told me was, “Get shorts.”.
San Francisco here. I’m in shorts most of the year round. Even in the office and there are only a few guys in shorts.
I was going to stop wearing cargo shorts a year or two ago, but then I realized - I have cargo.
mmm
BASF*
*Best Answer So Far
I own a Clutch Cargo DVD. It never occurred to me to store it in shorts. Facepalm.
Here on the left coast, it’s all La Rage baby.
I too like cargo shorts, but I find many of them to be too long. So I hem them up to the bottom of the thigh pockets. I’m a hack with a sewing machine but I can at least do that much.
This Canadian football fan swore at the beginning of the 2001 season that he wouldn’t wear long pants until his team, the Winnipeg Blue Bombers, won the Grey Cup.
They didn’t win it until 2019.
18 years of wearing shorts year-round.
In Winnipeg!
If the traditions of the British Empire mean anything, the only possible answer is the Bermuda variety. See the first picture on this page.
As long time Dopers are familiar with, my usual “home” location has been Puerto Rico. Where as a general society, for a tropical island we are extremely dressed up. Shorts are for chores around the homestead, the beach or a quick run down to the drugstore. But I see later generations are getting more relaxed about that.
But … my parallel “deployed” location is within the Capital Beltway. Wherein in Juy and August, tropical schmopical this is Og’s boiler room! Shorts and technical-fabric t-shirts are a boon for weekend wear.
As to styles, yes, cargo shorts are currently on the outs, mostly because of excesses. There’s having a cotton khaki cargo short with six pockets and then there’s having a khaki cargo short in ripstop nylon with ten outside and two inside pockets and zippers, velcros, snaps, drawstrings, carabiners, hanging loops, slung low with the waistband around crotch level… But the reality is in non-jacket weather, you just may need and want additional pockets and what business is it of anyone.
If they’re good enough for chasing and getting chased by Rommel up and down Cyrenaica, they’re good enough for me…
…OTOH…
Just don’t look like Magnum.
Just say no.
