I have an immodest proposal for your consideration and that is let's stop preaching modesty to
girls and women and perhaps in the process change for the better the way our culture
perceives female bodies.
I've had this issue of modesty on my brain for a long time. We're talking since childhood.
My sisters and I were always indoctrinated to be as modest as possible so as to not arouse
the sexual interest of boys around us. When you're a kid that's a little bit confusing
and also a little bit scary. I was reminded of all that while reading about the incident
in Richmond, Virginia where a girl named Claire was kicked out of her home school prom because
her dress which did meet the fingertip length rule was deemed so tight that it would be
arousing impure thoughts in the male chaperones. There have been so many stories about middle
schools and high schools banning leggings, jeggings, essentially any clothing that administrators
deemed 'too tight' on female students' bodies. Girls who have been kicked out of prom because
their dresses showed I kid you not, the curvature of their breasts. Only a few weeks ago for
example, a Utah high school got flamed across the internet because students found out that
oh wait they had photoshopped clothing on girls' necklines and arms in their school
yearbook pictures that they apparently deemed uh I don't know too provocative? What? Yesterday
I was reading about a sign posted at the Nursing School at the University of Texas Austin demanding
that female students dress appropriately including not wearing shirts that reveal any cleavage
whatsoever. If you are a large-breasted woman you know that can be a challenge. So as to
not quote 'distract' from the learning environment. When you unravel these messages that are often
targeted at girls, what they're being told from a young age is that if they dress a certain
way, then they're asking for it. These messages do a disservice to boys, teaching them also
from a young age that essentially they're just sex-crazed visual creatures and would
be rapists removing agency from both boys and girls making this a lose-lose situation.
When you look into the actual science of mens' sexual responses, this idea that they are
simply visual creatures who need female gatekeepers to make sure that they don't start just wanting
to screw everything in sight is just a touch off-base. According to a two thousand seven
meta-analysis looking at sex differences in how men an women respond to sexual stimuli,
the researchers stressed that the way that men respond sexually has a host of factors
behind it, psychological, biological, physiological, sociological, a girl wearing a spaghetti-strapped
tank top should not flip some switch in the male brain that says must have sex now, oh
I cannot do work anymore. It also sighted an interesting two thousand one study which
found that the more men were exposed to women, coeducational experiences and less hyper-masculinized
sex rules, the less sexual intent they read into their interactions with women, i.e. we
can effectively teach boys to respect women no matter what they're wearing. Isn't that
a radical thought? Something has to change and it's not the clothes the girls are wearing.
That's pretty good. Stop telling girls that they essentially have to protect themselves
from their own bodies. Stop telling boys that they can't protect themselves or other people
from their own bodies. We're also living in a culture wherein often the way that girls
feel the most validated is through male attention. Girls need more stronger and more empowering
messages than that and telling them to just go home and change their clothes isn't the
answer. That's not going to help anybody because you know what? They're going to just dress
how they want on the weekends and that's the fact of life. For boys in particular we need
to dismantle the dominant masculinity that treats girls and women as sexual prizes to
be had. For boys and girls alike we need to more boldly teach them that sexuality is perfectly
natural, its perfectly natural to see something and feel something in response but that there
are healthy and consensual ways to exercise it. This kind of crucial cultural change is
not going to happen if we just keep telling girls to go change clothes. This has been
my immodest proposal. Let me know yours in the comments below.