Is Dress Code Beneficial or Detrimental?
In schools across America girls are forced to conform to the notion of “dress codes”. Growing up I never really thought much about this social construct as it was just a part of my everyday life. It’s something that every girl I knew had to conform to. I didn’t know a school that didn’t either have a dress code or a school uniform. It was something everyone had to deal with. Not just me and my friends at my school, every other girl I knew.
It wasn’t until recently that I was made aware of the real reason why there is a dress code in America. At school we are told that there’s a dress code because some pieces of clothing could be offensive, inappropriate, or distracting. One of the main reasons that dress codes mainly apply to only girls is because some of the clothing that girls wear is considered distracting to boys. Obviously there are some things that are inappropriate to wear to school like a bikini, shorts that are too short, etc. But there are some types of clothing that are considered out of the dress code that don’t really make sense to me.
At my high school our dress code said that we could not wear spaghetti strap tops, ripped jeans, shorts that are shorter than our fingertips, backless shirts, strapless tops (like tube tops), and v-cut shirts. I don’t really understand why spaghetti strap tops, and ripped jeans are considered to be out of dress code. Why is it wrong to have some holes in your pants showing a little skin on your legs. Why can’t we wear tank tops that have thin straps? What is wrong with that? When I really think about it, both of those pieces of clothing don’t show too much skin and aren’t really that provocative. What’s going to happen if a girl is showing off her shoulders?
It has been brought to my attention recently that one of the reasons that the dress code is such a prominent thing in school for girls is actually because of boys. By this I mean that girls are forced to cover up and not show skin to stop boys from getting “distracted” or being unable to control their impulses. In my own personal opinion this is completely unfair. We shouldn’t be teaching young girls to cover up because if they show too much skin boys will not be able to control themselves. This facilitates the notions that come with sexual assault. The statements like, “did you see what she was wearing?,” “she was asking for it,” “she should have covered up more.” This is such a horrible thing to begin teaching to children at a young age, and we should not facilitate this type of behavior.
Everyone should be able to express themselves in the clothing they choose to wear. Obviously if what they’re wearing is inappropriate for a school environment (like a bikini or short shorts) then that can be against the dress code, but girls should be allowed to wear tank tops, v-cut shirts, leggings, etc. We as a society need to stop oppressing girls and teaching them at a young age that what they’re wearing is showing too much skin and giving people a reason to look at them. I personally don’t want to live in a society where we teach young girls and boys that it’s okay to make excuses for why sexual assault happens.
