We are animals, right? Well, we send mating cues to each other non-verbally, don’t we? Do you think women and men might be sending and receiving such cues using their attire? People are programmable, and we learn non-verbal vocabulary as we grow-up in our culture. If a guy walks around bare chested with it sticking out, my instincts are that he wants women to notice him as a sex object. Similarly, if a woman wears a mini skirt with high heels. To think that people would not interpret these cues in a sexual manner is vastly misunderstanding human nature.

I will wear my denim mini-skirt and hot pink high-heeled boots if I damn well please.

I LOVE you.

I don’t want sexual male attention, but ya know what? When I go out in a baggy shirt and jeans I still get hollered at. A friend of mine and I were in jeans and sweaters at the grocery store one and two guys tried to pick us up.

I’ve stopped giving a shit what other people think. Go ahead, call me a whore. I’ve heard it before. I’m a pretty fucking cool person, you’re the one missing out if you decide to live by snap judgments. Life is just too short to worry if other people approve of me.

I will wear my denim mini-skirt and hot pink high-heeled boots if I damn well please. I’m not doing it for you, I’m doing it because I think it looks cool. If I were simply trying to get men to notice me for my body, well, you’d think I’d try to fit the beauty standards a tad better than I do. Maybe flat iron my hair and lighten it, get a tan so I’m not as pale as a ghost, wear eye-liner, shy away from heels since they put me over the six foot mark…

But I don’t. Because I don’t care. If some random person in the grocery store or the mall or a diner chooses to pas judgment on me due to what I’m wearing, that is their problem. They should be ashamed, not me.

obvs there are cultures where women & men wear much less but aren’t considered insecure or asking for sex.

just as there are different opinions about what to wear around the world– there are different opinions within an individual society. wearing less or more clothes can be ascribed to a variety of motives, not just asking for sex.

women are harassed and assaulted regardless of whether they’re attractiveness or what they’re wearing. being “cute” is just as dangerous as being “elderly” if you’re in a vulnerable situation with a potential aggressor.

women in cultures who wear lots of clothes are still subject to sexual harassment and violence. it’s not about the clothes — that’s an excuse or justification or rationalization.

wearing clothes is not something someone “does” to someone else. outfits are not threatening — even though they may make you uncomfortable.

inviting someone to see your body is not the same as them offering a harassing or disparaging remark. compliments are alright. “i like your dress. you look nice.” insults are, well…insulting.

women’s legs, arms, cleavage, etc. are not dangerous. it’s not a crime to see women’s bodies. it’s not a shame to see women’s bodies.

American women started shaving their legs and armpits after WWI, when the doughboys came home and talked about those amazing “French women” who shaved. What those doughboys forgot to mention is that French women who shaved were *prostitutes* – shaving was required (along with a licensure and a monthly medical examination) for cleanliness reasons.

Yeah, I collect weird information. :)

This analogy is completely illogical. Both MEN and WOMEN wear shirts on hot days. Only women shave their legs. (I realize there are exceptions to this, but men are not expected by society at large to shave their legs.) The analogy would make sense if women walked around topless on hot days, but men continued to wear shirts, but that’s clearly not what happens.

That was a righteous rant. Very true, and well said.

judging character based on the way one dresses is almost always influenced by sexist, racist, classist, homophobic, transphobic, fatphobic, religiously bigoted, EVERYTHING, ideals and stereotypes. it helps perpetuate all these -isms and oppressions.

it’s already bad enough to be a woman/poc/gay/trans*/fat/poor/member of some unpopular religion/whatever, but then what you dress yourself in, what you don’t dress yourself in, what colour you dye your hair, what you put on your head, what you decorate your body with, how much you paid for whatever you’re wearing, your posture, all of this, is put under a microscope to give a BRAND NEW TOTALLY BETTER REASON to treat you like shit.

and three reasons are usually given:

1) ‘well, they’re just clothes and they’re changeable, so if they want to be more accepted, why don’t they just change it!’ because we shouldn’t have to change how we look so that you hate us a little bit less for something about ourselves we can’t change anyway. people shouldn’t have to wear more conservative/revealing clothes/expensive clothes, stop wearing the things their religion mandates, stop wearing the clothes they grew up with and everyone else they’ve known has worn, stop wearing the things they’ve seen their rolemodels who are like them have worn, wear and do the things that they enjoy and feel are instrinsic to their being like what sort of music they like to listen to just so that their difference from you isn’t as obvious and you can hate them just a little bit less. we’ll pass, thank you.

if they’re that insignificant and that changeable, then maybe you should stop making such a huge fucking deal about it.

2) ‘they’re just perpetuating the stereotype of their oppressed group by dressing that way!’ WHO GIVES A FUCK. if a gay man wants to dress like Carson Kressley, LET HIM BE. if a black person want to dress ‘ghetto,’ LET HIR BE. if a woman wants to wear the shortest skirt ever and show her cleavage and bleach her out hair, LET HER BE. the examples go on but i am fucking sleepy, y’all. but let’s be real. if you would GET OVER IT, it wouldn’t matter. it is really THAT SIMPLE. because all YOU’RE doing is trying to find a reason to solidify the prejudiced way YOU view an oppressed group, no matter how badly you want to say otherwise.

3) ‘they’re just dressing that way to be provocative/make a political statement/upset people/get a reaction/alienate themselves!’ rofllll. poor you, having to witness that! most likely they aren’t, and this is just your paranoid ass going OH NOOOO AN OPPRESSED PERSON WHO HAS BROUGHT ATTENTION TO THEMSELF, WHAT IS THE WORLD COMING TO, and if they are, maybe you should listen to the message they’re trying to bring across through their way of dressing instead of instantly shutting down like an idiot.

ugh, sorry to unload on here. the relationship between oppressed people and the sacrifices they have to make just to try and get as accepted as possible by the people oppressing them fascinates me and also ABSOLUTELY INFURIATES ME.

a comment about my experiences dressing as a woman is to follow.