Stop Telling Me How to Dress

I’ve recently been seeing a lot of publications about the legging epidemic that seems to be overtaking America. The “are they pants or not” debate has been raging since my junior year of high school, but it seems to be getting fiercer as stores come out with more styles and varieties. Up to this point I’ve just sort of rolled my eyes and stayed out of it but a series of incidents have led me to speak out on the topic. Let me start by saying that as someone who loves fashion, I do believe there are times to wear and not to wear leggings as pants, such as if they are see-through or in a professional setting. However I also firmly believe in a woman’s right to dress as she pleases without being labeled a “distraction.” Last year I remember seeing battles between middle/high schools and wearers of bright patterned leggings. Schools called them distracting and were working toward banning them as a result of this. Public education systems struggle enough with getting kids to focus, so even though I disagreed with this affront to self expression, I let it slide.

It wasn’t until I worked as a camp counselor this past summer that I really began to feel outrage toward this issue. The camp has a long standing history of trying to take the focus off of romantic relationships and put it on a more brotherly/sisterly type of bond. This is a reason that so many people love the camp, so it was easy to be accommodating when they started to establish guidelines for a more appropriate way of dressing. Booty shorts and low cut tank tops were quickly abolished, but soon they adopted the dreaded finger tip rule. The problem (as everyone who has recently been in high school knows) is that everyone has different body types and a perfectly acceptable pair of shorts may not always go down to the finger tips. In addition to this, it was becoming increasingly harder for campers and staff alike to find long enough shorts in stores and no one wanted to buy an entirely new wardrobe that they would never wear outside of camp. So, to avoid the issue, this year most of the staff came prepared with loads of leggings and yoga pants – easy to move around in, relatively thin, and not against the rules. Until… One day during the staff training week, one of my superiors told me that they were thinking of banning leggings. I, like all of my coworkers, was infuriated because that was basically all we had brought. When I asked her why, she replied that many of the male counselors had been commenting and talking about the girls. So, once again, they decided to blame the women for the male gaze and sexualization of women’s bodies.

I told her it wouldn’t matter how many times they change the dress code, boys will ALWAYS find something to talk about. For once it would be nice if they addressed the boys about their tendencies instead of blaming the women. Though I thought I was sounding like a broken record, she told me she had never considered it from this perspective. Never considered it?! Even this woman couldn’t fathom that boys looking at girls could be a boy problem, not a girl problem. I wear leggings because they’re extremely comfortable, agile, and stay in place whereas low rise jeans often require constant readjustment so as not to expose the butt crack. No girl wears yoga pants to be sexy. We wear skirts and dresses and booty shorts if we’re trying to dress to impress, but we wear yoga pants for comfort. So to blame us for men and the media’s long history of taking whatever we wear and sexualizing it, is outrageously unfair.

In an article I came across last night, a woman spoke of her decision to give up wearing leggings in public out of respect for her husband after she found out that men (shocker) check girls out when they wear them. She spoke of not wanting to tempt anyone, identifying herself as the problem. This self-blame for male temptation is the same reason that the first question many women get in cases of rape is “what were you wearing,” reaffirming again and again the idea that we ask for it. What this woman doesn’t realize that not wearing leggings isn’t going to change anything. Jeans these days are just as form fitting as leggings, slacks still reveal that we have butts, and skirts and dresses still show off our legs. I’m tired of society telling me I need to change me to be acceptable. That’s why there are so many cultures around the world that force women to almost entirely cover themselves up, so as not to tempt the men who never seem to be held accountable for their own self-control.

Enough is enough, it’s time to change the conversation and ask ourselves if we really want to sacrifice our right to individuality and self expression to try to adapt ourselves to these bogus social rules rather than trying to challenge and change them. I’m not in anyway trying to blame men, it’s a media that constantly sexualizes the female body that is really at fault for this pervasive vein of thought and needs to be put into check. Of course, it won’t happen over night, but in the mean time banning leggings is just further objectifying and manipulating the female body. It’s time to raise our voices just like 13 year old Illinois middle-schooler Sophie Hasty did in protest of her school’s ban: “not being able to wear leggings because it’s ‘too distracting for boys’ is giving us the impression we should be guilty for what guys do.” I’m not willing to turn a blind eye anymore and I think it’s time we rethink our systematized victim blaming.