Girls being punished for their bodies

Bored suburban educators are at it again.

A recent modification to an Illinois school’s dress code has restricted all females at Haven Middle School from wearing leggings, yoga pants and skinny jeans during the school day.

The school’s administration cites the reason for the change to be the distracting nature of the clothing articles for young male students during school time.

I’ve heard of limitations on tank tops, shorts, skirts and even flip flops, but not allowing females to wear leggings, yoga pants and skinny jeans is ridiculous.

I understand there are scenarios in which leggings can look inappropriate when worn a certain way, but the same is true for dresses and skirts. Banning any article of clothing altogether is eventually going to leave females with nothing to wear.

I don’t understand, however, how the three pant options can be blanketly judged as inappropriate.

Leggings and yoga pants are high rising, thick, dark, long and move with your body.
Skinny jeans are made of denim, which is thick and stiff enough to create just about as much coverage as possible for a pair of pants.

If the administration at Haven Middle School were being truthful, they would admit the coverage supplied by the three styles of pants has little to do with their impending ban.
If it were really about that, then the school would have put into effect a policy about boys sagging their own bottoms, displaying various pairs of plaid boxer shorts.

The decision to ban leggings, yoga pants and skinny jeans was based not on the styles and coverage, but how the female students look while wearing them.

A curvy figure isn’t a sin or a fault, and, therefore, it shouldn’t be punished.

Certain females are blessed with a better butt than others, and I guarantee it’s going to get attention whether it’s covered by leggings, a skirt, a pair of jeans or a muumuu.

Females are not at fault for the way they are built, yet they’re being treated that way.
Middle school girls shouldn’t be led to believe they are to blame in any way for their male classmates’ behavior, like these new policy installments suggest.

If these boys are spending their learning hours staring at girls’ butts, then I don’t understand why the female is automatically to blame.

Comfortable, stylish pants like leggings, skinny jeans and yoga pants aren’t the real problem in this situation.

It’s the mindset of this particular administration that the girls who are wearing leggings to school are responsible for a negative learning environment and the delayed success of their male classmates.

I understand the need for a dress code, but one that sensibly illustrates solutions to inappropriate outfits would be much more easily accepted than one that limits females to dressing like they’re straight off of “Leave It To Beaver” and isolating genders to seem like innocent bystanders verses sadistic temptresses.

After all, they’re just pants.­


cnmcelwa@indiana.edu
@clairemc_IDS