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Dress Code
Alvarez, Brenda. “Girls Fight Back Against Gender Bias in School Dress Codes.” neaToday, http://neatoday.org/2016/01/06/school-dress-codes-gender-bias/. Accessed 14 September 2016.
In this article, “Girls Fight Back Against Gender Bias in School Dress Codes,” author Brenda Alvarez explains the consequences and unfair rules about school dress codes. She states that a student is dress coded for wearing a skirt that falls a few centimeters over her fingertips. The student gets sent to the office where she repeatedly calls her parents to tell them what she is in trouble for. Her parents answer after two hours and the student is too embarrassed to go back to class. Alvarez also explains how boys wear trousers that sag and show their
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She states that a Canadian teen receives a detention for wearing a full length maxi dress because it shows her shoulders and back. She also says that students are asked to leave their prom for wearing dresses that are too sexual or provocative. One girl explains how she is dress coded for wearing shorts and after she leaves the office with a detention she walks past a male student wearing an inappropriate shirt. The teachers walk past that student and do not say a word. This demonstrates how girls get more consequences than boys when it comes to dress code. Bates says that the reason schools have dress code is to avoid distracting their male peers or making teachers feel uncomfortable. The problem is, the teachers do not discipline the boys for harassing behavior, they discipline the girls for their clothing …show more content…
She lives in New York and writes for Seventeen.com about pop culture, teen life, relationships, health, and astrology. I know that this source is reliable because it is published by a well-known author and it states specific facts about dress code. It proves that dress code should not be something to make girls feel ashamed of themselves and that boys need to control themselves while modifying a girl’s body. This article is scholarly because it provides educated information, from a popular author, about dress codes and how boys have a role in it. This sources facts are known to be true because they are written by a trustworthy author who writes about topics along these
Young women around the U.S are being made to feel insecure in who they are as almost anything they wear is attacked. My own high school, Granby Memorial High School, just recently rescinded a new rule requiring that girl’s shorts and skirts are six inches from the knee or longer. The rule was rescinded after student protest when “The students were told the clothing was inappropriate for school and distracting to the male students and staff.” This misogynistic idea that a young woman’s education is not as important as a young man’s is disrespectful to young men by claiming they are unable to control themselves, and containing a concealed message that women are under men. As a young woman, seeing all the civil rights movements both in the U.S and in other countries, and being told that I am not as worthy or wanted as a man fills me with a passionate rage. We, as a country, fight for basic rights in other countries even though there are stigmas in the U.S that show women in the workplace as either secretary-like positions or women who have had to take on a “man-like” mindset in order to succeed in business. While some of these rules may be acceptable, short-shorts being banned, for example, the educational system needs to realize that with so many restrictions to dress code it would almost be better to have a uniform of nice pants and a shirt. An extremist might even say that these strict dress codes are leading towards victimization as men are not taught to control themselves so it is up to women to make sure that they are not in the position to be sexually assaulted or raped. Even if you are not an extremist, you can understand that these dress codes must change to be all inclusive. Some of the rules in states like California only allow skirts and dresses for girls when the U.S has stated that schools should be inclusive of all
In Zhou, Li’s article “The Sexism of School Dress Codes,” she explains how the dress codes are diminishing children's self-esteem and, is mostly sexist towards girls as well as the LGBT community. To reach a wide audience including students, parents, and high school administrators, she relies on a wide variety of sources from high school students to highly credited professors. Zhou creates a strong argument against strict dress codes and encourages audience to take a stand against out of date dress codes that schools implement, using the rhetorical tools ethos, pathos, and logos to advance her argument.
According to think progress, students at a Staten island high school are frustrated with a new strict dress code that’s landing “girls in detention for wearing shorts. Despite the fact that many of their classrooms don’t have Air Conditioning. The school gave detention to 200 students, 90 percent of them were females.
Bates, Laura. " How School Dress Codes Shame Girls and Perpetuate Rape Culture. " Time. Time, 22 May 2015.
In the 2015 article on The Atlantic on The Sexism of School Dress Codes, stating that "Many of these protests have criticized the dress codes as sexist in that they unfairly target girls by body-shaming and blaming them for promoting sexual harassment. Documented cases show female students being chastised by school officials, sent home, or barred from attending events like prom." (Zhou, l.) There are more dress code policies for the females compared to the males. For example, girls should not use backless shirts, no spaghetti tops, no crop-tops that exposes the stomach, no short shorts, no miniskirts, etc. Boys on the other hand have no specific dress code policies. Dress codes may come off as sexist for women and they get insulted by it. An article on the problem with dress code from The Daily Princetonian stating "- women are policed so that they are no longer distracting to men, while men, if policed at all, are never told to change for the benefit of the opposite sex. The most prominent example that comes to mind when thinking of male-specific supplements to dress codes relates to sagging pants, an urban trend where pants are worn low to expose many inches worth of boxers. Efforts to ban these practices have never once mentioned how visible boxers would tortuously distract nearby females. Rather, they focus on visible underwear being inappropriate for a learning or work environment.", based on that article, dress codes seem to be a little too specific on what girls should or should not be allowed to wear, while boys only have a few dress code policies to worry
In elementary school there was a dress code, but it was not enforced, not even by the principal. One day after recess, a student was walking up the stairs wearing sandals and she stubbed her toe. When she hit the step, her toenail broke off and started to bleed. Catching a peek at her toe, it seemed as if it could be broken as well. Due to the blood and the possibility of a broken toe, she had to be sent to the nurse’s office right away. As the rest of the class went back to the classroom, the other students could not stop thinking about the accident, and how any one of them could have a broken and bleeding toe right now. In addition, all of the students knew that the situation was avoidable, although they were too late to help the girl with the broken toenail in the nurse’s office. The situation became even more intense when the girl’s mom picked her up and drove her to the doctor’s office. Two of her toes were broken from the hit on the step, and half of her toenail was broken off. The school didn’t get in any trouble, however, most other schools in the area do have dress codes that are enforced.
Multiple reports are taken from females who experience the shorter end of the stick due to increased fashion interests and sexist mindsets of their school staff. An individual’s choice of dress is a reflection of themselves, a form of identity. Officials conclude that clothing choices increase the risk of bullying. Punishment for those who violate the strictly enforced rules consist of in-school suspension until someone from home can bring replacment clothes, humiliating “shame suits” , or any other creative punishment the school decides such as detention, etc. Shame suits are humiliating outfits that those who broke the rules must wear as a form of punishment, most of the time these consist of extremely unflattering clothes that have written phrases on them indicating that their appearance is due to their violation of the school rules. Punishments indicated place risk on the violators education caused by missed classes. Few in society do approve of the dress code as it controls female students’ modesty, banishes a distraction, and preserves the professional atmosphere inside a school. Issues involving the apparel enforcements include sexism, repressed self- identity, and punishment issues will be discussed within this
Ensuing President Bill Clinton's State of the Union address in January of 1996, more and more public schools are implementing dress codes and uniform policies in their schools. As a result, there has been an increase in legal controversies dealing with the issue. The reason that dress codes are not conclusively enforced is due to the application of the First Amendment to juveniles in the public school setting. The First Amendment states that Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. Should children in public schools be able to wear whatever they want because of the freedoms classified in the First Amendment? I feel that the answer is no. Institutionalizing dress codes in public schools would do a great good for students and the entire academic community. I base my opinion on the fact that the pros of imposing dress codes outweigh the cons of the argument. By imposing dress codes or uniforms for students, it would eliminate opportunities for the ridicule of less popular or less fortunate students based on their attire, help prevent gang violence and gang members from wearing gang colors and insignia in schools, and generate an overall better academic concentration and discipline in the educational community.
Is covering all of her body more important than her education? Girls are not just sex objects that go to school with the soul purpose to distract guys, girls are there to get and education and most want to do so as comfortably as possible. Does sending a girl home for a low neckline say that a boys education is more important a girls? How does that make the girls feel? The purpose of the essay is to reflect on what dress codes are and how they make girls feel, propose a solution to end the enforcement of overly strict dress codes, and dubunk opposing views as sexist ways to pin girls and their bodies as objects.
Many female students fall victim to the gender biased rules. In an article written by Lee Hale for NPR, one teen named Sophie Manoukian in Pasadena, CA, told a local news station that "[i]t 's like girls should be ashamed of their bodies. And even though they presented it like it was about equal opportunity for education, it was about how girls can be distracting and pulled out of class to change." Hale explores the struggles of being an educator and fighting the war against dress code violations. Some of the comments from the educators she spoke with noted confronting students about the dress code were not something that they enjoyed, and that they have encountered negative pushback from female students. There are numerous social media stories like Sophie 's, about a female student who was sent home because she was violating the school dress code. One of the educators Hale interviewed points out the need to take gender out of the dress code and make the rules non-gender specific to ease the perception of gender bias. Uniforms were not mentioned in that article as a potential solution, however, non-gender specific uniforms would greatly assist educators in reducing gender bias. In an essay written by Todd DeMitchell from the University of New Hampshire, he summarizes the positive influence uniforms could have on the gender biases saying that “[a]llowing educators to enact such policies will allow
Our declaration is about the dress code on school campus. This logic is very deliberate when a student is dress coded when a staff sees a rip on the student's jeans. My reasons for this to get through and win an argumentative moment would be because the staff on our campus over reacts to a rip or few on them. It'd be understandable if they have a major cut or in an appropriate place or have the public see something they find disrespectful. What I want to mention is that if no skin is being shown there shouldn't be a problem, neither if we don't show too much skin. Not only about the jeans but shirts and length. By shirts i mean, no shoulders showing or the strap being too thin. That one is understandable to us girls. As the weather gets warmer every spring, more and more girls and boys around the world raise their voices against the policing of girls bodies.
“Many schools respond to criticism of dress codes by citing the importance of maintaining a ‘distraction free’ learning environment, or of teaching young people about the importance of dressing appropriately for different occasions” (Bates, 20015). Girls are constantly being told to cover up so they do not distract the boys or make male teachers uncomfortable. Bates also included “One student says she was given three specific reasons for the school dress code: “1) There are male teachers and male sixth formers [high school seniors] 2) Teachers feel uncomfortable around bras etc. and 3) Don’t want the boys to target you or intimidate you” in her 2015 article. Besides the physical distractions girls cause and the consequences they receive, the mental and sexualization can change their beliefs.
What’s one’s favorite thing to wear? Does one enjoy picking out outfits to wear to school? I certainly do, but sometimes it is hard having a dress code. I understand why we need one so nobody wears anything inappropriate, but for the people who wouldn’t wear anything like that, it can be tough sometimes finding clothes that meet standards. Every school has a dress code, some stricter than others, but when the question, “what would I change about it if I could”, came up, I would change the rule about shorts.
1 out of 5 schools had a uniform policy or dress code, were writing one, or had it up for consideration. School need a uniform policy or dress code to keep students safe. Some people say that school use dress codes for organization and others say that there are other ways to keep things organized. Requiring students to conform to a dress code is beneficial to the school experience because it gives students a better self esteem, helps administrators identify non-students, and reduces conflict.
Schools all over the world have created and enforced dress codes. Some schools are more relaxed than others; however, they all share the common theme of regulating what students can and cannot wear during the school day. But what happens when the latest fashion trends completely compromise the implemented dress code? That is the problem student’s-particularly young women- are facing in today’s society. The overwhelming increase in dress code violations has brought to light another issue associated with the codes: sexism. More and more, young women are being targeted and punished for dress code violations. While this may be due to the fact that fashion in today’s society is all about tight clothes, it could also lead to more long-lasting and sinister consequences. The rules set in place by schools prevent students and teachers from being “offended” or “distracted” by what these girls are wearing; however, this also lends to rape culture and making girls believe it is their fault if they receive unwanted male attention, as well as leading boys to think their behavior is okay. Dress codes send the message that it is a girl’s fault of anything bad happens to her due to her “suggestive” clothing.