A group of high school students, were protesting their school’s ban against tank tops and leggings, female students said that they were informed that this type of clothing was “too much of an interruption” to the men in their school. Can clothes really affect your capability of receiving an education? Does enforcing dress code favor men, but not women? It is absurd to me that the idea of a teen wearing leggings is provoking a male student and keeping him from getting an education. Menza). Students should be able to express themselves by their individual fashion and having a dress code restricts them because it’s limiting, it’s sexist, and it creates a shaming of the body and therefore can ignite a self esteem war within oneself.
Having a dress code doesn’t just restrict students from wearing what they want; it restricts them from the way they show their individuality. By telling us what we can wear, they are taking away our diversity as people and cultures,” says Michael Bowies, a junior at Stamford High (Pardon my do-rag). People often show their individual style, who they are, and what they believe in by what they wear. Students maintain specific constitutional rights to free expression, and when teens are in school, decisions about their appearance is something that is important to them. The dress code is sexist to all female students, as dress codes are mainly geared towards women only.
For male students it is acceptable to ‘sag’ your pants and for your underwear to show, but if you’re a woman and your shirt exposes your body too much it is a violation and you are forced to change (Are school dress codes). For females, the school states that students are not allowed to wear any type of clothing that is considered disruptive by any of the staff, which means no to clothing brands that have pictures or logos that state illegal, sexist, and/ or racist viewpoints.
Students have restrictions on clothes that have none of these listed things also, as they are not allowed to wear shirts that are the length of four or less fingers on their shoulders, all shorts must be fingertip length, and no cleavage can be shown. For male students, they can wear what they wish; their shorts can be as short as they want, their shoulders can be shown when wearing tank tops, and the only rule that males and females have together is there can not be rips or tears in their jeans. This dress code falls short of being anywhere near helpful.
What administrators don’t think about when enforcing restrictions on a student’s tightness of their pants or the length of their clothing is the girls themselves not just their clothes, but these young women’s emotions their thoughts, even their sexuality, and their self image. Instead, these restrictions are enforced on the distracted minds of young men, while girls receive sexual threats that are needing to be stopped. Dress restrictions in schools can cause the very problem the school district aims to solve: the shaming of teen girls.
When you tell her what to wear, you tell a girl that you now control her body. When you control a girl’s body, even if it is for her “own good” you take away her agency. You’re telling her that her body is not her own. In a time when so many girls “hate” the way their body is, schools should not invoke a rule that practically shames the human body by telling her that she must cover up her own skin that is already something that she does not feel comfortable in! Many teens spend ages worrying about if what they wear will get them in trouble during school.
The dress code is more distracting than the clothes people wear without it! An ideal learning environment is one where we respect each other no matter is going on in our lives and we are taught hti sat a young age.. By calling a girl’s clothes “distracting,” you are implying that she is at fault for any disruptions that go on that day. So just stop your task that you’re doing right now and just ask yourself what is more distracting: a girl’s outfit, or the rule itself (Menza)?
The school dress codes should be completely taken away from school districts a student’s attire is how he/she expresses themselves and it helps to show how all of the students are completely different in their own unique way. By enforcing dress code, students can, not express themselves, they can, not be different, because this rule has so many restrictions. Dress codes are limiting, sexist, and shames our bodies. Students should be allowed to wear what they like to express their individual freedom.
