“1. If you choose to wear shirts that show off your boobs, you will attract boys. To be more specific, you will attract the kind of boys that like to look down girls’ shirts. If you want to date a guy who likes to look at other girls’ boobs and chase skirts, then great job; keep it up. If you don’t want to date a guy who ogles at the breasts of other women, then maybe you should stop offering your own breasts up for the ogling. All attention is not equal. You think you want attention, but you don’t. You want respect. All attention is not equal.”
Here is my issue. Everyone is always telling girls that they need to dress more modestly to protect themselves, protect men and a load of other reasons, believe me I have heard them all.
My issue is that this post is telling women they have to change to be respected instead of say "hey guys those breasts are attached to a real person who deserves to have the respect given to a human being," no instead we tell girls all the things they have to to to protect themselves. That is not going to solve the problem.
Here is a news flash people. How you dress will not change how much you are cat called and how much guys will stare at you. I was wearing a very modest outfit(short-ish skirt with leggings, shirt with tank under, and a sweater) I was outside at school studying psych when a bunch of guys came and started making a lot of racket and running around. There was another girl I didn’t know not far from where I was sitting. These guys started calling us pretty girls and beautiful girls(not in a way that felt very complimentary), once swore at us about interrupting our study time. Now I was not dressed to ask for attention I was dress in a way that I think the above statement would say require respect, but was I respected. No. Why? Because these guys did not see me as a person to respect and how I dressed was not going to change that.
So here is my idea we tell people that women and girls are people who deserve respect for being a human being with thoughts, feelings, and intelligence, not to mention they are made in the image of God as well. How they dress is irrelevant to how much respect you get. Period. To paraphrase Dr. Seuss a person is a person no matter what they wear.
I have been in the very extreme modest camp. It does not sound like they are objectifying women but they are. They are just doing more subtlety. You have to cover yourself because your body is such a sexual thing that men cannot control their actions or thoughts around you so you must change for them. Really? Guys are humans they are people. Why do people not get upset when a guy goes around without a shirt on it can be just as dangerous for a woman’s mind in that situation. So why are women forced to change how they dress to protect a man’s thoughts but men are not forced to change to protect a woman’s? I call double standard.
I am so angry at our culture and society right now. I think I will go write about Frozen or something happy. Thanks for reading my rant. I would love to hear your thoughts about this.
Love
~Elizabeth
oh P.S. Click this picture to check out an interesting article about modesty and objectification and the connection between the two.
