School's Modesty Club urges girls to show restraint, less skin

[Liberal_in_LA]

A teenager’s call for her peers to lose their tight or revealing outfits and show restraint in their dress has prompted city officials to declare Dec. 3-7 Modesty Week in South Pasadena.

Saige Hatch, 15, launched the South Pasadena High School Modesty Club in September to combat the proliferation of short shorts, miniskirts and bare midriffs. Hatch blames popular culture and peer pressure for sexualizing women and girls.

“Women have fought for their rights, liberty, and honor more in the past 200 years than in all recorded history,” reads a statement on the club’s website, www.modestyclub.com. “Our bright, heroic women are being made the fool. A fool to think that to be loved they must be naked. To be noticed they must be sexualized. To be admired they must be objectified.”

Hatch is following in the footsteps of older brother McKay Hatch, who made national headlines and appeared on “The Tonight Show” after founding a No Cussing Club at the school in 2008.

South Pasadena Mayor Michael Cacciotti, who will proclaim Modesty Week during Wednesday’s City Council meeting, declared a No Cussing Week in March 2008 to honor McKay’s efforts.

Brent Hatch, a real estate agent and cousin of Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) who is father to Saige, McKay and five other children, said he initially was hesitant about his children taking their campaigns public for fear of the backlash they would face.

“It’s nerve-racking. As a parent you want your kids to fit in and get along with other kids,” said Hatch, 50. “I told my son what might happen, and everything I said happened and worse.”

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2012/12/school-modesty-club-urges-girls-to-show-restrain-less-skin.html

[Cleita]

1. Uniforms are the answer. I know it's something that Americans really resist

but there are practical reasons. One of them is if all children dress the same, the parents and teachers decide what they will wear by consensus. No one has better clothes, more fashionable clothes or trampier clothes than the others. Also you only need three changes to get through a year. Fashionable clothes, trampy clothes, sloppy clothes or dirty clothes can be worn when not in school and no one will have their nose out of joint about it other than the parent of each individual child.

I went to Catholic school and quite honestly never had to make a decision on what to wear that day. I went into shock my first semester of college having to put together an outfit every day. Uniforms are very practical.

[Proles]

15. Heh, I almost have to agree. Would lead to less students being picked on. Wouldn't have

poor kids with unfashionable clothing being made fun of and whatnot.

Not sure I would've liked the idea of wearing a uniform when I went to school, but I do see the benefits. Maybe I'm just saying that because I don't have to worry about school anymore.

[Cleita]

16. Many countries require them in their public schools or at least a smock to wear

over their regular clothes. That way the poor children don't have to compete with the better off.

[lbrtbell]

27. Uniforms are sexist

Do boys have to wear skirts? Do you want your girls looking like a pedo's fantasy? (They call it a schoolgirl uniform fetish for a reason.) Uniforms are just another tool to make kids robots instead of individuals.

Kids and teens need to learn early on how to dress appropriately for a school environment. Your own post shows what's wrong with uniforms: "I went into shock my first semester of college having to put together an outfit every day."

If you're 18 years old and don't know how to put an outfit together, that's not a good thing.

[Cleita]

31. Really? Where I went to school the boys had to wear uniforms too.

Sure back in the forties the girls wore skirts, but does it have to be that today? I find your arguments are not substantial.

a) Believe me the baggy, navy blue serge uniforms I wore were nobody's fantasy, but even if they had been cute, what is the difference from a sexy, mini skirt, midriff baring outfit and body piercings? Wouldn't that be a pedophiles fantasy, too? Actually, a pedophile doesn't need a school uniform to fantasize. They are just sick and clothing has nothing to do with it.

b) I knew how to put an outfit together. I resented having to do it to go to school. I suppose nurses' and doctors' scrubs are offensive to you as well, but they are so practical in a work environment. How about a mechanics outfit in an auto shop? I once worked in an auto shop and although it was a clipboard carrying job, I had to wear a shop coat with my name on it. I suppose that gave lecherous men fantasies too.

d)Teachers need to know how to dress appropriately for school. Sadly many don't, however, students should be focused on their studies not their clothes.

Just MHO but it seems more schools around the world agree with me than don't. School is not a runway show.

[Sherman A1]

51. +1

Agreed. Uniforms of the 1960's and uniforms of today can and should be vastly different.

[wickerwoman]

47. In China all the kids wear track suits.

Uniforms don't have to mean short skirts for girls.

The track suits are cheap, easy to clean, practical. They had one dress suit I think too for special assemblies or graduation, but for the most part, they just wore the same simple unisex clothes every day.

And I'm 36 and can't put "an outfit" together. I just don't give a shit and don't buy into the meme that women should have to spend heaps of time and money for other people to value them as a human being. Most people get over it in a few minutes of talking to me. The ones that don't... I suspect I'm not missing much.

[AlexSatan]

57. Good point!!-- in 1960

Most uniforms today allow girls to wear skirts or slacks--just as our military does. And the skirts go below the knee.

BTW, I'm over 40 and don't know or care how to "put an outfit together". Vanity just isn't my bag.

[GobBluth]

61. My daughter and son wear almost exactly the same uniform

The cut of the shirt and pants/shorts are a little different. My daughter gets more choices, shorts, skirts, dress/smock, skort, navy or plaid. She won't wear the skirts however.

[Egalitarian Thug]

35. Answer to what question? Isn't the real problem that our culture tells women that their value is

limited to their sexual allure? And what about those school uniforms? Perhaps you are not aware of this, but they have themselves been sexualized into a popular fetish, so there's no solution there either.

[Cleita]

46. Uniforms from before the sixties have been fetishized.

The new uniforms are pretty unisex and are usually pants with polo style T. Shirts.

[enlightenment]

2. Saige, try being honest about your goals.

It isn't modesty that is the goal - it is chastity.

This is just another manifestation of "good girls don't . . ." and as much as I dislike the current "styles", I dislike this cloaked effort to mandate morality more.

The club asks girls to pledge they will “wear shorts and skirts at knee length,” “shirts and dresses that cover my stomach, lower back, breasts and shoulders” and “not ask, persuade, or allow a boy to do anything with me that will jeopardize the code of chastity.”

What, exactly, is their "code of chastity"? Could it be staying unsullied and pure until their wedding night? A miniskirt isn't going to change that - keeping your knees together can be done as easily in a miniskirt and belly shirt as the Mormon missionary garb they are recommending.

[hifiguy]

8. Hmm. I got a spidey-sense tingle that

the Junior Anti-Sex League was actually at work here when I read the OP. Apparently the spidey-sense is in good working order.

[enlightenment]

17. Or at least we got the same tingle . . .

okay - that sounds a bit naughty . . . guess I'd better hand in my purity ring and pack away my twin sets.

[TwilightGardener]

3. When I was her age, I would have thought, "Then how will

everyone know how sexy I am?" Yeah, I had miniskirts. And enough makeup to coat a Buick--I cringe at my senior picture. But srsly, good luck to her.

[Quantess]

4. Try on some burqas!

[lbrtbell]

28. WTF?

This isn't the feminism I grew up with. We were tired of being expected to dress up as sex objects, because we wanted to be respected for our hearts and minds.

Now, "feminists" mock women for NOT dressing like sex objects. "Try on some burquas" is an excellent example of this.

Why mock these girls for not wanting to be sexualized? Why mock their choice of sexual activity? Whether a girl wants to be sexually active or not is her choice. That's what real feminism is all about--girls and women having control over their lives.

[liberal_at_heart]

38. there don't seem to be any good role models these days

Either you have the fundamentalists who want to shame women into modesty and chastity or you have the women who say you have to dress sexy to express your femininity. Personally, I wear old shoes, comfortable stretchy jeans, tee shirts, and no make up. I'm old enough now that I know life is too short to care what other people think about my appearance. My daughter is turning 18 and it is all about the tight yoga pants. She is still exploring her sexuality so looks are still very important to her. I just hope I have taught her that she is way more than her looks.

[wickerwoman]

48. No one is mocking them for not wanting to be sexualised.

They're mocking them for forming a club to pressure other people into conforming their "code" of behaviour.

I say wear what you want to wear and shut up about everyone else's choices. These girls, clearly, do not.

[Quantess]

50. Exactly. Fashion Police Club.

They should just cut to the chase and rename themselves The Morally Superior Fashion Police Club.

[AlexSatan]

58. Because non of the other kids or cliques

"pressure other people into conforming their "code" of behaviour"

[Quantess]

49. "girls and women having control over their lives"

Now there's a false dilemma if I have ever seen one.

Who do you suppose is picking out the scanty, revealing clothing, if not (at least in large part)the girls/women themselves? If they are feminists anyway, they are already dressing as they choose to. As feminists, I hope they are conscious of the images in popular culture, tv, music, etc, anyway.

What do they need a "Modesty Club" for? So they can sneer at girls who show their kneecaps? This is just more fashion policing. Fashion Police are one of my least favorite type of people in the world.

[gollygee]

5. Knee length shorts?

Do people under 40 wear those?

I think it's a chastity club with a different name and would involve slut shaming, so I don't like it.

OH wait, I'm not thinking rights - I guess she has a right to make it, I just don't like it.

[HappyMe]

6. So you can't be a 'bright, heroic' girl

in a miniskirt?

I support her right to make such a club, and for sticking to her guns. It's definitely not a club I would have joined.

[Tikki]

7. What I know about 15 year old girls...to each their own and some girls don't...

don't like skin tight clothes, some do and others like a sweatshirt and jeans and still another will
like to dress in a retro or costume look and another like her mother.

This young lady should dress the way she feels and let other 15 year old girls dress
the way they want. As they grow older the freedom they feel to express themselves
with their own style...they'll figure out.

Tikki
think: Romy and Michelle

[Bucky]

9. If it's voluntary, it's okay, so long as the school permits an FHA club for girls, too.

Future Hoochie-Mamas of America are working hard to prepare the young women of today to grow up and become the bimbos of tomorrow.

[Chorophyll]

10. That's some "fauxminism" going on right there.

Our culture sexualizes young women. But instead of all of us changing the culture, the young women women should change their clothes. Because it's all on them. Got it.

Oh, those wacky Hatches.

[lbrtbell]

29. I've been a feminist since the 1960's

There's no faux feminism at work here. It's the real thing--girls and women choosing what to do with their bodies instead of succumbing to societal pressure.

I had a brief period of dressing in miniskirts and the like in my early 20's, because people treated me as if I were invisible if I didn't.

Then I grew up, and realized that the people who ignored me for not being a sex object were in the wrong--not me. Now I dress the way I want, and to hell with anybody who doesn't think I fit their definition of fashionable.

These girls obviously realized this faster than I did. More power to them!

[Chorophyll]

32. I'm not sure what you're responding to.

I meant that Orrin Hatch's granddaughter was being "faux" by putting the onus on the girls in her school to change their clothes, rather than by putting the onus on men and boys (and other women) to stop objectifying them.

The fact that young women feel pressured to be "sexy" and visible is a slightly different problem -- but again, the problem doesn't start with them. It starts with everyone else.

[pnwmom]

36. The problem starts with the designers and marketers of girl's clothes,

which are often sexualized even in elementary school.

[Chorophyll]

52. I don't think the problem starts with them, but they sure don't help.

[AlexSatan]

59. +1

[LadyHawkAZ]

11. Nothing wrong with that...

Well, except for that whole bit about how women have been fighting for their rights for 200 years, but those that don't dress like me are fools. There's that.

But it's a cool idea. Except for that whole chastity code bit. Dress exactly like me, fool, and don't have any sex! What could possibly go wrong?



OK, forget it. In theory it's fine. In practice, they've already begun badly. Scratch this mission and start over, ladies, this time minus the slut-shaming and insults.

[riderinthestorm]

14. Lady Hawk, do you happen to have the link to that teen's video?

I know it was posted on DU and it was so powerful. I meant to bookmark it and now I can't find it.

[LadyHawkAZ]

19. check Catherina's thread in the Feminists group

I think there's one in that thread. I have a link on the laptop but I'm on my phone.

[riderinthestorm]

20. No star, no access to that group.

I don't need it immediately... if you think of it and get a chance, would you put it on this thread? Whenever its convenient, I'd be grateful! thank you!!

[LadyHawkAZ]

23. Here you go:

I didn't know you needed a star to access the groups.

[riderinthestorm]

24. You rock!! Thank you!! I know someone who needs this right now. nt

[LadyHawkAZ]

25. ...

in that case I'll add a to whoever they are.

[Liberal_in_LA]

40. +10

[riderinthestorm]

12. Thinly veiled slut shaming aimed solely at girls (Modesty Week doesn't apply to boys obviously)

"The club asks girls to pledge they will “wear shorts and skirts at knee length,” “shirts and dresses that cover my stomach, lower back, breasts and shoulders” and “not ask, persuade, or allow a boy to do anything with me that will jeopardize the code of chastity.”

"Code of chastity"?

I'm guessing Saige has to wear the Mormon magic underwear (and follow Mormon religious codes on premarital sex) which would prohibit anything too racy. So instead of minding her own business, she's trying to slut shame anyone else who appears or acts "sexier" than she does. Its interesting that there's no mention of tight shirts or pants for boys, or that they too should "cover their stomachs, lower backs or shoulders"...

Virtually every school I've ever been around already has a dress code in place that prohibits spaghetti straps, or super short skirts and shorts. Some go farther and don't allow exposed underwear or torsos.

[enlightenment]

18. I don't think they wear the magic undies until they get married.

Could be wrong about that.

She and her friends do look like the pack of Mormon girls in my high school class (back in the dark ages). They were modest and soft-spoken and deferential to adults. And judgmental, egotistical, and utterly self-absorbed.

yeesh.

[pnwmom]

34. Boys/ clothes don't usually expose that much skin.

I can see that some girls might draw some support from a club like this, especially in a place like LA where there is a lot of pressure on girls to look like Hollywood images.

[liberal_at_heart]

39. that depends on where you live

Sports are a very big deal where I live. Almost all the guys are in sports. Most of them have big muscles and they show off those muscles. The girls go crazy for it.

[pnwmom]

44. Do the boys wear tops with spaghetti straps to school, bare their midriffs,

and wear tiny mini-skirts and shorts?

[liberal_at_heart]

45. no they just wear shorts that droop so they can show off that area right above the pubic area

and no shirts or tee shirts with no sleeves. Even button up shirts can be worn sexy, real tight against the body as to show off the wide shoulders and skinny waist. Boys are sexualized just like girls are. In fact more and more boys are having body image issues because they are not buff enough.

[slackmaster]

13. All hail the Junior Anti-Sex League! Or the late Kim Jong Il's Pleasure Brigade.

[LeftyMom]

21. Orrin Hatch's niece and nephew? Modesty, no cussing? The Mormons must be recruiting.

[joeybee12]

22. It's not about empowerment, about repression, and as someonone noted-where's the modesty for boys?

Stupid club.

[Ikonoklast]

42. Religious Fundamentalists don't see boys as the "Temptress", but as the "Tempted".

Because that is where this young woman is really coming from, it has nothing to do with the sexualization of women, but of the control of women.

I say let them decide for themselves what they want to wear, instead of peer pressure to conform to someone else's standard of modesty.

Feminists fought for that right, why concede it so easily to religious nutjobs?

[Smilo]

26. Romney lost - so now there will be no trendsetting Mormon in the WH

to show these immodest women the right way to dress

[gkhouston]

30. What about boys? No "modest" expectations for them? n/t

[Tabasco_Dave]

33. Miniskirts and short skirts can be worn in good taste

[Le Taz Hot]

37. Could we get a student to start an

"Pull your damned pants up, I've no interest in seeing your nasty ass crack" movement? I keep thinking this trend will end but nope -- still seeing pants around the knees and boxer shorts that aren't always pulled up to where they should be.

[liberal_at_heart]

41. It doesn't bother me

Kids just want to express their individuality and older people almost always think the way they express themselves is stupid. I remember when I was a teenager one of the big crazes was kind of a zombie or vampire look. White make up on the face with black lipstick and black leather pants and trench coats. Then of coarse you have the grunge look where no one took a bath or brushed their hair. Back in the sixties older people couldn't stand the hippie look.

[Le Taz Hot]

43. My only objection is seeing their

fucking ass crack. I don't think it's too much to ask for them to cover that -- it's nasty. Anything else, I don't care.

[amandabeech]

53. Complete agreement here.

That "fucking ass crack" is just gross.

Most that sport that look are young and looking for "chics", or whatever the name of young women is today.

Do those guys think that young women are attracted to their "FAC"?

Gross. Just gross.

And probably counterproductive.

[AlexSatan]

60. When I see teens like that

I make a point to pull my pants down over my 40+ year old butt and have my tighty-whities hang out so the guys can see how cool they look.

Or just to screw with them, quietly say "Dude, your skid-mark is showing".


Their reactions are hilarious.

[jwirr]

54. I think I heard that in the 60s already. We were very aware of being used in these ways already

back then. In many ways our reaction was to ban the bra, short skirts that pointed this out in a very blatant way and even free sex, etc.

[LynneSin]

55. It's groups like this that create the stereotype that 'short skirts/short tops = slut'

Trust me I wore plenty of short skirts, high heels and midriff tops in my lifetime and I still knew how to say 'no' when someone pressured me to have sex when I didn't want to.

Being sexual has absolutely NOTHING to do with what one wears. I went to school with a girl whose parents made her wear very conservative clothing. She had her first kid in 10th grade.

[MineralMan]

56. Interesting, but odd.

Recently, I've been picking my 15 year old nephew up at the end of the school day. His mom works, and they recently left my moronic brother-in-law and are temporarily living with my mother-in-law. I work at home, so I can drive to his school and give him a ride home.

It's a very busy area when school lets out, so I get there about 15 minutes early. My nephew also has a lackadaisical style, so he's usually one of the last kids out of the school building. So, I get to watch all the high school kids as they emerge from the school to go to their own cars or catch a ride on the bus or with a parent.

I don't see girls in immodest clothing. Just the opposite. With few exceptions, everyone's wearing what I consider to be normal clothes for that age group. Mostly, it's jeans and loose fitting tops of some kind or another. Not much skin is visible at all. Everyone seems to be in more or less modest clothing. It's a very diverse school, so there are Muslim girls in head coverings and clothing that covers everything but their face and hands. But, I simply don't see the provocative clothing this 15 year old girl seems to be talking about.

I went to the modestyclub.com web site. The photos there looked like all the kids I'm seeing at that high school. I guess I'm not seeing what she's railing against. This all sounds more like a chastity club than a modesty club. I'd say to the girl that it's fine to stay chaste and wear clothing that you think is modest. I don't see a problem with that. There must be something more going on that I'm not seeing.