As each new generation comes of age, they grow to recognize that not everything that’s part of the status quo they grew up in needs to continue just because their forebears intended it that way.
And while it wasn’t uncommon to hear gripes about school dress codes from within previous generations, it seems to be an issue that’s inspiring a more organized approach from Gen Z.
Whether it’s because they place unnecessary restrictions on how students can express themselves or imply that female students are responsible for whether their classmates are “distracted” by them, it seems that the rallying cry among teens is to either seriously reform these dress codes or do away with them entirely.
And if anyone is still wondering why this shift is taking place, one woman on Tiktok is perfectly willing to explain the problem with dress codes.
TW: this article contains depictions or discussions of sexual assault and may be triggering to some readers.
Although school dress codes are an issue that TikTok user @chan42911 is passionate about, her video breaking them down didn’t come out of nowhere.
As her TikTok on the subject makes clear, she was responding to a prompt by another user who asked, “What’s something that’s actually incredibly misogynistic that everyone ignores?”
We can see from this screen capture that she described dress codes as they pertain to female students as the result of adults blaming children for the attention they receive from other classmates.
As she went on to say, “It teaches young girls as early as elementary school that their bodies are property.”
She also edited her caption on this point to add that in addition to learning that their bodies are property, girls are also taught that their bodies are inherently sexual regardless of how they live their lives.
And so the woman said that if other people sexualize them, girls are taught that it’s their fault that this is happening and not the fault of the adults or classmates actually staring at them.
As a result of this framing that she sees as inherent to school dress codes, girls find themselves punished for how they’re dressed regardless of the circumstances that led them to dress that way.
As she put it, “She is told that it is her fault and that she needs to change so that other people won’t sexualize her.”
From @chan42911’s perspective, that then instills a culture of victim blaming not only on the girls who deal with dress codes, but on potentially everyone growing up within the American public education system.
While you can get a more detailed sense of her position from watching the full video here, she attributed the intent behind school dress codes as having an effect on how survivors of assault are treated when they come forward with their trauma.
And as you might expect by now, we’re not talking about a positive effect here.
