Canadian women now
account for 50.4% of the population according to Statistics Canada (2011). One
could say that this makes the population equal. Like men, women can now attend
university, work in a variety of fields, and contribute to the paying of
household bills. Unlike men, women are still expected to take care of the
household chores, stay "in shape", and take care of the children.
Most of these unrealistic expectations stem from the multitude of stereotypes
that flood the media; however, some of them are subtly perpetuated through
practices in our very own education system. Public schools in British Columbia
contribute to the oppression of the female gender in many ways, however, the
most pressing problem is the continual implementation of sexist dress code
policies.
Dress codes have long been a popular debate. Most people
question whether or not dress codes diminish students' ability to express
themselves through their dress and/or whether or not students can afford a
uniform or expected dress attire. What is not discussed, however, is how these
dress codes implicitly target the female population of schools. Most schools
have a policy similar to this: "Articles of clothing which expose
the body in a sexually suggestive manner as commonly understood by the
students, staff and parents having recognized generational differences are not
acceptable in school" (Timberline Secondary). Other schools provide
explicit examples as to what is inappropriate clothing, such as: "No
skirts or shorts which fall above mid-thigh high; No low tops which reveal
cleavage; no offensive, discriminatory attire or attire (including cosmetics
and jeweller) which may intimidate or make others feel uncomfortable"
(Lord Byng Secondary). All of these policies suggest that all offensive
dressing occurs by the female gender and that the girls in these schools need
to be told how to act while insinuating that, without these policies, little
girls will dress in a sexually provocative manner. It is these policies that
perpetuate sexuality as taboo, therefore, providing youth with the desire to
rebel against them and to view girls who choose to dress in certain ways as
"sluts" or "asking for it" because of what they wear.
In
some schools, dress code policies claim to be in effect to ensure a safe and respectful learning environment for all
students and staff. Surrey, for example, states that the dress code is in place
"to balance individual liberty, social convention, functionality,
community standards and school community values" (School District #36).
What message does this send to the girls in our classrooms? In order to be safe
and respected as an individual, one cannot dress in a way that is deemed too sexually
suggestive by society. But, this message completely contradicts everything that
they are being told by the society that they see every day outside of the
classroom: music videos, magazines, billboards, or any other advertisement
medium. This further contributes to the culture of slut-shaming: by wearing a
skirt that was 3 inches above her knee cap, a girl would be considered as going
against appropriate community standards, therefore, she should accept the
consequences for this way of dress in whatever form that happens to come in.
This type of culture has snow-balled into an even bigger problem:
victim-blaming.
If
our schools continue to perpetuate this culture, girls will never be able to
see themselves as more than objects to be dressed up or down by others. Instead
of telling girls what is appropriate, what will or will not cause one to be
sexually harassed, policy makers need to focus on the education of all students
in regards to sexual exploitation and objectification. Until schools stop targeting
girls as manifestations of sexuality and start empowering them to focus on
things more important than how much of their navel was showing while running
track, girls will continue to see themselves, and other girls, as just that -
objects.
Ashley Slade
