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Children’s Fashion
Mirrored from brigidkeely.com/wordpress.
Nesko and I watched “The Exorcist: The Version You’ve Never Seen!!!” recently, although since I’d never seen “The Exorcist” before any version would be one I’d never seen. I was afraid it wouldn’t stand up, that it would be hokey or awkward or corny. It wasn’t! It was a good movie, very interesting, and I’m keeping me eyes out for a copy of the book it was based on.
One of the most interesting things in the movie (to me) was the way Regan dressed. In the first part of the movie, because she’s dressed in nightgowns and kept to her room/bed, she wears jeans and plaid shirts. She’s a girl, 12 years old, and she’s wearing clothing that’s really gender neutral. Other than possibly having buttons/zippers on the “wrong” side, or minor fashion detailing/stitching, her clothing is something a boy or a girl could wear and look good and feel good. I didn’t pick up on her being presented as a “tomboy” either. She was just wearing clothes.
I was walking around outside the other day and a big group of kids and their caregivers was walking in the other direction. There were 15-20 girls in the group, and every single one of them was wearing pink. Most of them were also wearing ruffles on their shirts and jeans. They weren’t dressed up, but they were ruffled and pink and heavily gendered. Some of the boys had non-gendered clothing, plain jeans and t-shirts, but most of them had macho things like “king of the playground” or “here comes trouble!” or something (as opposed to, you know, “‘princess” or “diva” or “flirt” or “cute”).
Children’s fashion is so excessively gendered at this point that seeing a girl in plain jeans and a plaid shirt jumped out at me as something to be noticed. There are people who claim that there’s no point in being a Feminist any more, no point in pushing a Feminist agenda, because wow! Feminists won! The world is a Feminist playground and women are in control and men are on the decline and becoming weaker and less powerful and less effective every single day. But there is an incredible divide between what’s acceptable clothing for “boys” and “girls,” and while it’s considered appropriate to dress a girl in “boy” clothing it’s not acceptable to dress a boy in “girl” clothing because that will turn him gay or something. Because “male” is still the default, and female the exception to the rule.
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I hate the porn star t-shirts on children, but I grew up during that era and felt horrible because I couldn't find anything at all that I liked and was forced to dress in sporty clothing. I always was fiercely feminist as a young girl, but resented that feminists of the era thought we needed to dress and act like men in order to get the power they had.
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But I do think there's something wrong with the society we live in that marks some clothing as just for girls, and some clothing for just as boys, and the girls clothing is worth less than the boys clothing which is why boys don't/shouldn't wear it.
Female clothing is devalued. People who wear female clothing are devalued. And it's becoming more and more obvious what clothing is female and what clothing isn't.
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I think it's kind of fantastic. We all do our little part. *GRIN*
(But yes: was at Herself's school this week for a class play, and she was the ONLY little girl not in pink that day. It was striking. She was wearing a navy blue jumper, peach colored t-shirt, and bloomers, so...not un-girly, but def. un-pink.)