It's Not My Job to Police Your Penis

This fantastic lady suggested I post on the topic of office dress. Specifically, being fired for dressing "too sexy" as a woman claimed in this article. While I find it difficult to believe Ms. Lorenzana was actually told by management that her attire was the reason they were terminating her employ, maybe they did. A company who provided such reasons may be in trouble for gender discrimination, but maybe not. That is not the issue I want to explore.

Instead, I want to talk about how this instance is just another in society's long history of holding women responsible for the inappropriate reactions of a man. Reactions that, in a sane world, would be his responsibility alone to police. If you click on the article above, you will notice the outfits Ms. Lorenzana wore were not inappropriate for her office job. They were clean, smartly tailored, dark suits & skirts. The problem was, they just fit her too well. Her body & the way her body fit inside her clothes, inspired the male gaze. She was punished because otherwise men would have to be accountable for their own sense of distraction.

This is what living in a patriarchy looks like. This is what male privilege looks like.

The idea behind the burqa & the reasons for which Ms. Lorenzana was allegedly fired are fundamentally the same: women forced to take on the responsibility for the male urge. Women forced to see themselves as a man sees them and react according to male input. In reality, it is the sole responsibility of an adult--any adult--to make sure they are reacting appropriately towards another human being. Should an adult feel they cannot control their urges, they should remove themselves from a situation--not force the blame onto another.

While its true that Western women have come much further in equality than our counterparts in other parts of the world, the forces we confront daily are the same. It should not be our responsibilities to dress "ugly" enough to not arose a man but not so ugly as to displease a man. It is just not our responsibility. Women should be able to dress appropriately for our positions at work regardless of whether or breasts have abundant fatty tissue or very little & regardless of how our hips fit into our skirts. Women should be able to focus on their jobs 100%, without wondering how all the males in the office are handling seeing them in a pencil skirt.






I chose this picture of Ms.Lorenzana because its is nearly identical--down to the big bootay inside it--to the dress I wore to my Bar course today.