Why was it a man and not a woman who was reporting this story about inappropriate prom dresses, and why was he allowed to wear something that promoted voyeurism?
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There are requirements for what men wear to formal events. A high school prom is not an appropriate place for men to play "Shirts vs. Skins."
Traditionally, women already have much more latitude for their choice of formal wear than men do. High schoolers who automatically choose dresses that are revealing, when there are thousands of styles and colors to choose from, might think that they're being daring and original. What they're being is banal. Unfortunately, they're not alone. There are women who make clothing decisions that way from junior high school to the grave; the correct term for those women is "badly dressed."
I think it's appropriate for high schools to disallow dresses that are too short, too tight, or otherwise too revealing. They should give their students a lot of advance notice about what the standards are. Students who aren't sure if the dresses that they want to buy meet those standards can bring pictures of the dresses to administrators and ask.
You have the rest of your life to show off your body, if that's what you want to do. A school-sponsored event such as a prom is supposed to be a chance for you to show off how mature you are, mature enough to have fun with your classmates during the last few years or months that most of you will ever know each other, without ogling and being ogled all evening and/or getting drunk and absconding to have sex in a car or hotel after the first hour of the mature party that the school organized for you.
Copyright L. Kochman, June 6, 2015 @ 7:28 a.m./addition @ 7:33 a.m.
