SDs dressing inappropriately

[Winosaurus]

I originally posted this on the step-parent board but posting here for traffic.

I know I'm going to get flamed for this but today this has reached a new peak.
My DP has to DDs 12 and 8, they dress so inappropriately I'm sometimes lost for words. They both are wear a full face of make-up and clothes that barely cover their bodies and I'm really struggling with this for several reasons.

1. People look at them constantly when we go out because of how revealing their clothes are and I'm worried it'll attract the wrong attention and potentially put them in danger - particularly as 12yo is getting older.
2. My DD7 now wants to copy them which is causing issues and uncomfortable conversations to come up as I obviously won't let her dress this way but I also don't want to be critical of SDs or their mother for allowing them to dress this way (she buys most of their clothes)
3. I honestly find it embarrassing. When we are out as a group/family people automatically assume I'm their mum and I've had women in particular make remarks about how they are dressed.

I've talked to DP about this and pointed out not only the inappropriateness of their overall looks but also how it could put them in danger. He agrees with me and will occasionally ask SD8 to remove her make-up but overall he doesn't seem to see how wrong it is. I am not being mean about the girls, they are lovely but it's getting to the point where it's making me uncomfortable to be on outings with them when they have their bottom cheeks hanging out of their shorts or transparent crop-tops on. How can I get my partner to see it objectively?

Does you go on family outings with your DP to places where 8 & 12 year olds hang out, like leisure centres, sports clubs and theme parks? The girls don't need to look as though they have stepped straight off the pages of a Mini Boden catalogue, but they should be wearing practical clothing that they can be pre-teens in and not wasting time covering their faces with make up. You say that your DP sees them as being his babies, but surely he can see that they are dressing beyond their years.

Keep reinforcing the message with your own DD & if you get the chance to buy them the standard pre-teen uniform of jeans, leggings & hoodies, grab it.

I am not in the UK but I find the idea of an eight-year-old trying to be like an adult woman horrible. I imagine it also implies a lack of other childhood interests.

As for the twelve-year-old, I do think it is dangerous for a young girl dressed in such a way to be out by herself. As we get older we learn where we are safe and where we aren't, but a twelve-year-old is just starting out and hasn't got the same antennae that an older woman would have.

And all this stuff about not "victim blaming" is being applied too mechanically. We all know that if a woman is walking home alone at three in the morning, it not her fault if she gets attacked, but would any of you allow your young girls to wander the streets alone at that time of night? And I say that has someone who has often walked alone at night in all kinds of places and never been attacked, because I am street-wise, but a twelve-year-old just hasn't been on the planet long enough

This is by far the most eloquent and reasoned response I've read in this thread. Well said, Natalia

One of the most trotted out lines on MN is "we don't make choices in a vacuum". And it is largely true and, I think, applies just as much to the choice of clothes that we make as to anything else.

We choose what we wear. We are therefore, even if subconsciously, making a statement to others by that choice. Let's take a totally different example. If I were going to a wedding, I'd wear something smart and dressy because I'm signifying that it's a formal occasion. If I turned up in jeans and a tshirt, then that would probably cause others to think that I couldn't be bothered/lacked consideration for the bride and groom/hasn't shown due respect for the occasion. They may be wrong of course. The jeans are just clothes and logically have no bearing whatsoever on my feelings for the happy couple. But social mores suggest that isn't appropriate. I know this; therefore to break with convention is to make a statement. It should therefore be one I am comfortable to make.

I think the same is true of revealing clothing. I may enjoy wearing it, but I am foolish not to realise that doing so will result in men looking at me in a sexual fashion. Does that cause them to assault me? It does not. Is it provocation to assault me? Absolutely not. But if I am revealing large parts of my breasts and buttocks, then a) men will look and b) social mores are such that this may well be interpreted by others as inviting sexual attention. I am clearly entitled to wear it if I choose to do so, but I'd be a bit ridiculous not to realise that others would interpret my doing so in a particular way.

The problem with very young girls, I think, is that they can't necessarily be expected to understand all the nuances and norms and therefore make a properly informed choice about what they are wearing and how that fits into a pattern of social norms. A grown woman chooses to flout those norms by wearing very revealing clothing? I have no problem with that. Entirely her decision and entirely up to her. But a young child/teen won't necessarily understand.

*As a feminist I do think dressing children like this endangers them. It gives out a message that there's no one looking out for them, no one caring for them...

This has nothing to do with how adults dress.*

This. Predators, whether men or boys, are not going to be on the look-out for the well-looked-after girl who is happy to stick to the rules laid down by a clued-up parent. They will be looking for the girl who signals that she is either at odds with her carers or has very lax carers. Because that is far more likely to get them somewhere in the first place and less likely to have repercussions afterwards.

Awful parenting from ur dh and their mother. Not sure what u can do tbh.

Thank goodness this thread has swung back to reasonableness after the initial ludicrous posts.

I must admit I judged in Costco today when I saw a mother with a huge boob job walking along with her two dds,, aged about 8 and 6. They were wearing off the shoulder tops, had blow-dried hair and had masses of make-up on. It was very disturbing, like Jonbenet Ramsey.

When I was about twelve or thirteen and had started earning my own money, I bought some of those pull ups that look a bit like suspenders. I wore them with denim shorts, instead of tights, as I hated the gusset part of tights, it used to itch. I thought it looked cool and edgy, but not sexy. I vividly remember teenage boys leering at me that day, men turning for a second look, women looking down their noses at me. They were all wrong for doing so, but it doesn't make it less real. I was upset and self conscious and never wore them again. Had my mum or dad been home when I got dressed that day they would never have let me wear them, and they would have been right. Not only did they look bloody ridiculous but I was completely ill equipped to deal with the attention I got.

At DBiL's 50th birthday party, his then 14yr old DD1 appeared in a dress that left very very little to the imagination. I was astonished, as were one of her aunts and her DGM. Aunt spoke to DNiece's mother, suggesting that perhaps a little cover-up might be appropriate given that there was a bucking bronco and a trampoline involved.

Mum was a bit and thought we were out of order. She changed her mind when a couple of hours and too many cocktails later her DD rushed in sobbing that one of the young men in the pub had invited her to give him a blow job. Leaving the niceties of that aside, he honestly thought she was about 17.

The incident ruined the party for everyone but they didn't learn. BiL and family later went to visit DH while he was working abroad in a popular sunny holiday place. DH said afterwards that he was very concerned that same niece was swimming in her tiny bikini and was the centre of attention from a group of older lads. They kept grabbing her, she wasn't unhappy until her top came off and was passed around like a trophy. In the end DH shooed them away as it was clear that neither of her parents was going to act to protect her.

This not to say that niece shouldn't have been dressed exactly as she chose, but she was too young to make appropriate choices and nobody guided her. The behaviour of the young men was reprehensible of course, no matter how she was dressed.

They are not your children so you need to mind your business to be frank. Would I want my children dressing like this? No! But, these are not your children. They have a dm and a df. You are not their parent so you need to back off and keep your opinions to yourself. I doubt their dm wants another women's opinion on how she dresses her children and your dh doesn't seem to care. So you need to stfu.

notanotherNC

Yes. Why should the OP care about her partner's children?

She should share her home with them, look after them and never, ever have an opinion. She's clearly just there to skivvy, not have a relationship with them. And definitely not, under any circumstances, worry about them.

I am sooooo glad I only have a son

No, seriously, anyone who thinks that young girls dressing this way is okhas a serious problem.

No this is not okay. My DH ex wife used to encourage this with DSD just to piss him off. Yet when facing the backlash of her being promiscuous with boys actually called her own daughter a fucking slut!
But it was okay for her to have boyfriends from a very young age (around 7) encouraged by her dickhead mother

In this situation I'd buy them designer clothes in the brands they are crazy about, that are a bit more appropriate. If they wear makeup and their mum can't afford the good stuff, I'd go to Mac and buy nude lipsticks etc.

They are not your children so you need to mind your business to be frank

Bollocks to that. OP has to be seen with them, and anyone with any sense should be saying how inappropriate and hideous it is.

So you need to stfu

Good god, why so aggressive? .

Some really weird responses on here. Thankfully reasonableness in the majority, but the ones who defend it, or tell her to shut the fuck up, it's totally and utterly unbelievable.

They are not your children so you need to mind your business to be frank
This ^ however inappropriate you and I think this is, if their parents think it's ok then really you just need to zip it.

As a feminist I do think dressing children like this ....
The children are not being 'dressed' they are dressing themselves and I would say there is a feminist argument that they should be allowed to wear what the fuck they want without being oppressed by other people's perceptions

But their ACTUAL parents have no problem with it! You can't go around telling other people how to dress THEIR children. Imagine if your ex's new partner was trying to dictate how you dressed your kids! Seriously you need to let their parents deal with it.

and I would say there is a feminist argument that they should be allowed to wear what the fuck they want without being oppressed by other people's perceptions

At 8 and 12? Are you seriously, actually, on glue?

As I said, I wouldn't let MY kids dress like that, but I would never try and tell another family how to dress THEIR kids.

They ARE her family.

Mum and Dad trump step-mum.

She isn't related to these children. Her mum and dad get to choose how they parent. She has voiced her concerns to their father. He has decided to ignore them. End of story. Regardless of what we all think, the only people's opinion here who matters is the parents and the kids.

The children are not being 'dressed' they are dressing themselves

To what extent do children have choice in buying their own clothes? I was a very liberal parent, but at the same time, I did exercise my parental responsabilities in what clothes were bought until she became a teenager.

Are we supposed to stand back and let our children learn everything about being in society by trial and error?

Something that I expected to have disappeared forty years ago is still going strong and that is the fact that a girl who sleeps around is still labelled as a slag by the same boys she sleeps with and this results in her subsequent treatment. I find this really, really sad and unjustifiable, but a young girl at least needs to know the risks involved in her conduct, not find out by accident after the fact.

She is related to them, she is their step mother. And she seems to be the only one who gives a fuck about them.

She married their dad - that is all. She has no parental responsibility. She doesn't get to veto the children's parents. They are not her children. She can voice an opinion but she has no real say in anything relating to parenting the children. She has to lump it.