AIBU to think this is grim. Funeral.

[ThatFraggle]

A group of mourners all in normal funeral clothes. Some more formal, some less. Some not black. Fine.

Then a group of three girls. They looked older than primary school age, but younger than A level.

The one was in a skintight mini dress she kept having to pull down.

The other two were in those hotpants-vest combo unitard things people seem to wear these days. Basically like a spanx leotard, coming a couple of inches below the bum.

Yes, it's hot. And yes, people can wear what they like, but surely there's a time and a place, and a funeral is not the place.

AIBU that if it were my young teens coming down for a funeral dressed like that, I'd tell them to go back upstairs and get changed?

@ZeldaWillTellYourFortune well I don't know what you've been collecting but I'll say it again. Yes, etiquette IS about making people feel comfortable. Not a trope, an excuse or anything else.

@CherryBlossom321 couldn't agree more. So predictable and depressing.

So what would you tell your girls? "You can always wear whatever you want, no matter the context!"

I didn't say every thread on MN is gossip, quite clearly some of them aren't.

I hope people wear whatever the fuck they like at my funeral. Whatever makes them remember me / feel good / give them comfort / makes it remarkable. I would like dramatic costume jewellery and headdresses and red lace veils and cocktail dresses and top hats and tails and Irish dancing shoes and fluro suits and Venetian masks.

But you said this specific thread is me gossiping, so why are you on here gossiping about the hotpants girls?

YABU. Should they or their parents have spent money on a new outfit that they’d never wear again during this cost of living crisis? Also most teenagers wear ridiculously short skirts nowadays. Our school bus looks like a tarts convention- that’s totally normal btw. I can understand your point of view but I have a teenage 6th former that had to attend a funeral - her longest skirt was still very short but that’s how it is at the moment.

"Appropriate" changes. In Victorian times black was essential; women wore long crepe dresses and men wore black suits and hats. Wearing a grey suit without a hat would be seen as "inappropriate" but I bet there were some of those at the funeral OP attended.

50 years ago, smart dress and preferably black (or a dark colour at a push) was deemed "appropriate" dress for a funeral.

Today, the trend is to become much less focused on traditions and etiquette but to accept people for who they are and to embrace differences and diversity and appreciate that if others have don't do things the same way as you it doesn't make it "wrong". It's realised that the important thing is turning up at the funeral (and equally if you don't feel able to come to the funeral that doesn't mean you don't care).

I think it's a shame that so many stick to ingrained views of what is right without questioning why that is so, and if their views should change.

I'm not gossiping about them - I don't care what they were wearing, people can wear whatever they want. You started a post to pass judgement on some teenage girls at a funeral, the modern day equivalent of going to a social occasion, with people you don't know, and discussing it. Someone telling you not to be so po faced and judgemental is not "gossiping". I give up!

Recently, I went to my uncles funeral and the gf of one of the principal mourners was wearing a pair of short shorts with bare legs and ankle boots with stiletto heels. It was a burial and it just looked so awful to see her teetering at the graveside in her barely there outfit. She was about 25, so.old enough to know better and even if she wasn't, could her bf or other family member not have advised her?

Of course its disrespectful to wear revealing bodycon clothes at a funeral. These inappropriately dressed girls in the Op must have parents to buy them the clothes in the first place and surely any parent would tell a child not to wear revealing clothing to a funeral. The teenagers should have some commsense and social learning to know this but if they aren't mature enough to understand it's down to parents to educate them. In the normal world the majority of people will agree it's completely unacceptable funeral attire to dress in unitards, short dresses etc.
However on MN posters will claim it's quite acceptable to dress how you wish at a funeral regardless of etiquette and that the teenagers choice to dress inappropriately trumps everything.

Agree cherryblossom. Older women sneering at and criticising young girls. I thought we as a society had moved on from this sort of small minded judgemental attitudes - very 1950s and unpleasant. Glad I don’t know people like this in real life.

Today, the trend is to become much less focused on traditions and etiquette. I think it's a shame that so many stick to ingrained views of what is right without questioning why that is so, and if their views should change.

Who set that trend, then? Why should the opinion of the person/people who set that trend have greater weight than others.
Isn't there a trend on tic toc, pranking people into thinking made up situations are real to scare them? Why don't we all follow that trend?

So no, I don't think I'm following the trend someone's come up with that anyone can wear anything they like, anywhere they go. And unless you're sending your kids into schools in boob tubes and short shorts, I guess you're not following the trend either. Maybe you should questioning why that is.

You literally accused me of gossipping. If that is the case, then you seeing the thread title, and clicking in are guilty of the thing you are accusing someone else of.

Again
Never seen a cathedral with an itemised list of what can and can't be worn like a club might have...
And if your church judges people for what they wear and would turn them away then you are ENTIRELY missing the point

At all the funerals I've been to children have always worn school uniform, so if they were my children that is what I would have advised them to wear.

So many people on about job interviews...
20+ years ago you'd be expected to wear a suit (with tie) as a man and heels and a skirt as woman regardless of the job.
Now the guidance is "dress for the job you are going for" and turning up in a suit for a mechanics job would make you look like you didn't know what the job was for and jeans and a polo would be acceptable, a suit for a basic minimum wage job would look like you thought you were too good for the job and a shirt, no tie and smart pants (or even jeans) would be OK. And of course, thankfully, women are finally starting to no longer be required to wear heels.

The same as the outfits you no doubt consider perfectly acceptable funeral wear would have been considered inappropriate in days gone by. Anything that wasn't solely black would be unacceptable, though now people wear navy, grey, accents with white... in fact look at the response to The Queen's Funeral when there was criticism for them wearing black as she was a devout Christian and WHITE would have been more appropriate as an expression of her faith...

Times they are a-changing.

And I personally would not see any issues with any of those dresses at a funeral
They're not remotely "attention seeking" as others claim.

I already have extensive conversations with them about dressing for their own comfort, not for anybody else’s, about how to identify misogynistic attitudes, not passing snap judgments on other girls and women based on their appearance.

We talk about how girls are hassled relentlessly when it comes to school uniform but not boys, how overall women are judged for their appearance much more commonly than men.

I’ve taught them that men are not in fact helpless animals who can’t control themselves, that their hearts and character are infinitely more important than their appearance, and that there is nothing wrong with wearing weather appropriate clothing.

We also discuss how so many women are still oppressed by cultural, societal and religious ideology, and I’m raising them to have autonomy and freedom when it comes to their own bodies. That their developing bodies are not for others to sexualise.

None of which is akin to what you’re suggesting.

I merely clicked on the thread to see what exactly was so "grim" at a particular funeral, especially as I detest the use of the word grim in this context. I'm struggling to see how opening a thread is "gossiping"!!!!

Bet the posters on here will be the ones in a few years calling the workplace after little
“Precious Marie” or “Pixie-Rae” doesn’t get the job after arriving at the interview inappropriately dressed. Because “clothing is just a construct designed to oppress women” and “she has the right to wear whatever she wants when she wants” because saying no or teaching about time and place is denying rights and freedoms and invalidating the feelings.
yes you can wear your hot pants or whatever else but no not every place is the right place to wear it. But hey ho we can’t say no anymore because ‘feelings.’

The workplace is a completely different thing. Employers are entitled to demand a certain standard of dress, and as they are paying the wages what they say goes. The majority of churches, or other places where funerals are held, don't have a dress code as such. It's nothing to do with feelings, and everyone is supposed to be welcome in a house of God, whatever they happen to be wearing. Some of us are able to see the difference, believe it or not.

When people say certain clothing is disrespectful who exactly is not being respected? Is it the person who died, or the family or the church (if it's in a church).

There's another thread going on where the OP was complaining everyone came to work too casual and she felt she couldn't wear smart blazers because she'd be out of place. A lot of people told her it was her problem and to get over it.

So even work place are changing

Exactly.

It's just all to disguise pure laziness.

Anyone age 10 or over who can't muster up tailored (non-legging) dark pants and a collared shirt, at bare minimum, for weddings, funerals and other rites of our society, is deficient. Providing such should be Parenting 101.

As most kids up through 17 or so have school uniform, there is no excuse for wearing bodycon, skimpy, strappy or flesh-baring attire to rites such as weddings, funerals, christenings, musical / theatre performances, etc.

It's always better to err on the side of more decorous than less decorous. I truly feel sorry for people who don't understand that.

If it was my funeral I’d be quite delighted that they wore hot pants.