DD and her school skirt

[BaconAndAvocado]

DD14 insists on rolling up her school kilt until it’s extremely short. Under duress, she will roll it down but it’s a battle.
DH goes mad, saying that men will look at her. Her response this morning was, “No man gets to dictate what I wear.”
When I drive past her school, a few girls are wearing their skirts extremely short too but many aren’t. I don’t think the school insists they roll their kilts down.
I drive her to school but she walks home alone.
Am I worrying needlessly?

What I find difficult about this, and if I had a teenage daughter I would be concerned because.... they don't understand their own vulnerability.

Freedom to choose and express their bodies- yes. But surely that expressiveness should sync with a deeper more informed education on the complexities of female beauty/sexual representation in the media.....for example.

I was also a teenage girl once and my friends and I had no idea of the dangers out there - often concealed as innocent stuff. We realised later, as most women do- that we were playing to male approval. Yeah, we were alive and equal in some ways. But also out of our depths in others.

Point is- I'd want to protect my daughter from the perverts. Teach her that her body is powerful and personal and beautiful- and that keeping it to herself a bit isn't something she'll regret.

It's hard. I want young girls to be fearless and empowered. But it's naive to think that's a safe attitude. Just look at the stuff going on around exposure to porn. It's a worry.

I wouldn't want my TD to wear a short skirt- but on a positive- it can be the way in to a more important conversation about sex and porn and objectification etc.

What a mixed up confused post, are you drunk? I cannot perceive why someone would post something so fucked up otherwise?

It’s not to look sexy it’s to be cool and to not be a neek.

Yeah good luck with that tiger pants. Come back when you have successfully parented a 13 year old girl!

I hate seeing girls with their knickers showing!

who is it for other than for boys? I never hoisted my skirt up to my bum at school?

And of course it’s just an absolute coincidence that it looks sexy.

I suppose it’s the same way as an adult woman saying that her lingerie, scarlet lipstick and heels are only about how she feels, and just bizarrely match what men like.

It's to push boundaries, completely appropriate and fine in my opinion. I'm nearly 40 and remember us all doing it, my dd does it now. I cant sweat it.

And wearing a short skirt doesn't put her more at risk. Being a woman, a girl, is the risk she/ we face. The men who abuse, do so because they enjoy and feel entitled to the power and control. Its got nothing to do with girls 'looking attractive', or provocative. Otherwise, more beautiful women would get raped / attacked, than unattractive women, and that's not the case. It's about power and dominance.

I was also a teenage girl once and my friends and I had no idea of the dangers out there - often concealed as innocent stuff.

Point is- I'd want to protect my daughter from the perverts. Teach her that her body is powerful and personal and beautiful- and that keeping it to herself a bit isn't something she'll regret.

Your whole post was nonsensical but these bits most so. How do you think forcing her to wear her skirt a bit longer will ‘protect’ her from dangers and perverts? Do you think a rapist will be stalking her down the street and suddenly go ‘oh hang back actually, her skirt is regulation length. Better save the rape for the next girl.’ What pervert (of the kind who wants to pose a danger to schoolgirls) do you think will be out off by a slightly longer school uniform?

The only time my Dd actually had an awful encounter with a perve on a bus she was wearing a school hoodie and baggy tracksuit trousers pony tail no make up 🙄

This!!

My daughter even got her skirt tailored to be extra(!) short and when the teachers tell her "roll down your skirt" she shows them that it's not rolled up. 🤪I must say her school uniform looks really pretty and most girls wear their skirts extra short. That's why the school brought in a policy that the new Year 7s have to wear a different type of skirt- a longer kilt, which the Year 7s are upset about and try to roll the kilt. 😂

This is normal. I actually looked better in shorter skirts than one down to my knees, its not flattering. And of course it look more flattering to show more leg, girls know what they are doing when they do that lol

I’m really impressed if she can roll a heavy, pleated kilt and get it to stay rolled.

Agree.

I don't get posters on here saying it's unflattering, it's much more flattering than an old-fashioned knee-length grandma skirt

Men will perv at underage girls whatever they are wearing

Yes

I don't see DD, whether skirt rolled up or down, in dance leotard, or naked after a shower, and see a sexual object

I am a single mother, but would hope that the fathers of girls her age would also see her as a child. The fathers I know don't (maybe turn the other way when their DD is naked after a shower)

Finding underage girls the object of sexual interest, and seeing that as OK, is condoning abuse

Sorry, ignore the 'yes', was meant to be 'yes but'

They roll them be used they don't want all that material flapping around their knees, and those kilt type skirts are so uncool!

I would have a talk about modesty and why people choose to be modest, how it is also empowering, values etc.

If she continues to disrespect your wishes buy her trousers and get rid of the skirt.

We did this back in the 60's.
The school had a rule that skirt hem must touch the floor when kneeling upright; and at the start of Autumn term we all knelt for the skirt check.

Then the hems raced up our thighs, explained by "rapid growth spurt". The michelin-man rolled waistband was concealed under our jumpers.

At one point there was a fashion conflict. The latest thing was brightly coloured /patterned nylon "passionkillers", knickers with longer legs. You then had to let your skirt roll down a bit to conceal the bottom of the PK's as they were definitely NOT allowed to be on view. (In an all-girls school).

Well across the.border into creepiness.

Just seen a post on Facebook about my secondary school - and the ladies used to do exactly the same thing in 1973.

‘Twas ever thus. I think, for the most part, this isn’t a battle I’d choose.
I would be having serious words with your husband tho, and telling him, in the future, to keep a lid on his comments attributing blame for male behaviour on women and girls. That’s not a life lesson i’d want my daughter to learn from her father.

Girls have been doing this forever, some schools tolerate it, others don’t. Where I live in Aus you can pretty much tell straightaway if a girl is in a private or public school uniform is by the length of her skirt. I am all for self expression but I don’t particularly want to see someone’s arse cheeks on the street and I don’t think it’s a great look for teens.

I was doing it 35 years ago and my 14yo does it now. Another teen who lives in hoodies and joggers and wouldn't wear a skirt in a million years outside of school but the school kilt ends up near her ears every single day! She wears thick tights so I'm less concerned than I could be. I don't like it but it's a rite of passage and me saying something would achieve nothing.

And the jumper tucked in to the rolled up waistband. Why?? They look like proper eejits!

'Fucked up nonsensical post....was I drunk'.
Some angry ones on here eh. Did I touch a nerve? I'm sorry that you struggle to understand things. But it isn't really my problem that you can't think beyond what's in front of you.

Joking about possibilities of rape and abuse is a little bit thick. Read more. As if the threat is only outside the school gates. Wake up. Expand your mind.
Are you even real?