Women's clothing (revealing) v men's clothing (practical)

[tabouleh]

Can someone help me sort out my thoughts wrt to women's clothing and men's clothing.

A couple of things last week set me off thinking about this:

I am doing some teaching in a university and I am at what some of the female students wear. [old lady emotion]

So for example: leggings really not much different from thick tights - but not with a long top covering the bum - so from behind the view of the bum leaves nothing to the imagination so add in a visable cleavage and full make up.

So it's her choice to wear that blah blah and men objectify women whatever they are wearing but what strikes me is how the culture pressures/forces/normalises revealing clothing on women.

I was then sitting in the car near a beach waiting to pick up DH from an activity he'd been doing and I ogled/checked out noticed a few men in wetsuits who were getting ready to go surfing. (The wetsuits gave a good view of their bodies IYSWIM .

And I thought mmm,wow you don't normally get to see male bodies in revealing clothing - no wonder men stare at women in their revealing clothing.

Also I was ovulating and that makes me notice men a lot more.

But of course I guess I was just looking not objectifying and I wasn't making them look uncomfortable/harrassing them/catcalling!

Any thoughts? I am a bit muddled about this - where would a happy medium be - what would our clothing look like in a feminist world?

Not disagreeing with you, but two points...

Men can walk around with no top on. I can't.

An average top on a man shows the shape of the front of his torso. In the same top, the shape of my breasts would be obvious and that would be considered in some sense revealing. Basically, some people would not be satisfied unless my large breasts were covered by some kind of kaftan/sack.

So I think that it is partially that women wear more revealing clothes and partially that seeing the shape of any part of a woman's body is considered a big deal in a way that seeing the shape of a man's body is not. Skirts for example cover the shape of a woman's bottom more than a man's bottom is disguised in trousers.

I was really noticing the difference the other day when I was throwing away dd's old baby clothes. I have a baby ds2 so I'm used to seeing boy baby clothes at the moment and I couldn't believe how curvily the girls' trousers are cut compared with the boys. It is insane, girl and boy babies are exactly the same shape ffs.

MillyR - I'm not really sure what you mean by an average top. Mens' suits, for instance, are quite concealing - yes you would be able to work out you had breasts but they would be nothing like as obvious as in most female tops (memories of wearing a mens' suit when cross-dressing at a fancy dress party once....) Some of dh's t-shirts are certainly tight but nothing my dad has ever worn in his life is.

Just a plain tshirt really or a shirt. I think it is quite rare for men, even in business settings to actually wear a suit jacket. Most are just wearing shirt and trousers.

I wear leggings with long tops or very short skirts. Usually with low heeled boots.

I have to say, they are far more practical and comfortable to play with DD, or walk around all day in than modest dress trousers or a knee length skirt would be. They don't stop me sitting on the floor or hanging upside down on monkeybars. I can run in them, and move easily.

I wonder perhaps if it's less about the clothes, and more about the perception that a woman can wear clothes that are practical OR revealing- but not both, because we like to pidgeon-hole women a lot more than we do men?