So I have a theory on why women feel unsafe in short skirts!

[PosieParker]

I think if you walk home at night in 'sexy' attire you are more likely to be a victim of casual abuse, wolf whistled, shouted at, etc. Therefore you feel unsafe and the ultimate in 'unsafe' is rape.

I think that's exactly it - lots of women do believe rape myths.

As to why we discuss rape myths - these all go back to society believing it has the right to control women's bodies. So that means, believing it has the right to control their bodies and their sexuality. In many times (including some modern-day societies we can all think of) women were literally not meant to go out of the house without a chaperone. In many more, what women wore was another way of displaying a man's wealth or status, or the fact she belonged to him. So married women would dress differently from unmarried women.

Obviously in the UK we'd like to think we've put those cultures behind us, but we're actually still seeing the remnants of them when someone say 'I wouldn't like to see my wife go out dressed like that' or 'John wouldn't let me walk home alone'.

Rape myths are a way of enforcing taboos that have been more-or-less torn down.

I don't feel safe wearing any skirt of knee length or above without jeans or thick legging underneath, probably due to dreadful memories of school having things shoved up your skirt by 'amusing' boys......
I do like the short skirt/shorts and thick tights and docs or trainers look tho, although I daresay that would be a bit 'muttony'.

I am nearly always in a short skirt. I find them reallyb comfortable and practical because I'm so short that trousers drag on the floor and get wet, meaning I end up soaked to the knee and cold all day. Give me a short skirt and boots any day!

Interesting about how women dressed in order to display the status of their owners. As LRD says, the catcalling etc. is a hangover from the days when that ownership status was explicit rather than implicit and it is a rebuke from men that we are out on the street without our owner.

If you say that to a man (or a woman) they are incredulous: but women don't get cat-called when they're with men, only when they are alone or with other women. It's a reminder to us, that we don't have the right to be on the street and we're only there on sufferance. It reminds us to know our place. Because non-misogynist men, don't shout at women in the street, only misogynists do.

I feel safe wearing short skirts.
Used to feel safe wearing ridiculously impractical high heeled shoes and short skirts/shorts/fishnets/footless gold tights when I was younger and could be bothered/wanted to dress like that. And that was staggering home through supposedly 'rough' areas at any time of the day or night (usually night).
Never got intimidated/abused/threatened. NOt once. (Got quite sore feet and cold legs though.)

On the other hand, when younger still I was chased along several streets in a 'naice' area by a man who tried to pull me into his car. I was 14 and wearing my (winter) school gear.

I really think how safe you are/feel has little to do with what you're wearing.
(In relation to other people's behaviour, obviously, not e.g. cross country running in stilettos. That would be very unwise.)

The idea that women wearing clothing that is close-fitting/low cut/short are more likely to suffer sexual assault seems intuitively logical to many people, because they see women dressed like this as signalling that they are potentially up for a sexual encounter; and they assume that men who commit sexual assault would actually prefer a consensual encounter, but have misread the signals or are feeling horny and let their standards of behaviour slip.

In fact, however men who commit sexual assault want to commit sexual assault, and sometimes (at least, so it seems from the evidence) enjoy sexually assaulting women who are dressed/presenting themselves in a totally non-sexual way. E.g., schoolgirls, women in jeans and woolly jumpers and (ugh) mothers with small children.