On March 31st, The New York Times posted the article “’Good Girl’ Prom Dress Fliers Draw Criticism for Florida School”. This news story describes the fliers hung in a Florida school that showed examples of prom dresses, saying “Going to Stanton Prom?” with a picture and either a “Yes you are. Good girl,” or “No you’re not”. The article goes on to discuss other dress codes in the school that are much more restrictive for girls than for boys. I had not heard of this story beforehand, and I was shocked by the misogynistic and demeaning language on the fliers. It astounds and infuriates me that a school could possibly think that it would be okay to call females who wear conservative prom dresses “good girl(s)”. This kind of language is unacceptable, and it only works to promote the idea in rape culture that if you dress a certain way that you are a “good girl” but, if you deviate from that conservative dress, you are no…show more content… This underestimates and trivializes the mental maturity of the male students, and it makes me wonder if it also works to socialize and enforce the idea that “boys will be boys,” which is also a sad part of rape culture. I would be interested to see if there are any studies that examine the ways in which school dress codes influence high schooler’s attitudes towards consent and sexual assault. I am not sure how I could help with this tragic problem that society has had for so long. The article mentioned that social media blew up with criticism after the fliers became public and the school later apologized, and I think this may be the best plan of action: bring attention to the problems that are made public. These dress codes are present in most public high schools, but when blatant sexism occurs and is made public, it is my duty, as well as the duty of other feminists, to call out the
