Women's Clothing

Elise Ngo

ESL 102

Mrs Lackatty

November 2017

Women’s Clothing

The dress code is recognized in the social and professional life like a regulation serving the good relation between others concerning the clothing. The author Charlotte Perkins Gilman wrote in her book The Dress of Women: “Cloth is a social tissue.” Clothing is not only a physical object used to cover and protect the human body, it has a social role in our society today. In some cases, the women outfit are singled out when talking about clothing. Nowadays, people advocate the right to freedom, which can be freedom of expression, of opinion, but also of dress. Women’s clothing cannot be analyzed as a simple garment. It is heavy with symbols and is extremely meaningful. Countries should not put laws which restricted women’s attire and there are three main point that can be argue about safety, women’s rights and people’s culture.

To begin, countries want to put a law restriction about women’s attire because of public safety. Regarding the wearing of the integral veil, or burqa, many people are divided on the authorization or not of this veil in public place. Some countries recommend that for security reason, the veil should not be worn. Some countries want to establish a law which restricted women’s attire for a security reason in public places. Lately, many countries have experienced terrorist attacks, and the Muslim community is single out. To avoid the feeling of insecurity in public places, the government want to put a law to restrict Muslim women to wear the integral veil for a couple reasons: The identification or the person is not possible right away, under the integral veil some people could hide dangerous device or impersonate someone. In the case of airports, wearing the veil is a major disadvantage in terms of security. Indeed, according to the article “Les mesures de contrôles et de sécurité dans les aéroports”, written by Melissa Ramsamy, a Muslim woman found herself forced to removed her veil before having access to the plane. The reason given is an excerpt from the European Regulation mentioning the fact that passengers are subjected to an inspection by means of a palpation or the crossing of a gantry of detection. As far as I am concerned, this is not a valid reason to forbid religious women to wear clothes protecting their modesty. First, the passage through the gantry of metal detection is ample enough to detect any dangerous object, such as firearms or explosives, which does not require in any case the need to undress a woman, except of course if the gantry sounded suspiciously. For the veil, nothing forbids it to be worn in the “public” space of French airports. During the checks, only the security agents can request the removal of the veil of any kind, but the only reasons of security could justify the request. In this case, during the identity checks, the veiled woman can very well remove her veil the time of the identification and thus put it back in place. Moreover, concerning the control of the whole body, the veiled woman can ask to be devastated in a close place. Once the checking done, she can thus put back her veil in full safety. It comes from the fundamental right of the dignity of the person not to transform a security measure into a true anti-religious inquisition. This is one of the reasons countries should not establish a law restricting the women attire.

Another point that can be argued about the laws restriction it is that it affects the women’s right. It is therefore clear that for a woman, defending women’s clothing rights, whatever they are, is thus to defend all women, regardless of their religious and social affiliation. In her book The Harem and The West, the sociologist Fatima Mernissi pointed out that if for a Eastern women undergo a spatial confinement, like the harem, Western women are trapped in an image. Mernissi thus showed the strong pressures, admittedly not inscribed in the law but very present, which consults women living in the West to adopt an image conform of the society.  It will be understood that the freedom of women to wear such a garment is fundamental, not because everyone does what he wants, but mainly because women’s clothing is always and still is a means of control of women. Inciting or prohibiting the wearing of clothing is a way of controlling the freedom of movement of women. If I point out to a beautiful woman that her clothing is a risk of rape, she will limit her movement by fear of an incident. And this is what is done everyday in France and anywhere without anyone being moved; worse, people will find that it’s a “common sense” tip. If I point out to a woman wearing the headscarf or the burkini that she should not wear it in certain places, then I also limit her freedom of movement since; logically, if she has the choice, she will not go where we do not want her to be. And telling her to pull if off comes back just as telling to a woman wearing a mini-skirt to wear a pants. Personally, I do not defend the right of women to wear or not the veil because I do not want to make the headscarf a particular clothing compared to others, and to make sense of the clothing that women wear. It is precisely a typically sexist and patriarchal habit to give meaning to all women’s clothing. It is our eyes on such clothes that make sense, not clothing. One will not judge a man with regard to what he wears, but by his deeds and words. On the other hand, a woman will see her clothes being a symbol of what she is, says and thinks. Indeed, Pamela Anderson is a perfect example; during her stay in France to defend her cause. The majority of the comments was focused on its broad neck and not on the cause that she defended. Her outfit being the focus which disqualified her words. A woman is then, not what she says, but what she wears. I therefore defend the right of women to wear any clothing. Because by prohibiting the wearing of certain clothes, we will justify the discriminations suffered by women. If we allow ourselves to judge what they wear, then we justify again this form of discrimination. Misogyny is, of course, to fight whoever is guilty of it, but by punishing those responsible for misogynist behavior and certainly not by limiting women’s freedom of movement, or asking them to wear or weave themselves according to sexist laws. That is another reason that explains why countries should not put restricting law about women’s attire.

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