posted
Today was my day off, and so I followed a tangent all day. In Thor BASHES another religion! I noticed the discussion between Tom and rivka about the headscarf requirement in Islam. This led me to the very old thread on sake about Tom's view that "modesty" is not particularly a virtue. My primary association with the word "modesty" growing up was entirely based on what clothing you wore. As a child, several things I wore to church without any kind of thought were criticized to my mother as "immodest." In particular, I remember one high square-necked sun-dress that had two-inch thick straps and no sleeves, and which, as a result, I had to wear covered by a sweater from then on out.
I did a search, curious to see what would come up for the word "modesty."
The first thing (after wikipedia and dictionary.com) that came up was a website containing a rather extensive survey of Christian guys about what they considered to be "stumbling blocks" if a girl wore them. The next few things were from a "modesty heartcheck."
I haven't given much thought to my upbringing vis-a-vis my body issues in a long time, but these sorts of pages seem so guilt-inducing and hysterical that I can't help but feel that no girl they're aimed at could ever escape with anything resembling a healthy view of her body or human sexuality. They seem to view women as either good Christians, inadvertent temptresses or on-purpose temptresses and explicitly write about guys "sinning by looking at them."
For example:
quote:Kevin: “Each and every day is a battle—a battle against my sin, a battle against temptation, a battle against my depraved mind. Every morning I have to cry out for mercy, strength, and a renewed conviction to flee youthful lusts. The Spirit is faithful to bring me the renewal I need to prepare me to do war against my sin, yet the temptation still exists.
Sometimes, when I see a girl provocatively dressed, I’ll say to myself, ‘She probably doesn’t know that a hundred and one guys are going to devour her in their minds today. But then again, maybe she does.’ To be honest, I don’t know the truth—the truth of why she chooses to dress the way she does. All I know is that the way she presents herself to the world is bait for my sinful mind to latch onto and I need to avoid it at all costs.
Or this quote from the modesty survey in answer to the question of whether a bikini is immodest:
quote:If you don't understand this, you need to start at square one. The more skin that is revealed, the more of a stumbling block. You can't reveal more skin than with a bikini. If you understood the purpose of publications like the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue, or the objectification of swimsuit and lingerie models, you wouldn't want to wear a bikini -- unless you actually want men to sin as they look at you.
Apparently even bending over the wrong way to pick something up is immodest:
quote:Girls: Please don't bend over towards us, or away from us. Please kneel down, or modestly crouch if you need to reach something. Bending reveals an attitude of carelessness and hastiness. A girl who makes the effort to kneel to attend to something draws good attention to herself because it shows her careful, and sincere attention to what she is doing.
Am I the only person to find the existence of this survey inappropriate? I honestly can't think of any similar aspect of a guy's self-expression where they would ask young women to judge them with this level of harshness or detail. It just seems to put such a load of guilt on young girls, to make them feel responsible for something that they actually have little control over. A girl, trying to fit into all these strictures of what is "modest" or not could never again just behave naturally. Am I the only one who finds this to be rather repellent?
Posts: 1751 | Registered: Jun 1999
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posted
Yeah, I feel the same way. It's pretty horrible. I think it's never okay to make someone (e.g. a girl) responsible for what goes on in someone else's (e.g. a guy's) mind.
I think of the time in our society when it was not okay for a woman to wear pants, or to show an ankle or wrist. The brave ladies who defied conventional ideas of modesty are the ones who won for me the right to dress in a way that lets me (for instance) do my job. It's a huge freedom issue, and we should honor the women who won this freedom for us.
So I honor those today, as well, who push the bounds of what's considered modest for our time. I'm glad they're comfortable with their bodies, and don't feel they have to hide themselves away for fear of what someone else might be thinking.
Posts: 6246 | Registered: Aug 2004
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posted
There is such a concept as not placing a stumbling block in front of a blind man.
I agree that there are degrees to which that line is drawn, but the concept certainly exists. I mean it all depends on your values and a community of shared values.
I come from a community where everyone agrees that premarital sex is wrong, and sex outside of your your relationship with your spouse is wrong. Additionally, lusting is wrong.
If a woman has the word "Juicy" written on her, it calls attention to her. If she is wearing tight or revealing clothing it draws attention to her. If a guy is walking around without a shirt, it calls attention to him as well.
If we stipulate that men have a larger sexual drive than women do, then say you are in a community of such shared values - it would be insensitive for one to dress immodestly. In my community, both men and women have modesty laws. Granted, the laws for women are more constricting than for men, but I don't think the women feel guilty.
There are people here who can speak about this more knowledgeably than I, pretty much because I'm not a female, but the reasons for modesty in my community are not only tolerated, but are generally held in high esteem.
Women and girls still dress to look pretty - but they dress in a way that doesn't make a guy leer at them as they walk by.
Posts: 1604 | Registered: Mar 2003
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posted
That's part of the problem right there. Women don't have the power to make a guy leer at them. Or to not leer at them.
Posts: 1751 | Registered: Jun 1999
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posted
That wasn't my point. My point was that they can certainly prevent a guy from leering at them. And if they can, and if they share the same values, is it not sensitive of her to dress modestly?
Posts: 1604 | Registered: Mar 2003
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posted
I never had a body for revealing clothes, and I knew it and never wore any. That did not stop me from being leered at. I do not think that a girl can prevent people from leering at her.
Certainly she can dress in such a way as to discourage leering, but she cannot entirely prevent it.
And it still seems to me to be hugely hard on girls to have a site that dissects all her clothing and many of her behavior choices and which then claims that she can cause men to sin just to look at her.
And it doesn't seem to do any more favors to men to present them as lustful beasts who are constantly battling the horrific temptations of having physical bodies.
Edit: I don't understand the potential benefit to this guilt-mongering.
Posts: 1751 | Registered: Jun 1999
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posted
Hmm. "Please confine your actions and activities to ones that I find non-provocative."
And please wear low-heeled, completely closed boots, because you never know who might be a foot-fetishist.
Dye your hair a nice neutral color; I have a thing for blondes.
Wear a long skirt. No, that shows too much. Wear pants. No, wait, I'm seeing the shape of your legs. AGH! Wear MC Hammer pants! And three layers of petticoats! Thank you!
I think I'll go out on a limb here and push past "find this to be a little repellant" to "these people are idiots." I mean, yes, you may have a right to impose certain standards on your community, so long as being part of that community is utterly voluntary, there are viable alternatives available, and you can leave at any time. (And you recognize that the standards of that community do not necessarily extend beyond it.) But by and large, I tend to think we do a lot better when we limit the number of standards we decide to inflict on others, mostly to those that actively harm others if they're breached. Discovering you're actually kind of a horndog doesn't fit my definition of "active harm".
But I must give one corollary. No one deserves to be harrassed or assaulted on the basis of what they wear. But I think we could do without people wearing tight or revealing clothing or emblems/signs/cartoons/phrases on their shirts getting huffy about the fact that people are looking at their bodies. If you have the freedom to show it off, other people have the freedom to look at it.
Posts: 3826 | Registered: May 2005
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quote:I haven't given much thought to my upbringing vis-a-vis my body issues in a long time, but these sorts of pages seem so guilt-inducing and hysterical that I can't help but feel that no girl they're aimed at could ever escape with anything resembling a healthy view of her body or human sexuality. They seem to view women as either good Christians, inadvertent temptresses or on-purpose temptresses and explicitly write about guys "sinning by looking at them."
conservative religious sexuality is bewilderingly odd and backwards to your average american teen, and it's also largely being thrown to the wayside. no-sex-until-marriage is fading away fast.
I'm not going to be too sad to see it go.
Posts: 15421 | Registered: Aug 2005
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posted
A degree of modesty is kinda nice. Leaving a few features to the imagination can make certain situations a bit more fun.
Posts: 2907 | Registered: Nov 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Sterling: Hmm. "Please confine your actions and activities to ones that I find non-provocative."
And please wear low-heeled, completely closed boots, because you never know who might be a foot-fetishist.
Dye your hair a nice neutral color; I have a thing for blondes.
Wear a long skirt. No, that shows too much. Wear pants. No, wait, I'm seeing the shape of your legs. AGH! Wear MC Hammer pants! And three layers of petticoats! Thank you!
I think I'll go out on a limb here and push past "find this to be a little repellant" to "these people are idiots." I mean, yes, you may have a right to impose certain standards on your community, so long as being part of that community is utterly voluntary, there are viable alternatives available, and you can leave at any time. (And you recognize that the standards of that community do not necessarily extend beyond it.) But by and large, I tend to think we do a lot better when we limit the number of standards we decide to inflict on others, mostly to those that actively harm others if they're breached. Discovering you're actually kind of a horndog doesn't fit my definition of "active harm".
But I must give one corollary. No one deserves to be harrassed or assaulted on the basis of what they wear. But I think we could do without people wearing tight or revealing clothing or emblems/signs/cartoons/phrases on their shirts getting huffy about the fact that people are looking at their bodies. If you have the freedom to show it off, other people have the freedom to look at it.
I agree completely with both these points.
Posts: 4393 | Registered: Aug 2003
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posted
I think men benefit just as much from dressing modestly as women do. I think for me, dressing modestly is less about not inciting others to lust, and more about showing that I adhere to a certain standard of conduct and place myself apart from those who do not.
Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
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posted
Kq, or others, what sort of get-up would be considered immodest on a man? The closest I can think of is guys who shamelessly flaunt their bodies by going shirtless when a shirt would really probably be more normal.
I think the parallel just doesn't exist very much, but that being said I think a parallel that does exist is dressing properly or professionally. For example: wearing a hoody as opposed to wearing a suit. I think the modesty stays the same but the amount of respect and regard that is assumed toward you increases dramatically.
Anyway. That site is absurd. Some of the questions they have answers to are so pre-supposing I don't think I'd be able to answer them. Crazy.
Posts: 655 | Registered: May 2005
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- Avoids provocative dress because of personal standards - Avoids provocative dress to avoid pushing the buttons of the poor lust-bot boys -Innocently inspires lust -Knowingly inspires lust, but is OK with that -Knowingly inspires lust, believes lust is wrong -Gets huffy about inspired lust
Only the last two seem to me to be appropriate target for "what are you doing to the poor boys!" judgment.
Comments about how you bend over are ridiculous. Either avert your damn gaze or accept responsibility for feelings aroused by what you're looking at.
Posts: 4287 | Registered: Mar 2005
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posted
The problem is the idiotic notion that it's wrong to have sexual thoughts. None of us would be alive today if our parents and every generation before them didn't have overwhelming sexual desires.
It's simply a means of controlling people by convincing them that they and their thoughts are inherently bad, and that the most natural things are unnatural.
The horrible irony is that these attempts to "control the lusts" and other such nonsense actually create the unhealthy gender roles and emotional trauma linked to sexuality that they claim to be fighting against.
Posts: 3950 | Registered: Mar 2006
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quote:Originally posted by MightyCow: The horrible irony is that these attempts to "control the lusts" and other such nonsense actually create the unhealthy gender roles and emotional trauma linked to sexuality that they claim to be fighting against.
QFT
...
My opinion is pretty simple, as long as you're not indecent (nude in public, or scantily clad in inappropriate situations. Say... a bikini or swimsuit in a funeral.), whatever you wear is your choice. If you personally wish to adhere to some standard of modesty, that's fine. If you don't, that's all right as well. But I don't like the idea of other people trying to enforce their standards of 'modesty' on others for the reason I quoted from MightyCow.
I only have two points on this in general.
1. If you dress provocatively, you should expect more leers and not get in a huff when you do.
2. That is not to say that someone dressing provocatively excuses other people from their actions. (Cat-calling, assault, sexual-abuse, etc.)
Edit: In re-reading my post I realized a somewhat subtle contradiction in my two points which is that leering is an action taken by a person. For reasons I can't really provide a good grounds for, I would argue that leering is an expected result to provocative dress regardless of who's wearing it. Things that go beyond that (cat-calling, assault, abuse, etc.) crosses a line that is unacceptable and not excusable.
Posts: 1831 | Registered: Jan 2003
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quote:Kq, or others, what sort of get-up would be considered immodest on a man?
While I'm sure there are others, some that come to mind are:
-Shirtlessness (I'm okay with it when, say, swimming. Other than that, I consider it less than modest.) -Extremely tight-fitted clothing -The guy I saw in the library once who was wearing his short swim trunks and, um, hanging out -The guys at the beach who run around in thongs-- really I'd consider longer shorts on men to be more modest. -Sleeveless shirts
I should add that I see both men and women in immodest (by my standards) clothing every day, but do not condemn them, because quite obviously they do not live by the same standards I do. Some things are only "sinful" if you have committed not to do them and are breaking that committment, IMO. My personal choice, and my husband's, and our choice for our family, is to dress modestly, by our standards, for our reasons. I am aware that in some circles/parts of the world/societies, what we wear would be immodest too.
Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
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quote: Comments about how you bend over are ridiculous.
I disagree. If I stick my hind end up in the air, that's an eye catcher I don't want you staring at. If I lean down so everything in the front is hanging out, that's more than I want you to see.
Since I'm the one who's uncomfortable with you looking at my bits, I'm ok with taking responsibility for how I bend over. I bend at the knees while keeping my torso mostly upright. (It helps to put one foot slightly behind the other and turned at a 45 degree angle.) Yes, a guy can still look down my shirt if he tries. But at 5'4", there's a decent chance he can do that anyway.
I'm going to take a middle path with this one. It's more polite to not put everything on display and to wear what's generally considered appropriate for the occasion. I'm still a big fan of individual expression, just within some boundaries.
However, these guys seem to have forgotten their Paul. It's bad to cause others to sin if you do it knowingly. Therefore, if my friend confides in me that he thinks lustful thoughts about a particular body part or outfit of mine and I flaunt it in front of him, then I'm sinning.
Posts: 2283 | Registered: Dec 2003
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posted
I don't dress overly immodestly but I wouldn't say I dress particularly modestly either. I dress in a way that I feel is appropriate to the situation. If I dress in a way usually interpreted as provoking, I will not be surprised if I get a response.
However, as many of the women above, what you are wearing often has very little to do with how much you are being leered at. It's more to do with the discreetness of the guys in question.
I love the survey. It works both ways.
Also: I love the comments more than anything. Poor guys. Obviously there needs to be one about guys.
Suits: Dressing like James Bond is a problem because James Bond is quite sexy and therefore wearing a suit is a huge stumbling block.
Ties: Ties make guys look respectable and respectability is often attractive. Therefore, wearing a tie is a stumbling block.
etc.
EDIT #2: I bet that if you collated this all together you would end up with something akin to modern highly modest clothing requirements.
If there was any question who drives the clothing in religions, this survey provides the answers.
Posts: 8473 | Registered: Apr 2003
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quote: Comments about how you bend over are ridiculous.
I disagree. If I stick my hind end up in the air, that's an eye catcher I don't want you staring at. If I lean down so everything in the front is hanging out, that's more than I want you to see.
Since I'm the one who's uncomfortable with you looking at my bits, I'm ok with taking responsibility for how I bend over. I bend at the knees while keeping my torso mostly upright. (It helps to put one foot slightly behind the other and turned at a 45 degree angle.) Yes, a guy can still look down my shirt if he tries. But at 5'4", there's a decent chance he can do that anyway.
I don't think what you're doing is ridiculous. Posts: 4287 | Registered: Mar 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Teshi: If there was any question who drives the clothing in religions, this survey provides the answers.
Really? Because I know several trends towards more (and even in my opinion, excessively so) modest clothing that are exclusively driven by women. In the case of one particular trend in certain segments of Israeli society, in spite of protest from husbands (and rabbis).
Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
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quote:Originally posted by MightyCow: The problem is the idiotic notion that it's wrong to have sexual thoughts. None of us would be alive today if our parents and every generation before them didn't have overwhelming sexual desires.
It's simply a means of controlling people by convincing them that they and their thoughts are inherently bad, and that the most natural things are unnatural.
The horrible irony is that these attempts to "control the lusts" and other such nonsense actually create the unhealthy gender roles and emotional trauma linked to sexuality that they claim to be fighting against.
I think we would be much healthier as human beings if, instead of trying to suppress normal, healthy sexual feelings and beating ourselves up when we can't, we would learn to cope with our feelings and control our behaviour.
Posts: 11187 | Registered: Sep 2005
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posted
Well, perhaps I was overhasty in making such a sweeping judgement. Clothing can be a political statement, too, and one of power in both directions.
That said, I do think that it is revealing (no pun intended) what these boys and men come out with on the survey. Nothing is particularly different from what you'd expect from the history of clothing in monotheistic society.
I have a related question for the men, though. If you see a modestly dressed woman who you are attracted to does she provoke fewer sexual thoughts (and more chaste ones) than an immodestly dressed woman, or do you simply categorize those thoughts as less immoral?
Posts: 8473 | Registered: Apr 2003
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quote:Originally posted by Teshi: If there was any question who drives the clothing in religions, this survey provides the answers.
Really? Because I know several trends towards more (and even in my opinion, excessively so) modest clothing that are exclusively driven by women. In the case of one particular trend in certain segments of Israeli society, in spite of protest from husbands (and rabbis).
Yeah, it isn't completely cut and dried. Often, when there is a group that is oppressed, there are often members of a group that will actively work to maintain the oppression of that group (Phyllis Schlafly leaps to mind as an American example). The reasons for this are probably fairly varied. I've never studied it, but I can think of a couple off of the top of my head that sound like plausible motivations for the behavior. Despite the fact that it happens, these figures can't accurately be said to be the driving force behind pushing their group into second class citizen status. They're a product of the system rather than a cause of it.
Posts: 16059 | Registered: Aug 2000
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quote:Originally posted by Armoth: If we stipulate that men have a larger sexual drive than women do
I'm not willing to grant that.
Actually, neither am I.
I would, however, stipulate that on average, men are more visually stimulated than women.
I seem to remember studies that measured physiological response that correlates with sexual arousal of men and women who were shown flims of people having sex revealing that while the women reported a lesser degree of arousal than men, their physiological responses suggested that this was not the case. It would have been the early to mid '90s when I read the studies, though, and I'm fuzzy on the details. Anybody up to date on the research on this topic?
Posts: 16059 | Registered: Aug 2000
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posted
I was actually looking for some sort of double blind study on viewing blondes as more attractive. I vaguely remember it being out there somewhere.
Posts: 11265 | Registered: Mar 2002
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posted
It seems that the problem (at least with the guys from the survey) is that they have no way they can possibly avoid what they think is immodest. It reminds me of a joke/game my friend always says. " if you think of your mother naked you go to hell"
It's horrible, but with that thought in your mind theres no way you can't briefly think about it. And there is no way those guys could not think about some one immodestly, although i think they should just make allowanes and not try tostop women form leaning over.
Posts: 549 | Registered: Feb 2008
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posted
There is a huge difference between lust and thinking a girl is pretty. Just because there is a bunch of creepy people who would lust over the very existence of a woman doesn't mean everyone is creepy. However, the human body is by nature made for sexual arousal. As was said, that is what makes babies possible. To dress or even act a particular way ends up saying, if you want it to or not, have sex with me. On the other hand, the idea of modesty is have respect for me as a person and not as a body.
Posts: 2207 | Registered: Oct 2003
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quote:Originally posted by Teshi: I have a related question for the men, though. If you see a modestly dressed woman who you are attracted to does she provoke fewer sexual thoughts (and more chaste ones) than an immodestly dressed woman, or do you simply categorize those thoughts as less immoral?
Yes, speaking for myself, fewer sexual thoughts.
However, the second part of your question is confusing. "do you simply categorize those thoughts as less immoral?" What thoughts? Attraction? Someone who finds "sexual thoughts" immoral probably doesn't find attraction to be immoral, if that's what you're asking.
I'm just more likely to think about specific body parts, and related activities, if those body parts are on display. However, I think this is very much dependent on context. The fact that certain cultures can make a big deal of an exposed ankle shows, I think, that the sexual thoughts are more or less a constant, and the triggers are what vary. If I found myself on a desert island alone with a bunch of habit-clad nuns, I'm pretty sure I'd start thinking naughty things about the nuns before very long.
On the other hand if I was stranded in a nudist colony I think I'd reach a point where just seeing a lot of flesh wasn't particularly inspiring.
Posts: 4287 | Registered: Mar 2005
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posted
So, to clarify, dressing a certain way says "have sex with me; don't respect me as a person?"
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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quote:Originally posted by Teshi: If there was any question who drives the clothing in religions, this survey provides the answers.
Really? Because I know several trends towards more (and even in my opinion, excessively so) modest clothing that are exclusively driven by women. In the case of one particular trend in certain segments of Israeli society, in spite of protest from husbands (and rabbis).
Yeah, it isn't completely cut and dried. Often, when there is a group that is oppressed, there are often members of a group that will actively work to maintain the oppression of that group (Phyllis Schlafly leaps to mind as an American example). The reasons for this are probably fairly varied. I've never studied it, but I can think of a couple off of the top of my head that sound like plausible motivations for the behavior. Despite the fact that it happens, these figures can't accurately be said to be the driving force behind pushing their group into second class citizen status. They're a product of the system rather than a cause of it.
*sigh* Since I definitely don't consider modesty rules "oppression" (in general; specific cases might qualify), nor do I consider women second class citizens, I object to you using my post as a basis for yours.
In addition to disagreeing with its substance.
Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
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posted
My dad once told me that the way I dressed would influence who was attracted to me. I've found this to be mostly true- the way you dress DOES say something about you- your values, your commitments, even. For example, if I show up to a job interview wearing torn, muddy jeans and a ripped t-shirt, that's going to tell that employer that I care nothing about my appearance and probably won't care much about the job. Same as showing up with my uniform wrinkled and dirty- it's a reflection on you to the customers or the people you're working with.
I don't want the first thing someone thinks about me to be "Wow, she's hot, I'd totally hit that." There's a difference, to me, in the above statement, and "hey, she's really pretty." And the way I dress can influence that, in my experience.
The way I dress is primarily based on what I'M comfortable exposing. I don't wear shorts, for example, unless I'm doing something like working out in the summer outside. I wear jeans in the summer, but that's because I just... don't like showing my legs. No reason for it, I just don't. Same with tank tops- I rarely wear them, because my bust is such that I inadvertently expose parts of me that I'm not comfortable exposing if I move my arms certain ways.
Personally, I've never attended a church where they told us exactly what to wear, down to the details. They asked for certain things in certain situations- one piece bathing suits for girls, and t-shirts and swim trunks for guys at church camp, for example- but as long as we weren't dressing in order to deliberately provoke sexual stimulation in those around us, we could wear what we wanted.
Granted, this is just my limited experience. But I thought I'd share.
Posts: 1591 | Registered: Jul 2005
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posted
There's a reason wearing few clothes is called "provocative." It provokes a reaction. Just because some guys can leer and lust without being provoked doesn't disprove the fact that some guys really only do it because they're provoked.
And placing the blame for the leering (which I am not defending!) solely on the guy is like placing the blame for a fistfight solely on the one to throw the first punch... even though the other guy provoked it by threatening and abusive behavior.
Yes, men are responsible for how they react to stimuli. But women are responsible for providing stimuli when it is easily foreseeable it's going to cause such reaction? Especially when the reaction is basically biologically based?
Assuming it were legal for women to walk around completely nude, would the responsibility for mens' subsequent reactions to such be completely on the mens' shoulders? Or might women be contributing to it? If so, then surely there is some reasonable middle ground between full nudity and being fully covered head to toe.
Posts: 454 | Registered: Mar 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Seatarsprayan: But women are responsible for providing stimuli when it is easily foreseeable it's going to cause such reaction? Especially when the reaction is basically biologically based?
Because, of course, in every culture known, men react to bare breasts or other such "stimuli" by be sexually aroused?
quote:Assuming it were legal for women to walk around completely nude, would the responsibility for mens' subsequent reactions to such be completely on the mens' shoulders?
I would expect the responsibility to be completely on male shoulders, yes.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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Assuming it were legal for women to walk around completely nude, would the responsibility for mens' subsequent reactions to such be completely on the mens' shoulders?
Their reaction? No. Their actions? Yes, absolutely.
Or, as my pcc professor put it, "If an extremely attractive person of the gender and sexual orientation compatible to your own walks into your office, strips off their clothes, gets up on your desk and does a little dance and then falls into your lap it's still your responsibility to say no."
Posts: 9866 | Registered: Apr 2002
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quote:Assuming it were legal for women to walk around completely nude, would the responsibility for mens' subsequent reactions to such be completely on the mens' shoulders?
Yes.
I actually think it ridiculous that our government tells us that in order to leave our homes, we have to have certain body parts covered. Especially the double standard of women needing their chests covered when men do not. I believe NY's supreme court ruled that a woman can be topless anywhere a man is allowed to be topless. I couldn't agree with that decision more.
If a woman goes into public naked in a society that legally allows such a thing, then guys are free to look all they want. Harassing such a woman (or worse) would be just as wrong then as it is if the woman is in a burka. What a woman wears does not affect her rights in any way that I can conceive of.
quote:Originally posted by Teshi: If there was any question who drives the clothing in religions, this survey provides the answers.
Really? Because I know several trends towards more (and even in my opinion, excessively so) modest clothing that are exclusively driven by women. In the case of one particular trend in certain segments of Israeli society, in spite of protest from husbands (and rabbis).
Yeah, it isn't completely cut and dried. Often, when there is a group that is oppressed, there are often members of a group that will actively work to maintain the oppression of that group (Phyllis Schlafly leaps to mind as an American example). The reasons for this are probably fairly varied. I've never studied it, but I can think of a couple off of the top of my head that sound like plausible motivations for the behavior. Despite the fact that it happens, these figures can't accurately be said to be the driving force behind pushing their group into second class citizen status. They're a product of the system rather than a cause of it.
*sigh* Since I definitely don't consider modesty rules "oppression" (in general; specific cases might qualify), nor do I consider women second class citizens, I object to you using my post as a basis for yours.
In addition to disagreeing with its substance.
I didn't intend for my post be be based on yours; I was conceiving of it as being more of a response. In any case, I apologize for any offense given. My post was a bit disjointed, because I was writing it while taking care of work stuff, so a)the writing in it is embarassingly bad, and b)I realize in rereading it that I failed to include something in it saying that I didn't know enough about the situation that you were talking about to know whether I would consider societal enforcement of the restrictions you were talking about oppressive or not. I don't consider the mode of dress that you adhere to oppressive, and I don't have the feeling that women in Orthodox Judaism are considered second class citizens, just to be absolutely clear on the subject.
Now, I do think that the imposition of headscarves and chador on women in Iran constitutes oppressive behavior, and I think that the imposition of this mode of dress as a requirement in the 70s is was part of an effort to force women back into second class citizen status in that country.
Posts: 16059 | Registered: Aug 2000
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quote:Or, as my pcc professor put it, "If an extremely attractive person of the gender and sexual orientation compatible to your own walks into your office, strips off their clothes, gets up on your desk and does a little dance and then falls into your lap it's still your responsibility to say no."
Absolutely.
But blame is not a zero-sum game, and the woman in this case would not be blameless, regardless of the man's subsequent actions.
Posts: 454 | Registered: Mar 2005
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posted
There were reports of fanatical "modesty patrols" responsible for several incidents of beating and vandalism in Jersualem late last year, too. Anywhere you find the concept of "modesty," you'll eventually find some form of retribution taken against the "immodest."
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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posted
Let's turn it around. Instead of sexual arousal, let's use disgust. If a man walks around naked, his junk swinging in the wind (but not directed at anyone) and a woman finds it disgusting and offensive, instead of arousing, that's just her problem, right? He's not responsible at all for her reaction? So if she makes a face or says "Eww!" then she's wrong for displaying her disgust, right?
Posts: 454 | Registered: Mar 2005
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posted
This is from what some of the young men said on the Modesty survey.
I noticed that sexual arousal is a big problem, but (according to what some of these young men say) it's only a problem outside of marriage. The chastity and modesty of girls only applies outside of marriage. Their sexuality must stay hidden until their partner is chosen.
To me, this can be interpreted in a negative way. It sounds as if the sexuality of girls and women is not hers to give away (or not) and belongs instead to a future husband (wherever he may be).
The fact that this modesty survey only goes the one way suggests that this kind of sexuality with a "reserved" sign on it equally only goes one way. This may not practically be the case in modern society, but if modesty is such a big deal and this is a modern site, why isn't there a male-questions-for-females portion of the survey? (Or am I missing it?)
Is the only reason for modesty to save young men from poor upbringings?
In certain societies where women follow many rules and men only a few, there is a behavior divide as well. Women are demure and studious, men out of control of their sexuality as well as their aggression. As a result, not only do men have the power, they are unequipped to have it-- not because they are male but because they have been brought up in this way.
If you have a society where women are covered entirely and men are still catcalling and leering, it is not because the men are so lusty that they can't control themselves (and thus requiring MORE controls on the women until they disappear altogether) it's because nobody has thought to bring the men up in a way to have them treat women in a respectful way.
Obviously, there are also societies where, despite differing rules (perhaps more equal ones), men are still brought up to be highly respectful (not worshipful-- HUGE difference) of women as people. In this case, although there may be what seem to me like unnecessary modesty rules, neither sex entirely dominates the other and no slippery slope is embarked upon where the more out of control the men are the more rules are imposed on the opposite sex in order to curtail the male behavior.
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Right.
