Teen girls dressing like Hookers

Teen girls dressing like Hookers [+ favourites]

quote:

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KATHERINE HEPBURN ONCE held a press conference at which a reporter in
a very short skirt got up to ask a question. The great actress stared
at the young journalist and in her cultivated diction asked, "Did your
mother let you go out dressed like that?"


Those words float through my mind whenever I see adolescent girls at
the mall, done up like over-the-hill streetwalkers. The surprise does
not come from knowing that 14-year-old girls want to wear tight sweaters
and show their pierced navels to boys.


It comes from the understanding that many of these young ladies walked
past acquiescent fathers and mothers on the way to the front door. And
very often these are the same middle-class parents who complain that a
sex-saturated culture is corrupting their children.


There seems to be a huge disconnect between the pleas of parents to
curb sexual messages in the media and the state of undress with which
their daughters leave the house. Sometimes you wonder whether all this
blaming of the media has somehow given parents an excuse to go passive. By
claiming to have no control over the situation, they absolve themselves
of all responsibility.


It's not true that consumers have no power against media messages they
abhor. Case in point was the homosexual boycott of Dr. Laura's radio
show. Gay-rights groups singled out Dr. Laura for what they contended
were homophobic sentiments expressed on her program. The charges were
unfair, but they nevertheless persuaded United Airlines, Xerox and other
big sponsors to remove their advertisements from her show.


Has anyone taken a gander lately at Britney Spears? The 18-year-old pop
sensation appears on the cover of this month's Elle magazine, revealing
a cleavage profile just short of a Playboy centerfold. Her core audience
is 5- to 15-year-old girls.


At her concerts, the angelic-faced Spears does bump-and-grind-and-moan
routines. She also performs a very suggestive number employing a pole
while singing the Rolling Stones' "Satisfaction." Meanwhile, her stage
is littered with life-sized teddy bears, pastel beach balls and other
paraphernalia of girlhood -- or of kiddie porn.


Parents take their little girls to these shows. And they supply the cash
with which to buy Britney Spears albums. Nine-year-olds presumably do
not have independent sources of income.


A recent newspaper article describes the booming cosmetics market among
teens in Florida. It's no longer about adolescents covering pimples or
sneaking in some mascara and lip-gloss. They are now buying the full
complement of war paint, supplied by such grownup cosmetics companies
as Lancome and Clinique.


In the article, a 13-year-old named Courtney remarks, "My mom says I
don't need to wear makeup to look better, that I already have a natural
look." Moms have been saying that to 13-year-olds for generations.


But in this case, Mom's opinion counts for nothing. The article reveals
that Courtney went off to the first day of school wearing blue-eye shadow,
bronzing blusher, brownish lipstick and some white lip-gloss. Mom sounds
more like she's running a rooming house than a family in which parents
may enforce a dress code.


Elsewhere in the article, a pretty 15-year-old talks about putting on
body glitter before she goes out clubbing. (She says it makes her more
visible in dark nightspots.) Like the other girls, she obviously holds
membership in a middle-class household. Columbia Pictures isn't giving
her the bar change. Her parents are.


I'm having coffee at the house of an acquaintance. She goes on and on
about the collapse of civilization: The perverts and criminals have
taken over, making life next to impossible for decent families. At some
point in the conversation, her daughter comes down. The 17-year-old is
wearing neck-to-toe, tight black leather with chains jangling at various
intervals. My coffee partner coos a few words of motherly concern to
the teen, who then goes off into the night.


Was I hallucinating? I don't think so.


Adolescents have always pushed the boundaries of acceptable dress. It
was the duty of parents to offer resistance. Today, many champions of
propriety do not see enforcement as their job. Sending a daughter back
upstairs to change can be unpleasant work. It is so much easier to blame
the media.


Froma Harrop is a syndicated columnist and Journal editorial writer. She
may be reached by e-mail at: froma_har...@projo.com.

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"Hating everyone protects me from elitism."

amen to this thread! parents most of the time allow their children to dress the way that they want to try and get closer to their distanced teen. you know how you discover a really good thing and after a while of having it/using it or doing it for a period of time it gets OLD. played out. look at the history of clothing. it wentfrom almost full coverage, long dresses etc to what it is now. so... as a progressive society the only thing left is public nudity. ick. either that or we go back to 1900 style dress.
anywayyy
there are some parents that set a certain dress code in their household, but the children break those rules as soon as theyre out of parents sight.
i dont think britney spears is 18..if thats what you were saying shes in her early 20's. it is scary how vain and superficial teenage girls are these days, and believe me i am living dead center of the fashion show.
i think all of this is going to kick us in the ass 20-40 years down the road you know. a lot of women who were 'perfect' will start to loose their looks, and their power. maybe i should go to college to be a plastic surgeon because ill definitly find work when i graduate! ive found that if you look good w/o much effort and then it starts taking more effort to better yourself, that causes depression in a lot of women. keeping up their looks.
wow i can not organize my thoughts into sentences der der

to sum it up even if parents do send their kids back upstairs to change, i still think they will hide something different under that in their purse or just borrow friends clothes. its already in thier minds what they should look like. and its sure as hell theyre not going to go to a party in a floral parent approved turtlneck when every other girl is... hookerlike

I feel that parents should discourage their daughters from being conditioned to believe that they are only as valuable as the way guys react to the way they look.

I speak to women about this and some of them think that they grow out of it... perhaps a percentage of them. But I'd say a goof 90% of the girls that begin dressing like hookers never really escape the stigma of judging themselves superficially.

"Hating everyone protects me from elitism."

as a teenage girl i must comment on this as well......

I COMPLETELY AGREE WITH YOU!!!! i hate seeing my friends dress like hookers...its a little strange to me and makes me feel weird. i must admit that i dress alot like a guy. i like board shorts, tshirts, and baggy pants. i guess i'm an extreme in another direction. just glad to say no one has tried hiring me for the night or anything

also, i really couldn't care less about how a guy thinks i look. if a guy wants someone who wears padded bras (stuffed with toilet paper most likely...) tiny shirts and pants 5 sizes too small...then he can go get one of the other call girls. i'm not much for shallow guys anyways. if a guy doesn't like that i dress how i want instead of how he wants, then he probably isn't my type of guy. i'm sure there are some guys out there that don't mind if a girl is comfortable with herself.

"Don't sweat the petty things, don't pet the sweaty things."

i second firefly, sounds like you dress like my gf. she wears jeans and tshirts, and baggy hoodies most of the time, she has the occasional girly moment, when she comes out wearing a skirt and a strappy top, but even then the shortet skirt she owns is about knee length, and she wont wear that anywhere she might see someone she knows.

though the weird thing is, there seems to be reletively little middle ground, i can only think of one girl i know, who fits into tha area most of the time, all the others, are either like firefly, or like hookers (thoug i think my gf sometimes reaches the middle gorund in her girly moments). why are there so few girls who can manage to dress attrctively, but still leave enough to the imagination to be decent in public.

"So Schrodinger's Cat is not only neither dead nor alive, but might also be sexually aroused by elbows and peanut butter?"

with you on that firefly
as another teenage girl
i dont see why they want too look like they sleep around (most of them do)
wear what you want is what i say
but i have to say most guys do look at a girl in a tiny skirt more than one in baggy clothes
if guys didn't want girls with 'padded bras'
most girls wouldn't wear them

"rock on"