on the “its acceptable for women to wear men’s clothes but not men to wear women’s clothes” thing- its always forgotten that women and girls have been fighting in small but organised ways to wear “masculine” (mostly read practical) clothing from at least the 1870s. I know women in their 80s and girls in their tweens who at some time in their life have organised in order to wear the clothes they want – from making petitions to persuade their school to let them wear shorts not gym skirts, to trade union organising at work to make sure overalls and workboots are available in women’s sizes, to being the first women in the office to wear trousers, to just turning up at social events in the clothes they want to wear – and getting solidarity from other women doing the same thing – and of course not forgetting the women who risked violence, losing their job or families, or being arresting for cross-dressing laws because of what they wore.
There just hasn’t been such a widespread and longstanding organised push from men to wear skirts or other clothes coded feminine in everyday life. That isn’t women’s fault.
Women have been fighting for centuries to wear clothing that doesn’t physically impede us when we’re being chased by men and we still don’t have pockets or shorts that cover our entire butt, meanwhile men want women to make skirts they can feel masculine in.
Nearly two centuries ago, women were fighting to be allowed to wear poofy pants under a poofy dress. The outfit had been put together by a Quaker woman named Amelia Bloomer. The women who wore it were harassed and assaulted in the streets. They were mocked in the newspapers. And still they kept fighting to be able to wear clothing that was less restrictive. Eventually, the Bloomer suit was adapted to become the usual design for women’s sporting apparel.
Women fought to not have to wear multiple layers of petticoats in the summer, and so a new “crinoline” (technically, a crinoline is an underskirt made of stiff horsehair) was invented, the “cage crinoline” (think hoop skirt) which became dangerous in its own right as women burned to death, became caught in machinery, and were otherwise harmed by the very design meant to be helpful.
Women fought to get rid of restrictive corsetry, inventing “emancipation waists,” (basically a sort of fitted undershirt), Union suits (yep, originally for women but quickly adopted by men), and even the “healthy” S line corset (healthy because it didn’t constrict the ribs. Sadly, like the cage crinoline, it was adopted by high fashion and became a tool of tightlacing.)
Women fought to have more comfortable clothing. Look up the aesthetic dress movement, and the earlier dress reform movement.
Women fought and fought to have swimming suits in which we could actually swim. Once we wore full dresses made of wool to go ocean bathing. Only slowly did the hemlines rise. Pants were added, then the shape became more streamlined. Women were arrested for public indecency. Still, they persisted.
Women fought to have appropriate garments to go cycling in or to ride a horse astride. Women fought and continue to fight to be allowed to attend school in comfortable clothing. I’ve said this before, but when I was a girl, I was required to wear a skirt unless the temperature stayed below 0 degrees Fahrenheit. I was not permitted to wear pants under my skirt, instead wearing woolen tights which itched and would pull down, requiring me to concentrate on keeping my clothing in order as well as my schoolwork.
Women are literally not stopping you. Go, buy a kilt or even an 80s bubble skirt. Nobody cares. But stop acting like women have not had to fight for every inch we’ve gained.
it was men who policed what women wore (and still do, lest we forget that it’s only acceptable for women to wear men’s clothes and ‘look like men’ in certain contexts and up to a certain point) and it’s men who police what other men wear through threats of violence. complain to MEN about this problem. organize and fight against MEN, because if you treat this as a men vs. women situation you’re never going to get anywhere.
Published
The Paradox Machine 