She's a Child, NOT a Sex Symbol!!

Once, when my daughter was 3 and swimming at the beach in just her bathing suit bottoms, another child, maybe 6 years old, asked why she wasn't wearing a bikini top. Throughout the day, I had several others, including parents, ask the same questions, and I looked at my daughter and wondered why, at the tender age of 3, people thought she needed to cover up. Cover up what?
Now, in elementary school, I allow her to choose clothing when we go shopping, but there are lots of items that stay on the rack either because of the cut of the clothing or the wording printed on them. Sometimes she argues, but I always win.

So let me join LZ Granderson in saying Parents, don't dress your girls like tramps!  Little girls do not need push-up bras, padded bikini tops, pants (or underwear for that sake) with unfitting slogans printed on them. They don't need to dress like 18 year olds and "flaunt it" - they're children!  Make sure they still look like one.

Mr. Granderson gives a lot of good examples, but the stupidity of some parents seems never ending, so let me also share this video of children "dancing" at a birthday party. And this is funny?  I want to slap these people!!

A friend of mine once told me that these sleazy Halloween outfits were selling so well, because parents thought that's how they were supposed to dress their little girls for trick or treating.  Are you serious?  Since when did we stop thinking ourselves?  If nobody bought it because it was too revealing, too sexy, too flaunting, then obviously the manufacturing company would make outfits more appropriate for the age group.  Supply and demand - it's as simple as that!




Photo by Tina Phillips/freedigitalphotos.net

When my daughter wants the same outfit as her friend, because "everybody wears that", I do still refrain from saying some of her friends look like tramps, but barely.  We can take that battle during the teenage years; for now she is still a child, and will dress like one!