Tell me what you really think.
I never realized until just now, how very grateful I am for Hot Topic.
You are soooo right about the clothes being sold for children especially girls being age inappropriate. Who puts their six year old in a leather mini skirt with a crop top???
Btw - *ahem* Zhank heaven for little girlzzzz, cuz little girlz get bigger every day. - "Gigi" Great song although a little creepy now that I think about it LOL
My youngest, Anna who is 9 has somehow gotten onto a mailing list for every single children's clothing store known to man. We were looking through some of the catalogs yesterday and I couldn't help noticing how the child models were posing! What IS wrong with the adults in charge? The clothes looked like mini adult crap that even I would have a tough time wearing in public and then on top of it, these little girls were in suggestive poses with shockingly suggestive expressions on their faces. It's sickening. I pointed it out to Anna, explaining my point of view to her and luckily, she agreed that most of it was "gross". Anna's a pain in the wallet with her girly-girl style, but looking at the alternatives available, I'd rather pay through the nose for her to wear dresses than have to deal with low rise jeans and belly shirts. Now, if I could just have the same conversations with my teens....
I so agree with you!
Take a look at the "made in" labels on that crap. Most of it is either asian, or increasingly south american. Most of it made by people who work 12 hour days and make less for that day than we spend on a gallon of gas. The people who own the factories in which this garbage is produced steal adult design and simply shrink the size. This avoids the expense of doing any REAL design work. They are then pushed to retail buyers as being the fashion that allows little girls to dress just like their Mommies.
I'm not kidding.
OH, but you should see what happens when they go to shoot those catalogs. Beautiful little children, all of them, cast because they are as precocious as hell. Each has a parent, usually a MOTHER, who stands annoyingly just behind the camera cueing their precious darling of what pose to take. Child obediently mimics each pose.
This would be why I don't shoot juniors.
Or weddings.
Or anything else with a Mother involved.
Sing it sistah!
I especially love the size 6X pants with the words "cutie pie" across the butt or the t-shirts that suggest the six year old wearing it is "Boy Crazy"... WTH??
Sadly, I think you are right to suggest that the schools step in earlier than they do to enforce some sort of dress code. It has not been until now, when K is starting jr high, that we have been issued a list of do's and don'ts...you would like to believe that this same list of no-no's would not have to be applied to the elementary crowd:
*"Clothes that expose a student's undergarments by being excessively loose or sagging, sheer, small, or having holes in them are unacceptable. This includes spaghetti straps, tank tops that expose the back, side, or midriff of a student."
K and I especially got a kick out of this one:
*"The wearing of dog collars, chains, or wallet chains is not acceptable."
Dammit. And we just bought that new spiky collar with the hopes of having her yearbook picture taken in it.
I won't even take my daughter clothes shopping - I buy her clothes instead, and she gets to choose from what I've picked out.
There's still more glitter and pink and sparkly crap than I'd care for (I can't put her in plaid and hope for the best, alas) - but at least shirts cover her belly button and she's too skinny/tall to wear the hiphugger stuff anyway.
Y'know, one of the reasons Lolita was so dangerous was because Nabokov left some things to the imagination - unlike these clothes.
I'm as tolerant as they get (well, toward everything but stupidity and George W. Bush), but yeah, too much of the apparel available today makes the average seven-year-old look like Just Another Night On The Sunset Strip.
And don't even get me started on stage mothers.
WF
My 8yo is finally starting to get interested in what she wears and it is so hard to tell her that she can pick out an outfit from these three racks of clothes because the rest of the store is inappropriate! She's 8, not 18, and since she's tall and thin, clothes are already likely to be shorter on her, and show more skin than I'd like. Luckily, most of her style seems to be of the sporty variety and velour hoodies and yoga pants (with NOTHING written across the backside) are a staple of hers. She's been excellent at understanding my POV about some of the "styles" available but she should have the right to choose from a bigger variety of clothes without worrying about how men are going to be looking at her.
Argh! This is one of my hot points too. Let our kids be kids as long as possible! Real life will hit them way too soon, as it is!
Well said! A day at the mall is so aggravating that I have to gear up for it well in advance. Trying to find shorts for my 12 year old to take to church camp was all but impossible. Hot pants are frowned upon as you can understand, and decent t-shirts without obscene or suggestive phrases are non-existent. Brittney Spears - curse your prostitute-like fashion sense!
awww I feel sorry for all mothers of girls out there.
Me, I'm happy with the semi-gangsta style my younger son prefers (My oldest will wear anything I'll buy him... he doesn't care). Long, baggy shorts or relaxed-fit jeans... size XL T-shirts... hoodies... and not a square inch of skin showing! Works for me!
PS. Psst... good news... Arethusa sez that the Britney style is now out! Pass the word to your daughters!
I have 4 daughters! I just got back from the mall, and you nailed it - super low-riders for 7 yr olds without hips, and hoochie lingerie tops for girls with little breast buds. I don't even wear that crap! I hate shopping for their clothes!
Ask me again why our daughter goes to a private school and has to wear dresses to her knees every day. Yah it's expensive and yes it's a sacrifice that I wish we didn't have to do BUT when I see a little girl with "Sexy" or "Where are you looking?" or my all time favorite, "I've got junk in my trunk!" on her REAR END I step up and pay the 4000 a year in school, go to church, and pray to God that she turns out ok.
Yup, to what Hula said. Thank God for catholic school, for uniforms, and nuns who enforce the dress codes.
The clothes out there are just vile.
Are you refering to Honore de Balzac's "Pierrette" and the perversion of child abuse? I understand that Balzac might have been a glutton, but the perversions and decadence that he wrote about belonged to his characters and were not based on his own life, oui?
Home-educating helps with the peer influenced desire for vulgar fashions. And, older, modest sisters are worth their weight in gold!
Honore Lachaille (played by Maurice Chevalier) sang "Thank Heaven for Little Girls" in the movie "Gigi." He liked to watch little girls grow up; the camera sequences as he sings are suggestive, and so are the lyrics if you analyze them. "Lost" up there is right; it's kind of creepy when you think about it.
Ugh, I just went shopping Saturday on Tax-free weekend here in Texas and it was just awful. I can not believe the ugly crap they expect little girls to wear. I would expect to see more modest clothing on the women walking down Montrose Ave in Houston on a Friday night.
And my daughter, 8, luckily, is a practical soul born of 2 fashion challenged engineers and will not wear any of that kind of stuff. She won't wear anything tight, short or irritating (like lace).
I have to take her to sporting goods store to buy her soccer shorts because those are the only knid of shorts that meet her and my requirements.
Thanks goodness she doesn't like the bad stuff, though. I do not have to fight with her over it!
Have you actually tried to go shopping for a little girl lately??? I tell you it is horrible, I refuse to let my daughter look like a hoochie momma but it is hard to find things for a little girl. Things that are girlie and age appropriate. Oh well that's why we have a grandma that does wonders on the sewing machine!!
Yep, nothing tied above the waist or written on the butt allowed here. You know what they have now that they didn't used to, though? Skirts with shorts built it! Love those!
I asked last weekend at the mall if we should just call elementary school "Future Hookers of America." Fortunately, my 8 y/o is much like Rocket Girl's daughter & abhors anything that is tight or itchy. God is good to me. I'd better be nice, lest her fashion sense changes in Jr High!
Ananda – That joy in existence without which the universe will fall apart and collapse. –Sanskrit Title
This is just fashion in America, but one thing reflects upon the entire country and I saw little joy in those posts above. I buy clothes for no one, but I despise it when girls, especially so young, are dressed in ugly ways. Thanks be to those parents who enforce what should be enforced, and the grimmest of frowns upon those who do not.
I'm not a mother (yet), but I wholeheartedly agree with you. And not only are these babies (cuz, let's be honest, that's what they are) walking around in hoochie cutters and various other garments that would make a porn star blush - but so are the teenagers.
I don't know how many times I've passed by High Schools and thought to myself - well then, she looks like a full grown prostitute...
Back in my day (and really, I'm not all that old) - we had a dress code and it was enforced. I remember being sent home because I wore a tank top - yes, a tank top -- now, these girls can show up in string and it's acceptable - pshaw.
(btw, Michele says hello!)
i totally agree with you. some of that stuff i wouldn't wear and i'm at that age where i want everyone to notice me! but i mean come on, soon 6-month olds will be wearing mini mini's and hot pink tank tops.
You have a witness here! It's a challenge to find clothes to fit my chunky 10-year-old, period. Add that to the whore-wear and it's impossible to dress the kid.
I got a huge laugh at my son's grade school graduation when my arch-feminist wife was hissing "what are those girls' mothers thinking" throughout the evening. I would not describe the clothes as whorish, but they were way too "old" and revealing for 13 & 14 year olds.
A-freakin' men, Sistah!!
Totally agree, Mama. My daughter and daughter-in-law each have a very hard time outfitting their girls in anything that doesn't make them look like "hoochie mamas" as they call them. I don't understand women who go for that look, but to put it on a child is just asking for trouble.
Perhaps there is a need for a mail order business creating and marketing decent, age appropriate clothing for girls? I fortunatly, have two sons and they attend public school requesting a school uniform.
My girl is only 3 months old. Still...I am afraid. I am very afraid.
Polski3: www.landsend.com is where I suspect we'll be doing most of my girl's shopping as she gets older.
A local high school here has a new dress code for the coming year. Basically, it's No bra straps showing, no tank tops, no cleavage, no belly buttons, and no butts. If your pants are so low we see your crack, the principal will make you wear different pants.
Believe it or not, the PARENTS are raising a fuss about the "restriction of freedom".
I really hope that the granny skirts, turtle necks, etc come back into style before Girl Terror gets any older!
Meredith is right on. Lands End for Kids catalog is one of the best as is the LLBean Kids catalog. My first daughter who couldn't stand trying on clothes in a dressing room loved the catalog clothes. They are upbeat with plenty of colors and choices, and they don't wear out so can be handed down. One other point, why not use the "business casual" definition/description for middle and high school dress codes? Those clothes are acutally available at Target and Sears - although most highschoolers probably wouldn't like them. However, that would be a prep for them for their future in the working world.
My buddy Mel has a word for this phenom; "prosti-tots". So very apt, no?
Try Gap Kids, they still seem interested in selling clothing that let kids look like....well, kids. Love it.
My almost-twelve year old had this to say when I told her I would kill her if I ever caught her dressed like Britney Spears;
"Please, Mom, kill me before anyone else SEES me! Then, go find whoever dressed me like that and kill them too!"
She just wants to be decently covered. Guess I done good (so far).
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