It’s no secret that a lot of high schools have sexist dress codes. Even though it’s been that way for decades, that’s not stopping this teen from taking a stand against her school’s double standards.
On September 25th, high school senior Eleanor Fitzwilliams took to Twitter to express her dismay over why her photo that she intended to use in her senior year book was deemed too inappropriate and rejected by officials at Verona Area High School in Wisconsin.
In her tweet she says, “Here’s my senior picture. [B]ecause you can see my part of my brallette, it was “too inappropriate”. [Y]et, here’s the boys’ swim team picture.”
As you can see from the photo, Fitzwilliams is making the point that her photo was rejected because of her undergarments peaking out, yet no skin was showing. Yet, the boy’s swim team photo was of the whole team without shirts on. Understandably, she was upset by this double standard.
Fitzwilliams went on to say, “[M]y tweet wasn’t to call out the boys it’s about the school saying my pic wasn’t ok but they show way more skin and get their pic seen a lot more.”
In posting the photos, she raises an excellent question. Why, as a female, is her photo considered inappropriate while a group of young men can pose without shirts on and nobody bats an eye?
Since posting the images to Twitter, the tweet has gotten over 173,000 likes, more than 33,000 retweets and over 600 comments.
The response from fellow tweeters was largely in support for the teen.
A lot of the responses even shared personal stories of similar situations where there was a dress code violation that stemmed from a long time double standard.
One woman even shared an image of her senior yearbook’s wrestling team to draw attention to the issue at hand. In her tweet, she shares with Fitzwilliams and the rest of Twitter that she was the only female member of her high school’s wrestling team. When it came time to pose for the yearbook photo, she was the only team member that wasn’t allowed to wear the wrestling singlet. Instead she is fully covered in a sweatshirt and sweatpants while her male counterparts are donning the school issued uniform.
“So far I have a lot of support from my peers and adults in my life; everyone’s really proud of me for speaking up,” Fitzwilliams told Yahoo Lifestyle.
While Fitzwilliams initially posted the photos on Twitter to vent, she’s glad that they’ve sparked a conversation around school’s dress codes and the sexualization and double standards surrounding these long standing codes. She hopes that the conversation continues and official begin to realize the weight of their decisions.
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