Forget last year’s Slut Walks in Canada, New York’s brightest high school students put together the most badass demonstration ever yesterday—or, as the students dubbed it, “Slutty Wednesday.†Stuyvesant High School students stripped to spaghetti straps and short shorts to protest the school’s new dress code, which was imposed September of last year. The mini-skirt-and-tank-top-wearing smartest kids in the city marched into school with flyers reading “Redress the Dress†and some with examples of the current dress code crossed out with red Xs.
The fresh sartorial regulations are as follows: “Sayings and illustrations on clothing should be in good taste; shoulders, undergarments, midriffs, and lower backs should not be exposed; the length of shorts, dresses, and skirts should extend below the fingertips with the arms straight at your side.†Since September, students have been butting heads with administrators not over the code itself, but “rather…the administration’s faulty, subjective enforcement of the policy,†as Tiffany Phan, a junior, writes in an op-ed in the Stuyvesant student newspaper. The Stuy Spectator is crawling with grievances by students, particularly by female students, who experience the code as being aimed at them directly. They have their students IDs confiscated (evidently some kind of guideline at Stuyvesant High School), and are even given long grey t-shirts to cover their inappropriate dress. Writes senior Jacqueline Krass, “I was advised to ‘think knees,’ or just wear pants. I was released with a warning, and left feeling like I’d been called out for wearing a bikini top to school, or a garter belt. It was an unpleasant, shaming experience.†Senior Lucinda Ventimiglia said an administrator told her, “the dress code was only instituted for [her] protection, because there are a lot of bad men outside school, and if [she were] raped, nobody would be able to take that away…Then, she said, ‘and you want a husband, don’t you?’â€
And so yesterday, in a radical act of free will, Stuyvesant students by the hundreds bared their shoulders and kneecaps. “We’re going to overpower the grey t-shirts,†Madeline Rivera, a senior, told reporters. “We’re outnumbering them now.†Senior Benjamin Koatz, who is credited with having helped organize the protest, is quoted as having said “It’s called ‘Slutty Wednesday’ because it’s not actually slutty.†(I can only wonder if anyone wore anything from Top Shop.)
Anyway, these kids are going to have an awesome time once they get to college, huh? (Image: Stuy Spectator)