Topic : 11/23 Mild vs. Wild

Honestly, people make such a big deal about the way individuals dress when that is not the problem. It is ignorance to say that because a person dresses a certain way that they are that way. In actuality, the way a person looks should not dictate the essesnce of their character. Parents are concerned with they way their children are dressing and the message it is sending, when the real concern is whether or not they are teaching their children self respect. If a person has a stable sense of self respect and dignity, then the way the dress or look should not be a concern. And the fact that it is a distraction to the learning environment? That is beyond ignorant. Why shoud people have to change themselves and their comfortability as a result of other peoples lack of respect. Society has continuously tried so hard to conform people to this superficial image. Instead of conforming people and trying to make them replicate everyone else in society, adults should be educating the youth about self respect not what to wear to be deemed socially acceptable.

If parent sare so concerned with the message that bratz dolls look, then why havent they been concerned with barbie or other forms of media? Why havent then been concerned when studies have shown that barbie and women in the media have GREATLY impacted the youth. Barbie and women have the media have resulted in low self esteem, anorexia, bulemia...women of the media, models, or even nfl cheerleaders have given young women the idea that unless they are a size 2, then they are not beautiful. Why havent people faught as hard to get rid of advertising or movies where women are just as effective in generating low self esteem or self perceptions.

People need to quit blaming the way women dress for they way they are treated. Women shoudnt have to dress to impress men or any other person of society. Whats important is if they are respecting themselves enough to only dress for themselves and what makes Them feel good. Not what society is comfortable with. Instead of blaming the women who dress what conservatives have considered 'provacative', they should be blaming the men who were not educated enough by their parents or their elders to RESPECT WOMEN REGARDLESS THE MANNER IN WHICH THEY CHOSE TO DRESS. Quit blaming these women and start blaming those who dont know how to show respect for others.

First, the girls who stood up at the begining of the show, the girl in blue(too tight button up) said something to the affect of she has the body of a 20 y/o not a 40 y/o and thats why she dresses like she does. Well, at 44 I have a better body than hers at 20. Anytime you wear ILL fitting clothes it looks bad. I like tank tops, short skirts, ect. as long as you have a body to pull it off. You can look good at any size if your clothes FIT! If you wear too tight jeans that creat the "muffin top" it looks bad. why not wear a cute baby doll shirt to hide the flaws. Nothing is attractive about too tight clothes that show off your rolls. As far as the young girls, come on parents...be parents. Who is shopping with these kids giving them the money to buy what they are wearing????

im nineteen years old and i can proudly say that i am a modest, yet very fashionable young person. i never show off huge amounts of clevage or midrift or leg. i can attest to the fact that you can look "sexy" without showing everything you have. everybody wants to harp about people being superficial and calling them "whores" or "sluts" if they dress in a manor reflecting so. they say people are just being judgemental and "jealous", but i couldnt disagree more. as human nature, we automatically judge each and every situation we are put in. if you pass a dark alley, you will use JUDGEMENT and say "hey, that dark alley is probably not safe". if one were to see a large, deep hole in the middle of the road, JUDGEMENT tells you that you better drive around it or else you could total your car and risk your life. but if we wanted to get more technical about it, if you see a person walking down the road with dark eyeliner, black clothing, tattoos and fifty piercings, one automatically JUDGES that the person is either gothinc or satanic. now whether that is true or not is impossible to know unless you got to know the person, but we JUDGE each and every day, and whether we like to admit it or not, we JUDGE people before we even know them based on how they dress or carry themselves.

 

it would be like having a man dressed in a cop uniform, walking down the street, and when a person approached him for help, he would scream "I AM NOT A COP, I JUST DRESS THIS WAY BECAUSE ITS COMFORTABLE AND FASHIONABLE!!! HOW DARE YOU JUDGE ME LIKE THAT AND ASSUME I AM A COP!!!" ridiculous, right? well its just the same as a girl dressing like a prostitute and when some guy (or catty girl) approaches them and makes the comment that they are a slut, the girl responds "I AM NOT A SLUT, I JUST DRESS THIS WAY BECUASE ITS COMFORTABLE AND FASHIONABLE!!! HOW DARE YOU JUDGE ME LIKE THAT AND ASSUME I AM A SLUT!!!

 

see the resemblence? the point is, we all judge whether we like it or not, and you and only you can decide how you will portray yourself and how people will judge/read you.

 First, Dr. Phil, you need to have a daughter before you can weigh in on this subject.  Your son dying his mohowk, well it doesn't compare to a daughter  projecting the wrong image.  Fairly disapointed with the Dr. today.  "It's the fashion", "Get with the times", "You see it everywhere".  So that's how we justify looking like a whore?  There is only one reason you dress so, You want attention and you want to be provocative.  I believe when I told my mom as a child "Everyone's doing it!"  Her response was, so you should jump off the same cliff becasue everyone is doing it?  That statement applies here. Fine to each his own, dress how you please, but no matter what you say, you are not doing it just because its the fashion.  I'll agree with you want to be like everyone else, and get that attenion.  You can be beautifull and sexy without baring what should stay covered.  Does n o one esle worry where our society is going?  Yes because we see it every day we are becoming decensitized to these things, especialy our young ones.  It is for this reason we, especialy as parents should stand up more and say no this is not acceptable!  So look at us today, what's accepted and whats not, 10 more years down the road, where do you think we will be?  It continues down this path, I believe it will be much worse.  Ethic, responsibility, and decency need to make a come back, and soon. 

 Barbie changed their dolls a few years back, they now have more realistic figures, bigger feet, hips thighs, and normal size heads.  Just thought that fact might interest you.  And I would like to also point out that bratz may have huge heads, but they still promote anorexia and the like with their undersized skinny bodies.  So if promoting eating disorders bothers you, you might want to reconsider those bratz.  Just a thought

 Oh...but it's not.  In a perfect world it wouldn't matter what other people thought, it wouldn't matter what message your clothing (or lack of) sent and it wouldn't matter what you played with or were exposed to. But it is what it is and to turn a blind eye to reality is truly irresponsible.  Just because they MAKE the clothes doesn't mean you should buy them or wear them. Just because they MAKE a toy doesn't mean you have to buy it. In the immortal words of Chris Rock  "Just because you can drive with your feet doesn't make it a good idea!"  Kids have parents to protect them from things that seem like a good idea but are not but that assumes that the parents know the difference as well.  To justify putting anything on your child or in your child's hands that sends a message that is unhealthy by saying 'parental influence will override (insert any number of possibilities here) makes the retailers and makers oh so happy because you've given up your common sense and become a sheople and are turning your children into sheople as well. I'm pretty sure that the term 'peer pressure' has always meant exactly what it means today and no generation has the corner on the rebel market. So they win.

Which brings up who is 'they' anyway? Oh yeah....'they' are the people making money hand over fists on your child...and then your pre-teen (who insists on having whatever the latest trend is because you laid that foundation nice and strong for her)..and then your teenager (who continues the trend in clothes but adds hair coloring, extensions, plastic surgery and low self esteem because she doesn't look just like the girls in the media. Hopefully you've been able to avert an eating disorder)..and then on your grown child (because you've grown up paying so much attention to what you look like that you've forgotten about the inside..bring on the plastic surgery and botox!!) .  Yes, it's a generalization but you give your kids vaccines, tell them to wash their hands and wear their seatbelts for their physical safety, yes? We have ratings on movies and games so that they are not exposed to things that will damage their minds. We teach them manners, make them go to school and arm them with rules of the road, rules at the table and rules for being a good friend. But why bother doing any of that when it is undermined by things that we knowlngly and purposely do to and for them?  I'd bet good money that most of us either threw out or researched every painted toy in our kids possession when we heard that lead paint was used in so much. How many will respond the same way to news that the toys our little girls play with actually DOES impact them? How many of us threw out painted toys on the mere possibility that it MIGHT have lead but won't stand toe to toe with the child you're going to turn out into the world over what clothes she wears?

 I have an 8 year old daughter, and two sons that are 19 and 22. She is not allowed to have Bratz dolls...even the name makes me wonder who in the name of all things holy buys these things. She has dolls and even a few Barbies (The "I can be" series is actually quite inspiring; pretty people can be just as smart and successful as anyone and not just on the catwalk). She has very distinct taste in clothes, loves to read, paint her nails, wear jewelry, is on her 5th belt in Tae Kwon Do and won the Barbara Boxer Award last year.  She's smart, funny, compassionate and curious. She's also beautiful and it's only been recently that she has begun to understand that people stare at her because she IS striking not because she doesn't match or has something in her teeth.  If I have any say so about it, she will continue to grow up knowing that how she dresses her heart and soul should far outshine the way she dresses her body. She may have won the genetic lottery but she will be responsible for the person she becomes....as....will.....we.

We can scream and shout that it shouldn't matter what we look like on the outside and that it shouldn't matter how we dress but it does.  The one thing missing from this show is the honest perspective of a male.  My two sons both watched the show and both had very strong opionions.  I raised them to see people as people but they are both fully aware of how the world works.  They are both in college; one is artsy fartsy and the other is a party animal. One is gay and the other is a girl magnet.  Did they judge the guests based on what they chose to wear? Yep. Is it judgemental? Well...of course! lol  We all choose our clothes based on what we like, how we feel that day, what people say about it. (How many of us were told that a certain color looked great on us and now we wear it....alot! Or were told that that certain pair of jeans made heads turn so we wear them when we want to feel good?)  There's nothing wrong with it...it's human nature...but when your kids are wearing skimpy clothes because it makes THEM feel good, don't you wonder why???  Don't you worry that the clothing choices are only the beginning of the slide down the slippery slope into any number of issues like eating disorders, low self esteem, promiscuity or self loathing?

You can say it doesn't matter but it does.  If it didn't matter then why do we all gasp when we see a 90 year old man in a speedo? or a pregnant mother in a bikini? or a 7 year old beauty pageant contestant in pantyhose, make up and fake nails?  It's just easier to give in....easier to not wage the war day after day....easier to justify the allowances by claiming free will and self expression.  But...I have to wonder....if the parents are joining that rally cry....how come they're not having LibbyLoo parties (what my son calls slut training) and wearing micro mini's?? 

Bravo to the parents who are teaching their daughters how to stand against peer pressure and to believe in who they are regardless of the clothes.   Maybe there should be a test: if the kid can wear a potatoe sack and still feel worthy then perhaps THAT is a child for whom clothes do not make the person. What a test THAT would be!!!!

It's the very philosophy of 'everyone else is doing it'' and/or 'if it's so bad why do they make it' that absolutely floors me. Extrapolate that attitude to various other issues and voila! we now have answers to global warming (I mean, they make cars afterall!), obesity (but Hostess Twinkies are the best selling snack foods ever!) and alcoholism (but they sell it everywhere and it's legal!).  Seems to me it's the little lessons like this one that teach a child how to stand up in the face of the big lessons later in life.

Hello Dr. Phil Show:

 

I am the mother of three daughters ages 24, 20, and 18. I am very pleased that the Dr. Phil Show chose to raise the subject of how young girls and women dress. My older two daughters are modest dressers, and my youngest daughter is coming to better understand that how she dresses does affect how men, especially how young men view her; her experiences in this matter do confirm the teaching she has received, and our conversations do continue. I hope that future shows are planned that continue this discussion.

 

Now, another view of Mild vs. Wild:

 

I went back to college when I was about 40 years old and in my Interpersonal Communications class(a great one) I came in contact with classmates, male students in their 20s, 30s, and 40s, who viewed immodest dress in women as a form of sexual harrassment. Sexual harrassment has been a hot topic as it relates to women, but not as it affects men. These men were sincere in their view, and I do agree with their view of this subject.  I am also the mother of a 27 year-old son who agrees with this assessment of how a woman dresses. "Fashion" is used as a socially acceptable form of sexual conduct in women and sexual harrassment of men. Here then is the making of a totally different view of how a woman dresses that is rarely heard from, though I have related it to my own daughters. This is what the proponents of Mild dress are really trying to convey to today's young women, unfortunately, this was not the message that came across on the Dr. Phil Show today. I am, therefore, hopeful that this very valid view of the subject of appropriate dress will at some point be addressed in future shows of a similar nature on the Dr. Phil Show.

 

Thank you for the opportunity to share my thoughts on the Mild vs. Wild show. I do look forward to future occasions to share with the Dr. Phil Show.

 

My regards,

NorCalOne

It just plain sickens me how these girls think they're dressing "cute" when they're dressing like something from the streets. Sure guys will look at them, but they're also talk about them behind their backs. Furthermore, any decent guy wouldn't want to end up with a girl who's willing to show herself off to everyone else. What do they think they're accomplishing? All these girls are doing is setting women a 100 years back to when we were just objects. Susan Bea Anthony and Carrie Chapman Catt must be rolling in their graves to see all their hard work going to waste.

 

I also agree with the APA that these so called dolls do objectify women. Little girls use their dolls as their best companions, so basically these parents who buy these dolls for them are saying it's okay for their daughters to friend around with a questionable crowd. These are also the same parents who will end up in complete shock if worst case senario, their daughter was raped or pregnant or both. Parents, mothers especially, need to wake up and see what they're exposing their daughters to. Do they want to raise well rounded, independent, succesful women or ignorant, unsuccessful, and have to have a man to live type of women?