KUTV News: A Salt Lake City high school student, Gabi Finlayson, was told her dress was inappropriate for the school’s Preference Dance and was forced to cover her shoulders with a coat for entire evening.
Finlayson said she was “embarrassed” when a school representative told her she needed a shawl or coat to cover her shoulders.“I didn’t want to make a big scene so I said yes. I had a coat in the car, so I had to go back and get it,” she said.
She added that she felt that the school was shaming her because of what some of the boys might think. “Somehow my shoulders are sexualized?” Finlayson said. “Like it’s my responsibility to make sure the boys’ thoughts are not unclean.”
Kristy Kimball, Finlayson’s mother, is incensed and says the school is sending negative, demeaning messages to the girls they shamed. “How have we gotten to the point that we look at shoulders as if they’re somehow pornographic? As if they are this shameful thing,” Kimball said.
Out of 1200 students, 4 were told to cover their shoulders.The school’s principal, Rhonda Bromley, claims the students are well aware of the dress code: “Formals, backless dresses and/or tops may not extend beyond the bottom of the shoulder blades. Girls’ dresses and tops must have a 2″ minimum strap on each shoulder. Shawls, boleros and other shrugs are acceptable if worn over the dress at all times. Cleavage covered.”
Bromley jumped to the wrong assumption that the students were not embarrassed when their dresses were deemed inappropriate. “This was done by one of my female school employees in a very careful and sensitive way.”
Finlayson purchased the dress when she was vacationing in Paris, France and it reminded her of her idol, actress Audrey Hepburn. She argues the dress fit the school guidelines. “There were a lot of dresses that were very short, very tight, a lot more exposing or revealing than mine. Maybe instead of teaching girls they should cover themselves up, we should be teaching boys that we’re not just sex objects that you can look at and derive pleasure,” said Finlayson.
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