The hype and hullabaloo has been long in the news. The noise has been huge and leaders of opinion have severally volunteered their perspectives on the issue of what decency or indecency connotes with regards to dressing. From a latent issue it has metamorphosed into a vibrant discourse. As it waltzed its way through the social spectrum it has succeeded in raking up enough controversy across ideological divides.
This controversy has been hinged on the confusion surrounding opinions on the issue. But what does dressing connote and at what point does the term indecency come into the picture? To answer this it is important I invite my readers through time back to the days of Eden. God himself is the first Designer and Clothe-Maker. It is understandable that some may wish to differ on this but that does not eliminate the fact of it. Dressing, fashion and all that they imply have their origins in an intelligent design that can only be explained as divine. From the original design of providing cover for the human anatomy, dre4ssing has e evolved down through history into a crazy fad and a universal issue. With the fragmentation of human habitation into continents and into subcontinents, countries, local communities, races, ethnic nationalities, cultures and subcultures, dressing has assumed diverse styles, patterns, formats, ETC.
Colour, designs, textures, etc have all served to create distinct cultural identities. Not only that, they have come in handy in the design of uniforms identifying professionals in diverse fields of endeavor and other ramifications of human existence. Beauty, harmony, interaction, and a host of other qualities that enhance humanity have been profoundly highlighted by dressing. The benefits clothing, nay dressing has afforded the human context are indeed overwhelming and unquantifiable. Clothing and dressing serves the purposes of covering the body, defining identities, accentuating beauty, promoting cultural dynamics and highlighting the diversity inherent in humanity. Obviously from the foregoing dressing brings a lot of good to the human context and the harm can be huge when it is perverted in indecency.
To hold that modernity has impacted much on dressing is to state the obvious. What today is referred to as indecency in dressing is the result of the interaction of so many different factors. One of them is the arrival of western culture at the doorstep of many different nations that were hitherto unaffected by the drift in morality. The past few centuries saw the spread of this imported culture in dressing which reflected many aspects of Western culture being brought to different parts of the world. As colonialism spread and was later succeeded by neocolonialism so did western fashion trends find their ways into different cultural settings across the world. Another one was that the developed world scouting for new markets across the developing world brought their wares into Africa, Asia, the Caribbean’s, etc. also the technological revolution which brought the television, computers, the internet, mobile phones, home videos, provided so much for people around the world to mimic as long as the fashion was concerned and the economic gains accrued. Beauty pageants, fashion shows, showbiz personalities, public figures, political icons, etc also brought so much influence to bear on dressing so much so that the dividing line between what was modest or immodest, decent or indecent became so blurred that contemporary youths now find it difficult charting moral coordinates in between.
Indecency, for all purposes, represents the opposite of decency. It implies indecency symbolizes what is not decent, proper, responsible and acceptable to the collective social sensitivity to morality- the collective conscience. When applied to the issue of dressing, it means that mode, form, style, pattern or way of dressing that is not decent, proper, responsible and acceptable. It defeats the very purpose of dressing. For the benefit of the layman, it means any type of dressing that does not properly cover the body(at least the sensitive parts of the body), or enhance the moral content of society and is suggestive. It matters not who is involved here.
Dressing such as displays sensitive aspects of the human body (stomach, navel, back, laps, cleavage, breasts, etc) are indecent. These include clothes like the spaghetti, mini-skirts, backless dresses, sleeveless shirts, transparent or perforated clothes, low-necks, etc. these types of clothing not only demeans the whole essence of dressing but also calls into question the morals rectitude of the wearer. It leaves a warped image of the wearer in the mind of the beholder.
The price of indecency is shared amongst all concerned – the wearer, the beholder, and the larger society. While the wearer bears the brunt of stigma associated with indecent dressing and struggles to mount a defense mechanism or coping approach, the beholders of such indecency suddenly find themselves in a situation where there moral sensitivity is insulted and that with impunity. They strive on a daily basis to avoid images they would rather be spared of. Also, they face the temptation of emulating what is morally debasing or accepting it as a norm.
The larger society suffers more in that with indecency in dressing paraded everywhere – at home and on the streets – comes the challenge of containing the fallouts of the former. Cases of rape, sex-related violence, pornography, loss of moral values, etc have been traced to indecency in dressing.
Whatever are the opinions of the perpetrators of indecency in dressing, the broader picture of the negative impact it would have on society needs to be considered. We all have choices and the more we make informed and responsible choices, especially with regards to decency in dressing the better our society will become.
Godswill Odeku
odekuga@yahoo.com +2348057879764
