On sexuality and teenagers
Last night I went to an Avicii concert. I was told ahead of time to wear something neon. If you know me, you know that my color pallet for clothes is pretty neutral. I hadn’t expected to see what I saw last night. Let me first preface myself with saying two things: first, I think clothing can be used as a form of expression, especially in a concert setting; second, I am a feminist (I really hate what that word connotes) and I believe women can wear what they want, and everyone no matter what gender, is free to express their sexuality. So, what was it that somewhat freaked me out about what the majority of the females in the audience wore? Mostly what I saw was bikini tops, sparkly pacifiers, short-shorts, underwear, lingere, see-through-dresses, and neon ripped clothing exposing everything. At first, I thought, “Whatever, to each their own. At least they are having fun.” But then I realized, when the lights would shine on some particularly scant clothed women, that these were not women, they were girls. Straight up, 16 year old girls in underwear.
Why was I so bothered? Was it that several of them asked me, “Are you rolling, too?” (And I responded, “no.” If only they knew I don’t do drugs or drink)? No, drugs are a part of concert culture and so many people experiment at a young age. To me, I think I was disturbed because it appeared that wearing these clothes were expected and assumed. The idea of a techno concert has an aura of 90s rave kid culture — so wearing bizarre assortments of day-glo lights and neon rainbows is OK (I guess.) I didn’t talk to any of the girls, I don’t know their story. But, I remember my own thoughts when I was 16 and insecure and dumb. I used to kid myself and think that I was OK with dressing skanky (is there a more academic word for ‘skanky?!’). But, in fact it was never for me. It was to get attention from men. It was what I thought I had to do.
And this is such a strange idea. I can’t really wrap my head around it. Because not only was it hurting me, but it’s teaching young males a really horrible lesson. It’s a two-way street of unhealthy sexual expression. It’s teaching males that young girls want to be highly sexualized (and nothing more, no intimacy…). One guy I saw had a shirt that said “PARTY WITH SLUTS.” That’s one guy out of hundreds, but to me it showed how we make oversexualizing teenage girls, which is a really weird practice, deemed OK. You might think I’m jumping to conclusions. Fine, whatever. But, our society is so repressed sexually. All I can leave you is with an analogy a dear friend of mine came up with. “Sexuality in America is repressed. We push it down and don’t allow it to come out naturally. Think of sexuality as a beach ball. A beach ball will naturally float on water. When we push the ball below the water, all it wants to do is push as hard as possible to get back to the surface. When we finally stop pushing it shoots out, almost violently.“
