Modesty

I saw a handsome man's butt the other day. I wasn't even related to him.

But I'll get back to that.

Today I listened to the latest podcast by At Last She Said It, a podcast run by some faithful LDS women with "ideas." (AKA - they're feminists.) I love these ladies, and have enjoyed listening to their podcasts, which seek to address "women's issues" in the Church. 

The latest episode was all about clothing, specifically, about how we address modesty with our youth, and especially with our young women. Now, with my history of Obsessive Compulsive Personality Disorder, the For the Strength of the Youth pamphlet put out by our church used to be like a little mini bible to me, and that pamphlet had more than enough to say about Dress and Attire. With my OCPD driving my moral compass, and the drive I had to inflict my morals on those around me, I was quite a little "modesty Nazi" growing up. I've done all the arguing there is to be had, on modesty. LANP was once a battle cry. (Leggings Are Not Pants.)

But as I've gotten older, as my disorder has become quieter, and as I've come to learn that leggings are just danged more comfy to lounge around in, I've had to reevaluate what "truth" is, and confront the uncomfortable fact that in many ways, I was wrong. 

I once wrote a lengthy essay, many years ago, on modesty as a Zion principle - that our actions all affect each other, and if something unnecessary we are doing is creating difficulty for another person, maybe we shouldn't do that anymore. I hold that this is true in many ways. Look at masks. (My current moral hobby horse, I know.) It is unnecessary to fight the good anti-mask fight, and not wearing masks is making people get sick, so maybe you shouldn't fight that fight. Just wear the mask and help your community, because that is a principle of Zion - what is best for "us," rather than selfish living.

I wrote my Zion Modesty article while begrudging legging wearing. I had it on good authority from many men that I was good friends with that leggings, which hide nothing, were "tempting." I was worried about my boy friends! I inherited a pair of leggings from a DI bag a year or so later, which, to my chagrin, I found to be soft, comfortable and forgiving at the waistline, while simultaneously being the least restrictive option for kneeling and general unladylike behavior like driving with one foot on the seat, or lounging over an armrest, which I was fond of. So I wore them in the confines of my own home as a guilty pleasure. 

With motherhood and stay-at-home motherhood in particular, I found that comfort and lounging became high priorities for me. In addition to leggings at home, soon followed no longer wearing makeup, and generally becoming more comfortable in my own skin - accepting who I was, wrinkles, rolls, and all! I even wore leggings out of the house! I embraced Mom Life! And in that embrace I recognized my motivations. I didn't wear leggings because I wanted to tempt all the men in my vicinity. (If they're into Mom Bods, good on them!) I wore leggings because it was more important for me to be comfortable than to care what anybody else thought about me. I wore leggings because I was humble enough not to be concerned. And in recognizing that slovenly fact about myself, I realized that all those years ago, I had not given that benefit of the doubt to the other women in my life.

For me, the Zion principle never changed - but wearing leggings wasn't as "unnecessary" as I had once thought, and "tempting" men was something impossible to avoid, so, rather, coping mechanisms and healthy relationships and sexuality with others were more important to prioritize in teaching those youth. The slovenly lifestyle was necessary for me - it helped me embrace my "expanding" (YUP) Mom body, and realize that my worth was so much more than any perception by myself or others of my body, beauty, etc. 

Listening to At Last She Said It's podcast today, one story struck me as beautiful. The mom asked her swimmer daughter if she had a hard time being around all those other girls and swimmers, wearing a swimsuit all the time, including boys. Her daughter quickly replied "Not at all. I never feel better about myself than when I'm wearing my swimsuit! When I'm wearing my swimsuit, that's the one time it's about what I can do, not about how I look!"

Too often we inadvertently view bodies as just that - bodies. We view them as objects, not instruments. We lose sight of the person, the spirit, because of the shell. And I realized that shells matter a lot less than I used to give them credit for. 

At the beginning of this post I mentioned that I saw a handsome man's butt the other day. That's 100% fact. No lie. No trickery. I saw his butt. Well, just one cheek. 

I was at a tattoo parlor. (Hey, you don't know me!) (Or you don't know tattoo parlors...) ;) A joke came over the radio overhead, and a handsome gentleman stepped from the back of the store towards the front, into view. He was laughing, and started chatting with another guy, who was in the part of the parlor I was in about the joke. I remember looking over my shoulder and seeing him. His smile was contagious, as was his grin and easygoing persona. While joking with his friend, he made me love humanity.

He had on only underwear. Boxers. Purple, with one leg pulled up and tucked into his crack to expose one white cheek. Obviously he was getting some cheeky art done! But that was far from the first thing I noticed about him, and was far from the last thing I remembered about him either. His JOY was his defining feature.

It took me until my drive home to realize just what had happened. This gentleman had been OUTRAGEOUSLY immodest in front of me! And I hadn't been tempted to sin in the slightest! 

Over the last several weeks I have thought back on this man and his butt cheek several times. That sounds creepy, but it's actually not. I realized something very important about modesty! It's not about the clothes. It was never about the clothes. Clothing style is cultural and ever changing. (Even garments, my LDS friends. Even garments.) It's not about the clothes. It never was. And we need to stop pretending that it is, because it does women and men a great disservice, and gives us unhealthy views about each other. 

If we gender reversed things, seeing that man's butt might have really given me a hard time. If Mormon boys were raised on the same lessons Mormon girls are, and everybody knew what was being expected of them, I would have assumed that man was a sinner, for flaunting his body shamelessly in front of people. (He was getting a tattoo, so obviously he WAS a sinner, right, but I mean, apart from that...) ;) I would have seen skin in a private place that had been drilled into me that I was NOT supposed to see, and I would have felt shame for everybody, and embarrassment. I would have dwelt on that shame, and thought about that butt, and the shame, and the nakedness, and the perversity of it all would have the potential to drive me to some real problems. I might even be angry at him for not covering himself up better! 

But he did nothing wrong. He was a beautiful, happy man who made me feel hope for the world!

Yet in our culture, we can't seem to see women the same way. 

Instead we shame them for their bodies, then wonder why Utah has more plastic surgeons per capita than LA. Because we have raised children in a culture with an unhealthy obsession about women's bodies. Women's bodies which victimize us, betray us, and steal away our men's hearts!!!

The podcast also told the story of a woman who was tired of rushing to the mail before everyone else in the family, so that she could cut the underwear advertisements out of the paper before her family looked at it. 

Women's bodies are unavoidable. We should not insist on protecting men from women's bodies, inadvertently oversexualizing all of them against their will by default. Women are sexualized in all their forms and, heaven forbid, situations. I'm sorry, but women have to grocery shop. Women deserve to buy underwear. Women deserve to be comfortable in their own skin. Who are we protecting from who, and why? Is there not a better way to address the real concern? At what point can we expect men to be responsible for their own physical attractions? Physical attractions which, get this, even girls feel when looking at men, too. 

Frankly, I think we need to have more lessons on modesty for the men. How dare they shove those pectorals in our faces, with those suit coats squaring out and extenuating those broad, powerful shoulders... 

What a slut.

But wait...

...Maybe the Church is giving men the modesty lesson, and I've just been missing it. Here I was, thinking they were telling men to be clean shaven because they were anti-hippie, but maybe, just maybe, they know... They know how beards make us ladies feel...