The Right to Bare Arms

Fresh in time for summer, the AP recently wondered, " How much skin is too much at the office?"

New or young employees showing up to professional office settings in tank tops, flip-flops, exposed bra straps can cause the summer heat to ramp up inside managers' offices. While some companies have dress codes, many do not. Apparently too, people today are not necessarily taught what to wear to work.

I just thought I'd share a few thoughts about office dress.

1. Writers for television series "House, MD" like to have House mock Hospital Administrator Lisa Cuddy's perpetually plunging décolletage. The undercurrent there is that middle aged women who expose cleavage -- no matter how lovely -- are showing desperation.
2. When I was a young engineer, we had a new hire from college join us just in time for summer. I was pregnant with my first child and feeling particularly whalesque at the time. "Beth" had a lovely, athletic build and was one of those who could look sexy in a flour sack. Instead of flour sacks, however, Beth chose to wear tight-fitting high-cut shorts and midriff tops, and those skanky strappy sandals that say "fuck me" to passers-by. Interestingly enough, Beth never had to do any of her own work. In that day and age, most of our co-workers were guys. I think you get the connection. When their own work started slowing down, it was the first time I'd ever heard of our department's dress code. Beth quit shortly after.
3. In my father's day ('round the time Fred Flintstone was just starting his first paper route) there was only one uniform for the men in corporate settings -- white long-sleeved button shirt, black or charcoal suit (pin stripes were verboten), dark, solid-colored tie, black shoes. When I entered the corporate work force, things had loosened up a little and women were permitted to wear pants suits or very dressy slacks, colorful dresses. Men could wear nice button-down dress shirts with khaki slacks.
4. Casual Friday! About a decade ago the company I work for started to permit people to dress down on Fridays. The intent was that we could wear clean, untorn jeans instead of khakis or pantsuits. In the Southwest, however, we had already been wearing jeans most every day, at least in the engineering sections, so we took "Causal Friday" to mean we could wear shorts. This apparently really bothered the manager in one of our Texas divisions. He passed a rule: Men's knees could NOT be exposed. Women could wear skirts or tasteful shorts, but men had to have covered knees. One guy showed up wearing pants that, today, we would call capris. He was sent home. See, you could be sexist in those days.
5. Today, every day is Casual Friday where I work, although most of us keep the clothing in good taste. We're not exposing belly buttons, undergarments, nipple-outlines, butt cheeks. Our clothing is clean and well mended -- mostly. Men wear shorts if they wish. We all wear jeans if we wish. Even my boss's boss wears casual looking capris and tropical blouses (she's female, so it's okay). I wish, however, they would re-institute a dress code. I'm not sure how they could get away with what I have in mind, however, given you're not supposed to notice the particular details about any one individual, officially, but here's what I wish: grotesquely overweight people, particularly ones who are hirsute, are prohibited from wearing anything that exposes any bit of drippy flabby flesh. No shorts. No skirts or dresses above ankle length. Long sleeves and very high necklines or even scarves are required. I just don't know how much more of this guy's ape-ish bowed legs I can see each day. I try to look away, but the image is burned into my mind like a particularly gruesome accident site.

's'all. You got any dress code stories?