The Fashion Police
I have written a few blogs about the different ways men and women are treated in the workplace. My last blog on this topic discussed a study which found that women are much more likely to receive workplace reviews which contain some kind of personality criticism, such as comments that the woman was “abrasive,” “judgmental” or “strident.” Therefore, it would not be unexpected that I found the following news story both interesting and foreseeable.
An Australian newscaster, Karl Stefanovic, became frustrated with the appearance-based criticisms viewers regularly emailed, tweeted, and wrote to his female co-newscaster, Lisa Wilkinson. In response, Stefranovic secretly decided he would conduct an experiment. He wore the same blue suit on air every day for a year.
Nobody noticed. Nobody said a thing, including the staff and producers at the television station. Not one fan sent a letter, not one article was published, nor was there any comment on social media. The only comment was from Stefanovic, whom after a year of wearing the same blue suit on the air for a year, said the following:
No one has noticed; no one gives a s**t. But women, they wear the wrong color and they get pulled up. They say the wrong thing and there's thousands of tweets written about them. Women are judged much more harshly and keenly for what they do, what they say and what they wear.
I've worn the same suit on air for a year-except for a couple of times because of circumstance - to make a point. I'm judged on my interviews, my appalling sense of humor – on how I do my job, basically. Whereas women are quite often judged on what they're wearing or how their hair is ... that's [what I wanted to test].
In a world where the press is still discussing Hillary Clinton’s fondness for wearing pantsuits, what Amal Clooney wore on the red carpet instead of her incredible professional accomplishments, and the fact that Michelle Obama wore the same suit during her husband’s delivery of the State of the Union that Julianna Margulies wore on “The Good Wife,” can we call the results of Steanovic’s experiment anything other than foreseeable? Could we even imagine Savannah Guthrie wearing the same outfit two days in a row on the Today Show?
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We are the prettier sex - LOL. Being noticed for our clothing instead of our intelligence and accomplishments is very unfair. We still have a lot of work to do. When I began my career in finance, I had to dress like a banker. Blue suit etc. However, women love their pretty attire and wear our femininity proudly. We have some work to do getting the other gender to look past the pretty and to embrace our professional capacity as well!
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-I found the info you provided about the personality criticisms eye-opening and will carry that into my job experiences forever
-There is a big difference between being on TV and in the "regular" workplace
-I doubt any guys really care about Michelle Obama's wardrobe
-Guys can be attracted to women and sometimes respond to clothing, but usually stop caring about their clothes once they've left the room
-I can't even imagine a guy taking the time to respond to a TV station about a woman's clothing unless they are offended (a condition that seems to afflict way too many people these days).
-Women are probably more likely to critique men's clothes than men are to critique women's clothes
My overall point would be that I have to guess that the overwhelming majority of criticism of women's clothing has to come from women. I would assume that most of the time when a man comments on a woman's clothing (something in this day and age I would expect would be a harrowing and death-defying experience for any male) it is something they feel forced to do (whether correct or not) because of appropriateness. Obviously and unfortunately there are still scoundrels in the world, but hopefully as time moves on, those types get rooted out and are fewer and fewer. While men can be simple, most can and will evaluate women's looks, personality and capabilities independently of each other. No guy remembers what Julianna Margolies wore on The Good Wife. They know that she's beautiful, she's cool, she's smart and she's a really good actress.
P.S. it occurs to me Rona, that both of our insights may not be completely correct. As I conclude my comment, it occurs to me that this experiment may have actually been done many years ago. If you remember, Mary Ann on Gilligan's Island seemed to wear the same outfit over and over again literally for years, while Ginger actually wore far more glamorous clothing and managed a new look every single day (miraculously, even though she was marooned on a deserted island). After years of debate, scrutiny and polling from everyone from Quinnipiac to NBC News (Brian Williams was actually on the boat that rescued them), it has been determined that guys overall found Mary Ann more attractive physically, much cooler personally, more intellectually stimulating and far more productive than Ginger.
Then again the margin of error of those studies have fluctuated over the years depending upon the fashion appropriateness of Ginger's artificial mole and Mary Ann's girl next door look..
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As for Mary Ann v. Ginger debate, I was always firmly in Camp Mary Ann.
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Also, I am not kidding myself about sexism in the work place (your overall point). Women may be their own worst enemy when it comes to fashion issues, but I realize that there are plenty of other hurdles that they have to clear that are propped up by men...some knowingly, some unknowingly.
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