Missouri House Toughens Dress Code, but Only for Female Members

 

by. Pa Rock

Missouri Voter

This past week the Missouri House of Representatives passed a rules package that toughened its dress code, but only for the female legislators.   The heavily male-dominated legislative chamber (116 men versus 43 women) did try to take some of the sting out of the measure by finding a female GOP House member to introduce it onto the floor for a vote as an amendment to the rules package, but that charade did little to make the gender power-play more palatable.  The amendment passed on a voice vote and the entire rules package passed on a vote of  105 to 51, with pushback from Democratic legislators.

The Missouri Legislature, which has a history of being antagonistic toward some women's issues, voted for a total ban on abortion in 2019 which was to go into effect - and did - when the Supreme Court reversed itself on Roe v Wade, a decision which ultimately made by the Court last summer.    

The new dress code, which did not impact the existing male dress code,  added the requirement of an outer piece of clothing to cover women's shoulders.   Now, in addition to the shirt or blouse that they happen to be wearing, women will be required to also wear "a jacket like a blazer, cardigan, or knit blazer."  There was also a flap over whether to allow cardigans or not, but that was accepted based on the argument that blazers could present issues for legislators who happened to b pregnant.  

State Representative Peter Meredith, a Democrat, refused to even vote on the measure, but he had plenty to say about it:

"I don't think I'm qualified to say what's appropriate or not appropriate for women, and I think that is a really dangerous road for us all to go down . . . Y'all had a conniption fit the last two years when we talked about maybe, maybe wearing masks in a pandemic to keep each other safer.   How dare the government tell you what you have to wear over your face?  Well, I know some governments require women to wear things over their face, but here, oh, it's OK because we're just talking about how many layers they have to wear over their shoulders."

Democratic Representative Ashley Aune derided the debacle from the House floor:

"Do you know what it feels like to have a bunch of men in this room looking at your top trying to determine if it's appropriate or not?"

Representative Aune later emphasized that she felt the House should be focusing on "important issues."  Perhaps she had in mind things like adequately funding public education and social services in the state, things which the legislature regularly ignores as it instead works diligently at creating tax breaks for millionaires, billionaires, and big corporations.

Missouri public schools are dangerously underfunded, child protection in the state is a mere shadow of what it was two decades ago, hospitals are closing, roads are crumbling, bridges are failing, and our legislators rage over dress codes.

How pathetic.