Homecoming dresses. They are either really pretty or really ugly. They are really trashy or really classy. There has been a huge trend featuring cut outs and tightness and glittery things and it has become ridiculous. Girls are going to extreme lengths to try to achieve this very popular trend and end up looking half naked.

I went to homecoming this Saturday with my best friend, Olivia, and my sister, Cherry Ann, and we were shocked to see so many people wearing such revealing things. We had fun but it bothered me to see that so many girls opted for dresses that did not cover themselves. Their hair and makeup would be gorgeous and then it looked like half of their dress was missing. They weren't ugly; they just weren't what I would consider decent.

Everyone has their own opinion but I believe that if you are going to flash someone accidentally from the cut outs around your breasts or when you sit down, I can obviously see under your dress or your dress might rip from being too tight, then you probably shouldn't wear it.

As young women, we are trying to earn respect from men and people around us and how we dress and act in our everyday lives or at events matters because people perceive you a certain way according to what you wear. Men are visual beings, for the most part, and tend to notice what you're wearing and what you're wearing gives them certain "standards." If they look at a girl wearing head-to-toe black or dark colors then they tend to assume that person is "goth" or "emo" and yes, sometimes it's true but when you go to an event and dress scantily then they often times don't have the respect for you that night or any other time that we as women want.

We then also create this idea that we should look a certain way and yes, we should be able to wear what we want but we should also understand the consequences of things we wear. Older generations question us because our newer generations have taken "fashion" to this point that none of them ever felt the need for and because of that we are also losing or failing to earn their respect as well. Studies have shown that what we wear affects people around us. The color red is often associated with sexiness, maturity, lust, and luxuriousness but it also triggers the same part of the brain that makes men think of tools. So when they look at you, they think about you in red being associated with a hammer. Now, take that image and add the fact that your dress was skin tight, super short, and was low-cut. All that teenage boy is doing is envisioning you, their extreme "attraction" to you, and that hammer. It doesn't feel good to be thought of as a tool, does it? Boys don't realize it, either. They know what they're thinking but they don't understand that it's giving them unrealistic ideas about women, as well.

There also always seems to be this unspoken tension between girls as well about the need to try and outdo one another, but we don't have to do that by wearing less and less. You could always try for the prettiest hair or most "on-fleek" brows, instead. It doesn't have to be the skimpiest dress girls. It really doesn't. If it's what you really love fine but at least consider what other people actually think before you decide to go out in it. I know I might sound like a prude but I believe honesty is the best policy and I honestly believe that a horrible trend of under dressing has hugely taken over and that it needs to end because all it is doing is affecting younger people, our generation, and older generations negatively.