Retail Worker Shares The Outfits Her Job ‘Dress Coded’ Her For & The Contradictory Reasons Why
PeopleImages | ShutterstockKelly Mooney, a retail employee at a clothing store, shared a video that went viral after she revealed the outfits she was supposedly dress-coded for at work. Upon viewing the video, however, people weren’t entirely sure what all the fuss was about.
It calls into question the whole idea of workplace dress codes, which often toe the line when it comes to legal protections afforded by the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and policies instituted by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. In a nutshell, as Tulane Law School noted, "Employers must balance the need for a dress code against employees’ right to personal expression and beliefs."
A retail worker revealed all the outfits that got her dress-coded at work.
In the text overlay of her video, Mooney wrote, “outfits i’ve worn to my retail job & why they violate dress code,” where she then models the said outfits in front of her bedroom mirror.
Mooney showed off her first getup, and the next… and the next, and by the end, the video earned a series of confused reactions from how shockingly ordinary her outfits were.
From a v-neck button-up to square-line blouses and a yin-and-yang-printed top, all paired with different pairs of jeans, all unripped, by the way, Mooney explained how each outfit got her into trouble for “violating” the dress code.
According to her employer, most of Mooney’s tops were “too low cut,” or “tight and revealing” to wear to work, except for one outfit, where the user sports an ever-so-slightly loose graphic tee that was deemed “excessively baggy” for her employer’s tastes.
@kellsfromhell | TikTok
Most viewers came to the retail worker’s defense against the employer’s strict dress code.
It’s not uncommon to adhere to a dress code, especially in a workplace; however, clothing retail jobs where fashion and individuality should be showcased seem worlds away from a law office or an accounting firm.
@kellsfromhell | TikTok
Relating to Mooney’s experience, a woman wrote, “One time I wore an entire outfit from the store I worked at and they said it was ‘inappropriate.’” Another shared, “I got dress coded and sent home for wearing white socks.”
In a separate video, Mooney replied to a commenter who addressed an all-too-common problem: employers selectively singling out employees’ clothing choices based on body type. They wrote, “but imagine [these] shirts on a different body type… same shirt [different] level of ‘low cut’ but you can’t tell one girl no and the other yes.”
Coming in at a height of 4 feet and 11 inches, Mooney expressed that mass-produced clothing “is not considering anyone on the small or the big end, whether that’s height or weight.” In other words, popular, and typically more affordable, brands such as H&M, Zara, Forever 21, and the like don’t always have a wide range of options for people on the shorter side, like Mooney.
She concluded, “And although we have stores that specifically cater to these types of bodies, they typically come at a higher ticket price. So when you’re working six days a week, you just wear what fits and wear what seems appropriate. That’s all.”
Dress codes tend to be disproportionately harmful for women.
Hryshchyshen Serhii | Shutterstock
From our elementary days and throughout our professional careers, women have somehow always been a target for every dress code policy.
While dress code policies are primarily put into place with the intention of creating a “conducive” working or learning environment, they almost always disproportionately affect women and girls by perpetuating sexist expectations on how they should present themselves, leading to a series of body image issues and other emotional burdens.
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission isn't messing around when it comes to employers with gender biased dress codes, stating that the standards cannot favor one gender over the other. The Supreme Court decision in Bostock v. Clayton County backed this up. Of course, that doesn't mean policing women's clothing and bodies doesn't happen.
Bearing all of this in mind, perhaps it’s time for us to reevaluate dress code policies in an effort to promote change and prevent discrimination. At the end of the day, it really is just a piece of fabric.
Xiomara Demarchi is a graduate from the University of Illinois at Chicago and a writer who covers news and lifestyle topics that focus on psychology, relationships, and the human experience.
