What's Up With All This "Hooker" Chic?

There is a practice that is becoming all the rage these days among young women: I call it "hooker chic". There are many ways in which this trend manifests itself, but for now let us content ourselves to focus on the manner in which college age kids are taking it to a new level of acceptance. Indeed, it has become highly fashionable to throw parties where girls dress like prostitutes and the guys like pimps (or some other kind of seedy looking character). Setting aside what this says about the boys (who are more than happy to oblige), let us consider how this phenomenon plays out among the girls. I have no desire to judge the morality or immorality of this trend. The question I want to ask is whether or not this increasingly popular practice is consistent with the social reality of what it means to be a hooker. I feel this is an important question because I feel the distinction between playing "hooker dress-up" for a party, and the way young girls dress in general is becoming more and more difficult to distinguish. If society is at peace with the two being indistinguishable, then so be it, but before such personal attire (and no doubt behavior) becomes entirely acceptable, it might be a useful exercise to ask ourselves if we are in fact aware of where our ideas go (and have gone) in this respect.

At this stage, few, if any, fathers want their daughters to grow up selling their sexual services for money. Nevertheless, many fathers today seem a bit naive when it comes to the slippery slope of fashion trends. As for the girls, perhaps they simply want an excuse to dress provocatively and be ogled under a slightly more dignified banner. But the truth behind all this hooker chic is as follows: most people still regard the business of prostitution as something shameful and sad, especially if they have ever known anything about life on the streets- much less seen the effect that such a life might have on the one who lives it. Therefore, I have no problem if society collectively decides it wants women to dress as prostitutes. However if they do accept this practice, they should do it on the grounds that these young ladies (and older) appear in such a way which is consistent with what a prostitute actually looks like. Many prostitutes are the furthest thing from sexy- in fact, they boast an appearance that only the most desperate man would find sexually appealing. Many prostitutes look starved because they spend whatever money they have on drugs and not food. They are often beaten and abused by their pimp, or by the one who pays them for their services. Moreover, most of them do not possess any sort of dental plan, so quite frequently their teeth are not in the best condition (to say the least). So if they want to dress as prostitutes when they are going to a party, then let them fit this description.

Now some may argue that perhaps these young girls simply want to shoot for a 'hooker look" that is a little more high end- like say the girl who had an arrangement with the former governor of New York, Elliot Spitzer (I believe her name was Ashley Dupre). But however exalted that prostitute may be, society still regards a young woman selling her body for cash with a certain degree of uneasiness.  Fairly or not, most view such a way of life for young women as nothing short of tragic and abysmal. To further highlight this point, can you imagine anyone, even girls who are inspired by hooker chic, who want to be mistaken for a prostitute? Thus, if we are going to deem such exhibitions as sexy and acceptable in the context of a party, then why not other things that we deem to be shameful? If it is acceptable to make a prostitute appealing, why should it be regarded as evil to make make Nazis attractive, as David Bowie apparently once attempted to do in the 70's? What about pedophile chic? Cannibal chic? Take anything in our society that is considered vile and unacceptable and imagine a party dedicated to glamorizing it. Imagine a ceremony of the KKK, with a bunch of white men laughing as they perform mock hangings. Like I said, I am not saying that young women dressing as whores is right or wrong. What I am suggesting is that if that is acceptable, then we should also let the rest of society celebrate and take delight in (without judgment) all of the things that we regard as a society to be most deplorable.