First, I want to cry. Second, this is why I am afraid of having children. It is a scary world.

Ooh! This goes great with that child stripper pole you posted last year!

(vomit)

I just vomited all over the world.

I just vomited all over the world.

oops sorry about the double post.

Don't forget to mention the panties from Walmart...

Seriousely, anyone who puts this shirt on a child should be sentenced with icky eczema and arms to short to scratch.

Way to set fantastic goals for your daughters.
And you KNOW a lot of people are going to eat this right up.

...and kind of ironic that the mannequin's got no pants on.

and is a legless/armless torso? j/k

I mean, this is a toddler shirt, so this is way before the age when kids can pick out their own clothes, or know what a Hooters was. So, that means parents have to choose this for their daughters. Despicable...unless maybe somebody bought it for their son as a joke :)...maybe I shouldn't be a parent.

What a great way to show your children what you hope they can one day become..

"maybe I shouldn't be a parent."

Maybe you should be a parent, since you obviously have a grasp of common sense.

What you do is set the shirt on one end of the room, that dream cottage playset on the other end, and your toddler in the middle. In no time she'll be able to choose to be a sex object or a virginal homemaker. After all, it's important to let children know that they can be whatever they want to be (as long as they conform to sexist gender expectations).

Oh yeah, cause all women need to be fucked up at an early age. *rolls eyes*

This actually looks like something my mother-in-law would think was funny and would buy for my daughter. And while she sometimes gets her things that I would never put on her (pink camouflage comes to mind) those usually go into the Goodwill bag. Not this one. No way. This one burns. It's hard for me to fathom that there are actually parents out there who would want their daughter wearing this.

Peggy: That was more a joke about dressing a future son in a shirt that says "hooters girl." I'm sure he wouldn't appreciate that...especially if I took pictures and showed them to his future girlfriends (or boyfriends, I guess)

cry. ewwww

Ily, I had the same thought about the lack of pants.

One does wonder what Hooters Girl training would involve.

How is Hooters even legal? If I was any women who applied to work at Hooters that didnt have huge tits, or an anorexic barbie doll figure I would be turned down for the job. If a man applied wouldnt he be given a position as a cashier or as a cook while the women just become waitresses. This is straight out of the 1960s.

you know, i find this shirt pretty stupid and objectionable but i also find (to a lesser degree) all the "cute" shirts parents put on their kids to show of the parents personality pretty stupid. they often say more about the parent than the parent realizes.

you know, i find this shirt pretty stupid and objectionable but i also find (to a lesser degree) all the "cute" shirts parents put on their kids to show of the parents personality pretty stupid. they often say more about the parent than the parent realizes.

Gopher: I've always wondered how that sort of discrimination works under the law. Is it sort of like how firefighters have to pass a certain test to be firefighters? You cannot be a successful hooters girl without large breasts, and you have to pass te skinny with large breasts tests?

werent there some lawsuits regarding hooters hiring practices?from what i remember they were all settled out of court or dropped by the EEOC.

you can only explicitly physically discriminate in certain career fields, i remember a list i saw once but the only one i recall from it now was actors. not sure what the deal is with hooters.

Femidancer, my husband's first words when he saw that shirt were, "Can we buy one for our son?"

So clearly, you're as qualified to parent as we are.

Is it just me or does that mannequin have a huge junk? What are little girls packing these days?

I was a hooters waitress a few years ago. The job was awful, but just to nitpick, you most certainly don't have to have huge boobs or blond hair or be stick thin to work there. For example, I'm not conventionally attractive - I'm a dark, curvy little Jewish girl. The other women I worked with were of many races and body types.

What the management does care about is that you smile all the time, keep your mouth shut about harrassment, and be willing to scrub the toilets even if you were hired as a server/hostess.

I took the job because I needed the money for school and rent (I was also doing sex work at the time).

As far as the hiring practices are concerned, hooters girls are technically hired as "entertainers," so there is more leeway for discrimination - ex, they can turn away guys who apply to be servers.

My least favorite part of the job was when the manager told me I had to wear more makeup to work and do my hair "like you are about to go on a date with your boyfriend."

i wish I could have told him that I date girls who don't care what my hair looks like.

EmilyEileen,
'Is it just me or does that mannequin have a huge junk? What are little girls packing these days?'

I was drinking water when I read your post, and nearly choked, that was so funny!

How did Hooters manage to pull off the charade that they are a family-appropriate place anyway? I cringe when I see people taking their children in there. No way would my folks have done this. Not appropriate. Way to set consistent examples, folks.

Un-fucking-believable.

Who in their right mind would buy and dress their child in such a shirt?

Would such a parent think it appropriate for a person to sexually objectify and harass their child?

Would such a parent excuse the sexual molestation or rape of their child because by wearing such a shirt the child was asking or choosing to be sexually objectified?

I hope that parents would outraged if such behaviour was directed towards their child. Yet the people who would seriously consider, or even buy such a shirt for a child seem unable to understand that this is sexual objectification of a child. What the fuck is wrong with these people?

Another former Hooters girl here! I actually enjoyed the job but I was fortunate enough to have a very caring management who had the comfort levels of girls in mind. Of course, they didn't hire girls who weren't aware of the appeal of the restaurant but as soon as someone was uncomfortable the manager would go chat with the guests and I have faith would have removed them if they were obscenely inappropriate.

I have abnormally large breasts for my figure (whats wrong with that!!???) but am by NO MEANS rail thin or blond! The girls I worked with were VERY diverse in ethnicity and even body type - so I get a little defensive when people badmouth hooters for these reasons.

*Ahem* That being said children should never ever ever be marginalized the way this shirt does! I had fun at hooters, took everything with a healthy skepticism and learned allot from the experience. I was mature and comfortable with myself and my sexuality, all of which children are incapable of being.

What offends me about this shirt isn't the hooters reference in and of itself but what the connotation of the reference obviously implies.

I was at a Hooters restaurant b/c my friend graduated from Beauty School to be a teacher and her cousin worked there... long story short, we saw this shirt in person... great way to set goals for your kid.

I was at a Hooters restaurant b/c my friend graduated from Beauty School to be a teacher and her cousin worked there... long story short, we saw this shirt in person... great way to set goals for your kid.

oh and I think it came in baby sizes too.

I was in Old Navy the other day and I walked through the children's section on my way to the adults. I noticed that the posters in the children's sections (boys AND girls) featured young kids (probably 8-10 years old) in rather grown up positions. Not overtly sexual but just sexualized enough that it bothered me. It was a tad scary, but not as bad as this shirt.

I had seen this t-shirt before, and it squicked me then, but the added perverseness of displaying it on a headless form that displays only the t-shirt and a bare pubic area is grotesque.

At toddler age, little girls are being marketed to as faceless bodies whose only value is their sexual attractiveness. And yet, there's no misogyny. My irony meter is about to burn out.

alicepaul, former Hooters staff, says: "As far as the hiring practices are concerned, hooters girls are technically hired as "entertainers," so there is more leeway for discrimination - ex, they can turn away guys who apply to be servers."

Interesting - that confirms exactly what I was suspecting they did. The acting is the main part of the gig.

I would imagine that women who wanted jobs in the back could get them, though, in that unrelated job category? Dishwasher, etc?

I totally get it now - "Mommy, wow! I am a big kid now!" was actually talking about her breasts. Un-fucking-believable.

People seem to say that women are objectified because they wear certain clothes to get objectified, because they like it ...

Well, it's kind of hard to think otherwise when you've been socialized to think such at a young age ...

Yeah - "life begins at conception" and objectification begins shortly after birth ...really fucking classy.

This shirt is less ambiguous than the underwear to me--it's terrible and if i saw a child wearing it, I'd be compelled to unleash a hailstorm of choice words on the parent accompanying them. Why isn't anyone rallying to protest it? Just curious, since there was such an outcry against WM for the underwear. I also don't really care how well Hooters treats its women, it's a degrading job and you have successfully added to the dehumanization of women if you've chosen to work there. I don't get the appeal of working there or eating there. Most things I've read and a few girls I knew who worked there said the money wasn't that great. The food stinks as well.

I don't want to sound like I'm just blaming the girl for working there, I know the part society plays in the push towards taking jobs that heighten sexualization.

"you have successfully added to the dehumanization of women if you've chosen to work there."

What I added to, actually, was my ability to be financially independent and go to school. It was a degrading job....as was being a salesclerk, a secretary, a cashier, a telemarketer, and all the other minimum wage shit I had to do to make money in my life.

"you have successfully added to the dehumanization of women if you've chosen to work there."

What I added to, actually, was my ability to be financially independent and go to school. It was a degrading job....as was being a salesclerk, a secretary, a cashier, a telemarketer, and all the other minimum wage shit I had to do to make money in my life.

I've seen this shirt, and I've also seen the Halloween costume. You can actually dress your toddler as a Hooters girl.

*headdesk*

I heard a story about a father who coached a boys little league team. After their last game he brought them all to a Hooters restaurant and taught them how to get the girls in the best positions, like speaking softly to get them to lean in closer so you can get a gander at their 'hooters' among other degrading acts. These boys were around 9 years. On the drive back the boys lauched such questions at the dad such as 'how many holes does a woman have,' and other sexual questions. The mothers actually approved of the restaurant venture. I wonder, how are mothers able to encourage this type of behavior and how many sexist acts could be annhilated if boys were raised by mothers with a backbone?

From the Dept. of "Let's Have a Little Good News":

As I've pointed out before, PamelaV, the home stripper pole is not marketed to kids. It has a notice on it saying "for adult use only", and has photos showing an adult woman assembling it.

Second, despite one being featured in Jesus Christ: Vampire Hunter, Hooters doesn't do very well in Ottawa. I suspect that if men want titillation, they go to an actual strip club, and if they want a decent meal, they go to an actual restaurant. Guys go to Hooters once, from curiosity or for the novelty value, and don't return. So, no business lunches or Little League trips.

"you have successfully added to the dehumanization of women if you've chosen to work there."

Want to talk dehumanizing, talk to anyone who's ever worked retail. Sure, it isn't necessarily a sexual dehumanization (though I'm sure it is in some places), it's certainly a degrading job. Customers boss you around, yell at you, and treat you like you are beneath them.

I'm sure being a waitress at other restaurants is the same, especially if you're working on a Friday night and there's a bar. I've never waitressed but I can only imagine the lewd comments and grabassing waitresses must deal with, even if they aren't wearing orange hot pants.

Having said that, I don't think anyone has the right to judge someone else's job choices. I worked retail because I was fresh out of college with no money and no career-type jobs lined up. I took what I could get. The pay sucked. If I could have made (probably) triple+ the money just by wearing tight little shorts I seriously would have considered it.

BTW, I've never been in a Hooters. I grew up in Buffalo. Hooters never really caught on because the wings suck. For real wings you could hit one of the thousands of little pizza and wing places in B-lo, and for T&A it's just a hop skip and jump across the border to the Canadian Ballet.

"I wonder, how are mothers able to encourage this type of behavior"

Now I'm wondering just what those mothers did in order to support those sons...

Thank you, Liza. I think it is safe to say that most low wage service jobs are exploitative and degrading, and that for women, sexual harrassment is probably part of the package, in varying degrees depending on the atmosphere.

When one is being demeaned either way, it makes sense to opt for the job with the most tip money. I think this is why some women work at places like this.

I agree that Hooters hasn't exactly cornered the market on the dehumanization of workers in the service industry. When I worked as a seater (not even a server) at a somewhat upscale Italian chain, I got it all the time. For instance, I once asked two men to follow me, to which one of them replied, "We always follow pretty girls." And to make it worse, he was at least fifteen years older than me, and twenty years older than I look. A man once came in when we weren't very busy and asked for a "pretty waitress--maybe you?" Oh, how I wished I could have reamed him out, but instead I simply had to tell him that I wasn't a server and he would get the server who had the section he sat in. And the number of men who called me "sweetie" when they came to ask questions was just too many to count.

It's not even just service jobs. I'd say most jobs come with at least a little sexual harassment of female staff.
I work in a male-dominated sector of the economy, and a big part of my job is staffing conventions, conferences and trade shows.
After a day of work there I feel like I need a scalding hot shower.

It saddens me that the design for that shirt got through a number of phases and reviewers eyes and still ended up being created and sold. I'm not surprised, but I'm still disgusted.

'Guys go to Hooters once, from curiosity or for the novelty value, and don't return. So, no business lunches or Little League trips.'

Who are you defending? What demographics do you have to support this? I know you dont have any, because I know plenty of guys that go to Hooters-and not just once. Yes the story about the father taking his Little League team to Hooters after the season is true. Dont contradict first hand sources, and dont be so pompous without data.

'Now I'm wondering just what those mothers did in order to support those sons...'

Mina,
I didnt quite understand your post. The mothers didnt work at Hooters, they gave permission to the father to take their sons to Hooters.

Femilala, SarahMC,
I wish women could document through the media how female workers are treated everyday, so society gains a larger understanding of why its not acceptable to make crap shirts like this, and create other attire that encourages the acceptance of sexist indocrination to girls and women. Those are some f*cked stories.

Gopher -

Just wanted to say that you are right. When I worked there, plenty of groups of men came in for business lunches, and many guys were repeat customers...as in, every single day. (These were usually the ones who committed the most harrassment. One of them used to write "I'm stalking you" on napkins and hand them to me.)

So I too wonder where ShifterCat gets his or her information.

Am I the only one who read Shifter Cat's statement as applying to the Hooters' in Ottawa, not everywhere?

Am I the only one who read Shifter Cat's statement as applying to the Hooters' in Ottawa, not everywhere?

That's exactly what I meant. Sorry that wasn't clear.

Actually, I seem to recall reading the story about the Little League team a while ago, and it's one of the reasons I was glad that the Hooters chain doesn't seem to do well in my particular area.

dananddanica, I have to say, I have a problem with the idea that my baby girl's Doctor Who t-shirt is even remotely in the same category as something like this.

LucyGillam: ?When I read dananddanica's comment, I assumed she was referring more to shirts that said stuff like "Hottie" or "cutie" or "daddy's lil girl" your usual screen tee with a "cute" phrase. Not, you know, stuff that is actually related to children, like doctor seuss or fuzzy animals

"Hottie" I'll grant you, but I'm again having trouble seeing "cutie" or "I Heart Daddy" in the same category. And the Doctor Who t-shirt in question has a phrase taken from an episode that I'm no way letting her watch for at least five years. The irony of this and her Torchwood onesie (gift from a friend) do not escape me, but I don't think they equate to dressing her in a "future sex object" shirt.

But if we want to address the broader question of dressing kids to reflect our interests, how do people feel about, say, a baby shirt with a feminist message? I should add that I'm genuinely asking, here, because I'm a little squirmy about that (even though I desperately want a Wonder Woman shirt that says "Fights Like A Girl" for her) in a way I'm really not about baby geekwear. Putting her in a Doctor Who shirt at worst risks having people confused, but if I put her in an overtly political shirt, where am I crossing the line between starting empowering messages early and using her as very cute walking billboard?

Re: cutie, Dr. Who, or (in the case of my child) The Clash. Some people just hate it when other people call attention to themselves. I have friends who hate bumper stickers. Any bumper stickers. Go figure.

Seeing the Hooter t-shirt on an actual toddler though would be guaranteed to make me vomit.

I can ride with

clearly this is part of a sting operation. whenever a customer purchases one of these, the cashier is required to take down their information and pass it on to DSS. right?.... right???

I totally want to get one for a little baby boy.

Lucy: can we be best friends so you can buy my daughter both a Dr. Who AND Torchwood outfit? Or, if you know, that's a little forward, maybe you could send a link? :)

I love the "funny" shirts for my Daughter, but I do shy away from anything that says "Future so-in-so", or things that express an opinion that she can't possibly have. For example, she has a shirt that says "I'm already smarter than the president" because she is, but when I buy her an Obama 08 shirt, it'll say "My Mama's for Obama" instead of "Babies for Obama." It's a small distinction, but it's there. I also want to get her the "I'm too young to vote, what's your excuse" shirt.

liliana28, this is the Doctor Who t-shirt I got her. The Torchwood onesie was a gift, but I'd bet anything it was from Cafe Press.

And yeah, your distinction makes a lot of sense. At this age, putting her in stuff that says something about my views is probably okay, since everything she wears is picked by me or her father, but putting her in something that ascribes opinions and goals to her is probably not.

"'Now I'm wondering just what those mothers did in order to support those sons...'

"Mina,
I didnt quite understand your post. The mothers didnt work at Hooters, they gave permission to the father to take their sons to Hooters."

Yeah, I was wondering if any of the mothers approved of that partly because they themselves used their sexuality to support themselves and their sons.

"And yeah, your distinction makes a lot of sense. At this age, putting her in stuff that says something about my views is probably okay, since everything she wears is picked by me or her father, but putting her in something that ascribes opinions and goals to her is probably not."

That makes sense. It's even clearer than putting her in an "I think ____" shirt and hoping everyone will get that it's really her parents' opinions.

"I was wondering if any of the mothers approved of that partly because they themselves used their sexuality to support themselves and their sons."

Um, would this automatically be a bad thing? Women do what they can to survive/take care of their children. For instance, many sex workers are also mothers. More economic options for women = good. Judging people who are trying to support themselves and thier families = not so good.

'Actually, I seem to recall reading the story about the Little League team a while ago, and it's one of the reasons I was glad that the Hooters chain doesn't seem to do well in my particular area.'

This was a local story told to me from my mom who heard it from the father where she works. She knows the father, and heard it from him. I'm not surprised if you heard another story it from a newspaper. It seems to be a pretty popular place to indoctrinate your sons into a 'male right of passage.'

'Yeah, I was wondering if any of the mothers approved of that partly because they themselves used their sexuality to support themselves and their sons.'

None of these women were doing any sex work. They are middle class suburban parents. I think mothers that live the suburban lifestyle see the Hooters experience as something healthy, or necessary to their sons developement as men. Maybe the mothers also think that in general, males have a bigger sexual need than females so it would seem that if they were to protest the Hooters resteraunt, it would be seen as inhibitive because they believe women wouldnt understand male adolescent 'needs.'
I find it abhorrent.