Where is Your Mother? By Deb Lisa Daily

I’ve written several posts about my amazing, wonderful mother, which you can read here, here and here.

So, for a change, I’m going to write about someone else’s mother.

Sadly, I think she may be trapped in a well.

Marche Taylor, prom 2008Marche Taylor is the high school senior who was kicked out of her prom because school officials deemed her dress was too risqué and insisted she leave. She refused. She asked for a refund of her prom tickets since they would not let her enter, the school official refused and told her she could go home or be escorted out by police.

So she was dragged away in handcuffs.

According to an ABC news report by Emily Friedman, a representative for the school district, Terry Abbott, said,
“The young lady came to the prom wearing an inappropriate dress after the students were told what the guidelines were.”

According to the report, “Only one inch of an attendants’ midsection was permitted to be shown and slits in dresses could be no more than three inches above the knee” and “see-through fabrics should not be worn in places which reveal private body parts.”

Marche made her own prom dress, according to news reports. And I think we can all admit she showed a great deal of creativity in her design. (Although not a great deal of fabric.)

A young girl who goes to the prom dressed in a gold lame ace bandage is looking for attention, and now, thanks to YouTube and 24-hour news cycles, she’s got it in spades.

Google Marche Taylor, and you get 506,000 hits.

My question is, how did Marche get out of the house in that highly creative dress?

Why did Marche’s mother not stop her at the front door and say, “young lady, you are not going to the prom unless you march yourself right back upstairs and put on some clothes.”

I am not in favor of schools dictating how students dress, I think that’s a parent’s job. I also think one of the most important ways that young people express themselves, as they are trying to figure out who they are, is through the way they dress.

And if that creativity is thwarted, via school uniforms or color-coded students, they will express themselves some other way, like with piercings, or tattoos. Or in my day, with legwarmers and mall bangs.

It’s disturbing to me that schools have found it necessary to create a rule that specifically states that see-through fabrics which reveal private body parts are not allowed.

Who are these parents who are letting their kids go out in public dressed in translucent loincloths and boob tubes?

More importantly, where are they?

Deb Lisa

Fifteen Minutes of Shame by Lisa Daily

Author: Lisa Daily

Lisa Daily is a real-life TV dating expert on Daytime. She's a syndicated relationships columnist, a popular media guest seen everywhere from MTV to the New York Times, and the author of the bestselling dating advice book, Stop Getting Dumped! : All you need to know to make men fall madly in love with you and marry "The One" in 3 years or less. Visit lisa online at www.lisadaily.com

11 Replies to “Where is Your Mother? By Deb Lisa Daily”

  1. What I find even more disturbing than parents letting their kids out the door like this (but believe me, it IS disturbing) is that these kids feel they need to dress like this. Where are the parents when these young girls need guidance about self-esteem and why dressing like a skank will not get people to love you (like you for a few hours, yes, but not LOVE you).

    I realize the media is completely contrary to this message (be thin and slutty like Beyonce/Brittney/Christina and everyone will love you), which is why parents need to be even more present in their kids’ lives.

  2. Exactly!

    It’s made me very sad this week to hear people talking about this girl liek she is a tramp — she’s a child. She shouldn’t be dressing that way, but her parents should be telling her why the important parts of her are her brain and her heart, and that she doesn’t need to wear a piece of gold saran wrap to show off her gifts.

    I have a young daughter, and I can’t even imagine what will pass for prom wear by the time she gets to be of that age.

    Pasties and a g-string probably.

    Lisa

  3. Dragged away from prom in handcuffs – now there’s a scrapbook memory to hand down to your children.

    She’ll never be able to run for public office now.

  4. Wow, so scary on so many levels. I remember not being allowed out the door in certain outfits and it was a good thing.

    You and I can battle the g-string prom dresses together a few years from now, Lisa, as our girls are close in age.

  5. A teacher friend once told me about a 6th-grader who came to school in a sheer button-down–the kind you’re supposed to wear with a camisole underneath–only she wasn’t wearing anything under it. The teacher sent the girl to the office, and the girl’s father later accused the teacher of being jealous. (shudder)

    I don’t think I ever tried to leave the house in something too risque. Too weird, maybe, but not too risque.

  6. Monda –

    So true!

    Danielle —

    Gail —
    Thanks!

    Katie —
    Oh. My. Gawd. Nice message, Dad. Creepy.

    RE: >>I don’t think I ever tried to leave the house in something too risque. Too weird, maybe, but not too risque.<<

    My mom always told me, “Don’t say ‘weird’, say ‘interesting’.”

    Great comments!

    Best,

    Lisa

  7. Well, I have been in a self-imposed news embargo, and now I know why. I grew weary of perpetual election coverage, doom, gloom and all-around dismal everything. Haven’t missed the news at all, in fact.

    A lovely side benefit of this news black-out is I manage to avoid hearing about such compelling life dramas as this one. And with the number of hits she’s had I clearly am one of the last people around to hear about her.

    It’s really very sad, isn’t it, that there are so many parents completely abandoning their responsibility as parents. It’s always such a fine line we must dance between imposing our will and imposing what’s right and trying allow our children freedom while not giving them so much freedom that they do really stupid things. I guess teaching them boundaries but also moderation are the two greatest gifts we can give them.

    Poor Marche must’ve missed out on the moderation lesson. Of course in her defense, if she watches the types of programming geared toward her age group on TV, what she is wearing is downright modest by comparison. So it is true, the media helps to fuel this type of thing. Chances are pretty good that we’ve seen celebrity on the pages of US Weekly wearing something awfully similar to Marche’s outfit, in fact. I guess its one thing to wear that outfit on America’s Top Model, but quite another to wear it to a public school prom…

  8. I was wondering about the date, too!!!

    Someone just forwarded me a bunch of ridiculous prom photos, and the thing is, there was at least one dress in the bunch WORSE than the one Marche wore. (Think Lil’ Kim at the Grammys way back when…)

  9. Where was her mother? Such a good question. My mother would have never let me out of the house wearing something like that when I was in high school, in fact she probably would have something to say if I wore a dress like that now!
    Speaking of my mother, she’s works in a high school and she always has stories about her students whose parents aren’t paying any attention. That’s a huge problem. Parents like that are forcing schools to take care of their kids, instead of focusing on teaching them.

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