A novel gender-specific garment
Here is a practical invention for helping to solve some of the social problems that burkahs, veils, and bikinis are meant to solve. But let us first paint a modest backdrop in order to highlight the problem:
Preventing evils of desire
Proper female dress has been assumed to prevent "evils of desire" for millennia. For the moment the "Muslim dress code" for women is the most talked-about costumeary device for preventing erotic evils. However, in the Islamic world the dress code varies wildly, from the totally photon-impregnable burkha and all the way down to the bikini, the latter being a two-piece textile contrivance that enjoys as much popularity among secularised Muslims as it does among Europeans, Americans and Oceanians. In between there are some less extreme contraptions for covering selected parts of the body, for example the rather unpretentious “Muslim shawl”, a female hair-concealing device that school-girls in France are currently forbidden to wear.
There is of course nothing inherently Muslim about covering the body in prescribed ways. In many historical societies in Europe, the Orient and elsewhere it was quite popular for religious authorities to decree that a certain way of dressing a female was the only proper way. Just a few decades ago rural women in much of Europe had to cover their hair (some still do) with a shawl that is virtually indistinguishable from the "Muslim shawl". Orthodox married Jewish women are still required to wear a natural-looking wig for concealing their natural-looking natural hair.
For ladies only
Notably, in all religious denominations it is taken for granted that a dress code for the prevention of evil applies to women exclusively. Men are exempt, by their very nature, as it were. A possible explanation for this theological lopsidedness is that the theologians seem to see men as innocent victims of vile women. The male rapist or stalker is regarded as the real victim, not the raped or stalked female.
How is it possible to arrive at such an odd conclusion? Well, I don’t really know. But it’s conceivable that the theology crowd might have reasoned in the following way:
Men are the sole potential perpetrators of the evils which the female dress codes are supposed to prevent. By not following the dress code, a woman actively draws the man into a path of iniquity and crime, thus wilfully making him a victim of punishment and other unhappy circumstances. Hence his suffering as a victim is much greater than her suffering as a victim. Because after all it was her negligence that originated the crime. Consequently it was she who actually committed the crime.
Spiritually uplifting logic, don't you think?
Camouflage dress for deer protection?
Theology aside, requiring women to wear special “protective” gear to prevent men from attacking or annoying them, seems somewhat ineffectual. If poaching is a growing problem in a game-rich region of your country, how should you respond? By covering all of the umpteen deer in the forest with camouflage dresses? Or would it be more efficient to try to restrict the movements of the poachers? Well, this is what I suspected -- you seem to like the idea that a garment for the protection of morals and for preventing gender-specific crime should be worn by men, rather than by women. If such a garment could be designed, then there would be no need for burkhas, veils or even bikinis.
The requirements
So here is a practical proposal, designed to allay dress-related fears. Rape is not the only problem that theologians see as dress-related, but we may use it as an illustrative example. The potential rapist is dangerous for a number of reasons. Among other things he is
(1) Fast
(2) Strong
(3) Able to penetrate
A suitable compulsory male dress code could -- and should -- address the above issues efficiently.
The design
The compulsory male dress proposed here is a kind of long and narrow ankle-length skirt, which is stitched (sewn) together vertically between the legs, creating a two-legged ankle-length garment. In effect it would be like a pair of wide-legged trousers, but with closely connected trouser legs. This design (more details below) would address the three threats listed above.
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/ \
integrated / ( ) \
penis sheath-> | ( ) |
(3x denim) | ( ) |
| I |
| I |
| I |
| I |
| I |
|___ I ___|
^
connected legs
(1) The close connection between the legs (some 20-25 cm) would restrict the movement of the person’s feet to rather small steps, thus making the individual walk along with mincing steps. Any speedy pursuit of an intended rape victim would become difficult, if not impossible.
(2) The narrow separation of the potential rapist’s feet would also offset the muscular strength-difference between the rapist and the victim, because it would be easy to topple the attacker’s unstable stance by a determined push.
(3) Inside the Holy Trousers (or HolyT, the proposed name for this novel garment) would be an integrated textile penis sheath, made of triple-layered denim and resembling the ones worn by males among some tribes in New Guinea. This would offset the penetration ability of the attacker, as it would necessitate complete removal of the whole garment before penetration can be attempted. By this time the potential victim would have had ample time to escape.
The prescribed use of this male garment only awaits decisions by the morally concerned parties, i.e. the respective religious authorities of the major monotheist denominations -- Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Its adoption would save virtue as well as money. And it would do that more efficiently than most previous religious dress codes have done.
NOTE: The terms Holy Trousers and HolyT are are as of yet unregistered trademarks, but they are the intellecual property of montecarlo nevertheless.