Letter: Dress sense

Like many fathers of daughters, I sympathise with the policeman who warned girls that "dressing like sluts" was asking for trouble. I thought the inflation of his well-meaning - if incautious - advice into a thought-crime and the international explosion of "slut walks" was self-indulgent and absurd.

No girl dresses to be raped but clothing, like all social conventions, carries meaning and girls are surely aware of the effect such "signals" have on hormonally-driven young men. Insisting her behaviour never contributes to any harm that befalls a woman is deeply anti-feminist. It infantilises women as incapable of taking responsibility for their actions.

(Dr) John Cameron

Howard Place

St Andrews