How's this for an oxymoron? High-school dress codes for females promote rape culture.

You may be scratching your head, dear reader, trying to figure out how school rules requiring students to dress appropriately for that serious enterprise known as learning something encourage young boys to fill their heads with thoughts of sexual assault. Shouldn't the modesty rules encourage the boys, undistracted by scantily clad females, to assault their chemistry problem sets instead?

Not so, apparently, at Boston Latin School, the city's magnet high school for the academically gifted. Here's what Fox News reports:

Administrators at prestigious Boston Latin School have been embroiled in a dispute with female students over rape culture.

And the whole thing was triggered by the school’s decision to actually enforce its longstanding dress code.

Furthermore, the dress code itself scarcely requires the girls to don burkhas:

It bans gang-related colors and symbols, sexually explicit logos, hemlines higher than 4 inches above the knee, and shirt-shoulder straps narrower than the width of three fingers. It also prohibits leggings worn as pants (as opposed to under a skirt or dress).

That sounds reasonable. Try showing up at most jobs in a micro-mini and a spaghetti-strap tank top. Nonetheless, several female students at Boston Latin posted this Change.org petition:

By allowing the school to dress code us, we are telling the school several things:

Yes, we still live in a patriarchal society where men can decide whether a female’s clothing is appropriate or inappropriate.

Yes, a body should be covered in order to be attractive. Establishing a sense of shame towards girls bodies is okay and perfectly acceptable.

Yes, a girl’s body is a sinful temptation that needs to be covered up at all costs for others to focus on their education.

Yes, a female’s body is more tempting and sexual than a male’s body.

Yes, it is our fault when girls get raped because they should have covered up and avoided the situation by dressing in a way that does not attract another person.

Let's see–if girls supposedly get raped because they're not "covered up," how does requiring them to cover up encourage rape? I'm confused. And where's the part of the dress code that says that girls look more "attractive" in skirts four inches above their knees than in skirts eight inches above their knees?

Also–don't they teach punctuation at Boston Latin? It's "girls' bodies," not "girls bodies."

The school may be prestigious, but its curriculum could use some revamping in the logic and grammar departments.