Frumpy Middle-Aged Mom: They're young girls, not tramps

It's nice to know that we can walk into any mall these days and outfit Curly Girl for her future career as a prostitute. Maybe she'll meet Hugh Grant while she's trolling the streets.

Maybe she'll be a stripper or a call girl who meets a nice married governor from Back East.

What the heck, she's only 12, she's got a year or two to decide. And, when she does, every girl's clothing department in America wants to provide her wardrobe.

I know this because we peruse the racks together.

Need a black lace bustier designed to hold up appendages that aren't even there yet? No problem. You can find them for 8-year-olds.

Need a padded bra to attract those future johns? No problem. I mean, every girl's got to look hot, even when she's 9, right?

On a recent visit, we couldn't find a bra that wasn't padded in our fruitless hunt through a major department store.

Walking into the shops that market to girls these days is like cruising a convention of Future Strippers of America.

Does your daughter need booty shorts that nearly expose her cheeks and say "JUICY" across the bottom? You can find one in every color.

But just try to find some attractive shorts that come down to mid-thigh. Good luck with that. I hear Big Foot is out there waiting to be discovered, too.

I recently read an editorial telling moms to stop dressing their daughters like tramps. Well, gee, I'd like to. But it's not as easy as you might think.

At some point, the fashion industry apparently decided that, if sex sells for young women, it should also sell for girls.

And, I presume it does, because there are very few cute, trendy clothes out there that aren't so risque you want to cover your daughter's eyes before she even looks at them on the racks.

I know I'm such a Luddite, but seeing women wearing bottoms with writing across the rear reminds me of those female baboons that have brightly colored genitalia designed so that even the stupidest male baboon can find it easily when it's time to mate.

Here it is, boys. Come and get it.

The irony to me is that shorts on boys have gotten longer and longer. My 14-year-old son, Cheetah Boy, now refuses to leave the house if his short pants display even a glimpse of knees, as if he were in some sort of bizarre religious order that decreed his knees be covered at all times, while showing the tops of his boxers.

Meanwhile, shorts for girls keep getting shorter and shorter, until now there's very little point in wearing them at all, except maybe to keep your underwear clean underneath.

Don't get me wrong. My daughter would be happy to wear these clothes, if I let her. It makes her feel grown-up. It makes me feel like she's got a big red target on her back for a child molester.

A few weeks ago, we went looking for a black dress she needed for a school concert. Everything we found was either really frumpy or cut down low to display merchandise she doesn't even have yet.

Finally, she ended up with a marked-down Calvin Klein dress designed for someone three times her age and a little too low-cut, but at least it covered all the necessities.

I know other moms have this dilemma. One wrote to me that she took her daughter looking for a fancy party dress and, because she's tall, she couldn't find anything that wasn't strapless.

If a gown is missing the top half, I think it should be cheaper, don't you? Well, that's another topic entirely.

Hey, at least we don't have to go shopping for a bathing suit. I have a skein of yarn at home. I can make one at home in 15 minutes that will cover more skin than most of those on the racks.

Though I won't have the privilege of paying $40 for one square inch of fabric.

Sad, really.