This viral story about a 2-year-old girl told to “cover up” by pool lifeguards is NOT OK

Taking your toddler to the pool is a summertime rite of passage for many families, and these days, it’s the only way to make the sweltering heat we’re dealing with feel the least bit bearable until the record-high temps finally break. But apparently, even two-year-old kids aren’t free from patriarchal double standards, as evidenced by Megababe founder Katie Sturino’s recent Instagram post.

Sturino shared a story of her friend’s daughter, who she says was told to put a shirt on by two lifeguards at a recent swim lesson, despite plenty of shirtless toddler boys around swimming and playing happily.

“I was just catching up with my friend and she said that her two-year-old daughter was at swim lessons yesterday and all the little boys around her were shirtless. Baby boys were shirtless in diapers and she was in a swimsuit bottom and didn’t have her rash guard on yet and the lifeguard came over — two different lifeguards came over at two different times — and said, ‘Ma’am, you need to put a shirt on your daughter. There’s no nudity allowed at the pool.’”

Sturino’s reaction? “That made my f****** head pop off. Because I was like, ‘This is it. This is when they start policing our bodies. They start to say, ‘You gotta cover up. There’s something wrong with you. You’ve gotta cover up, okay? This is not appropriate. Your body, not appropriate.’”

“‘You’re two years old. You’re a two-year-old little baby.’ These rules are put on women from the start,” she concluded, asking her followers for their thoughts on whether or not “toddler girls [should] have to cover up.” She echoed those sentiments in the caption of her post, writing, “Different rules for boys and girls’ bodies start young and are reinforced constantly along the way.”

Sturino, a digital influencer, is passionate about advocating for autonomy and acceptance for all bodies, and she was rightfully outraged by that autonomy being taken away from a baby girl still in swim diapers. The story sparked a lively conversation in the comments section of her post, with plenty of people equally disgusted by the double standards set and upheld by these lifeguards, who seemingly had no issue with the toddler boys being shirtless at the pool.

“Ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew calling a baby’s body ‘nudity’ gives all the wrong messages,” wrote one commenter. “That is some #ShinyHappyPeople #duggarfamily #purityculture #rapeculture nonsense.”

“What,” added another. “As a pediatrician and expert in the bodies of children, there is no biological difference between a toddler girls chest and a toddler boys chest. That is absolutely insane.”

“This is an America problem,” agreed another. “Anywhere else kids would run around free and naked and it would not be sexualized.”

A former lifeguard also agreed, writing, “I lifeguarded for 10 years and never once was it my place to tell a child what to wear. It’s much more acceptable in other countries for children to be shirtless. America is so effing rigid and obsessed with sex at the same time.”

Some commenters feel that no babies should be naked in public (hmmm… k!) and others feel that little girls should be “protected” from prying eyes of pedophiles, as evidenced by one commenter.

“You are the problem,” she wrote. “Yes there is a difference between a boy and girl body. Not because we have a problem. And 1,000% that little girl should wear a shirt!! How is that even a question? It is more to protect her from people looking at her. There is so much evil in this world and maybe you are not aware of the cruelty because you look at her and see an innocent child but there could be a creep who sees her as a fantasy. Why even risk someone seeing her with those eyes? As females our private areas are both top and bottom.”

Of course, the unfortunate reality is that sexual violence against children is a very real issue, and the vast majority of juvenile victims are female. That said, a swim top is not going to prevent someone who would consider harming a child from doing so, and arbitrary rules like this are simply instilling early fear and shame into girls about their bodies when they are literally still babies. And that’s without mentioning how it reinforces the notion that boys can do and wear whatever they want while it’s “unsafe” for girls to do the same.

One commenter summed it up perfectly, writing, “This story is disturbing and is all kinds of fucked up. It’s also a harrowing reminder that under a patriarchy, it doesn’t matter what age a female is… her body will always be sexualized, which means it will always be at risk of danger.”

What do you think about this story? Should toddler girls have to cover up while toddler boys can be shirtless at the pool?

A version of this post was published in July 2023. It has been updated.