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Your partners are dinosaurs that have no concept of modern clothing. Not to mention sexist. And yes, even women can be sexist.
The female partner should have told him to STFU.
Wear the pants. But if you decide to wear a dress or skirt on one of your trial days, wear pantyhose.
Wear the pants!!!!
Wear the pants. I never wear skirts or dresses anymore, and it has never been a problem at trial or arbitration.
Wear the outfit that you’ll feel confident in. If you don’t, it will distract you during the trial and it will impact your performance. I say this as a female who exclusively wears dresses/skirt suits to court.
Screw them. Wear pants. this is not 1950
Ugh wear the pants. Unless they give you a concrete reason, wear the pants.
When I started practicing, my 85 year old grandfather, whom I loved DEARLY and was a retired judge, told me that all women needed a navy skirt suit in their rotation because some of his colleagues wouldn’t respect them without that. I wore skirt suits my first few years and then realized how BS it was.
So wear what makes you feel comfortable and forget the rest.
Assuming that the jury is sexist isn’t a legitimate excuse to behave in a sexist manner toward associates. Moral people don’t pander to assumed biases… would you also dye your hair brown because the partners think the jury believes all of the “dumb blonde” jokes? Hell no!!! Wear what makes you feel like the powerful professional that you are!
Wear pants. Look him in the eye and make HIM tell you that BS. He won’t.
Unfortunately, many judges are boomers and still have that mentality. Same with the public, and that is who your jury is. People judge. And judgment creates bias. It does not make it ok nor excusable. But it is reality.
Sad but true. Jurors judge appearance too
So many significant issues with this any one of which should trigger a significant backlash against your male partner but unfortunately appears it will not given he got a female intermediary to carry out his misogyny for him. Shame on her for agreeing to be the messenger when she should have shut him down hard and fast the instant he mentioned it to her and you never heard a word of it unless it was her telling you it happened, was addressed, will not happen again, and to let her know if it does. He’s not just a bigot but a coward who knew telling you what to wear based on your gender was wrong so he enlisted a woman to do his dirty work and probably in mind temper his misogynist directive. Of course a woman telling you a man demands you dress in conformance with dated gender stereotypes does not make his directive any less sexist. Only and I mean only if you dressed unprofessionally in some manner that has nothing to do with your gender would it warrant comment from your partner. Something like holes in your suit or a dirty shirt. He knows that otherwise he would have said it to you himself.
Wear the pants and I bet he’ll say nothing to you. In fact he hasn’t said anything to you at this point and should he muster the gumption to criticize your choice to dress professionally in a way that doesn’t adhere to dated gender norms then you could respond with something along the lines of “Am I not dressed professionally in this suit? It seems your issue is me not dressing the way you think a woman should dress.” You could of course also ask him if he’s told any male colleagues how to dress at trial or whatever else calls out his overt misogyny to make it clear you won’t tolerate this kind of thing.
There’s of course many considerations in how to best handle this situation including whether you want or need to have a continued working relationship with this guy. If you need this man for some reason in service of your current role, career etc. then please do whatever you can to make that no longer the case.
Unfortunately I’ve seen and heard this kind of overt bigotry consistently throughout my career. Id grind my teeth as my old (both in former and age) partners would be openly sexist and racist during a partner meeting I presume in large part because they thought a room of straight white men shared their views or even worse because they saw no issue with their comments regardless of audience. The latter proved to be true once there was a female partner at the table. She chose to ignore or brush off the sexist commentary to maintain harmony and her position thinking it would lessen as these guys aged out of partnership and retired. Her choice but certainly not an approach that addresses the problem or helps other women in the firm. Seems like your female partner messenger has the same mentality or worse as she’s not simply turning a blind eye to sexism but agreeing to be a messenger of it. Be very wary of someone like her who may deliberately hinder the career advancement of other women within the firm.
Bottomline - Wear what you’re comfortable wearing and before trial starts inform this guy that is what you’re going do. It’ll be awkward but get that out of the way before you’re making first impressions on the 12 people you need to like and trust you to win your case. Your foe in the courtroom should be seated at another table; not your own. Tension with your co counsel is the last thing you need at trial. A jury can tell when you’re at ease and there’s no good reason to add additional stress to the already stressful trial process.
Confront your partner before trial and let him know who wears the pants! Then I suggest exploring your options to work with someone else who cares only about you being a good lawyer.
Haha wear the pants. Make the male partner have to look you in the eye and tell you not to, and then ask him why. If he says, “it’s more traditional” or “more professional” keep asking why until it’s clear what the true answer is - sexism.
Try to record any future interactions regarding your attire 🙏🏼
Wear what you want. Tell the male to stfu