The Ethicist

I am a young, female law student who represents indigent clients in criminal matters. I have learned (both from professionals at my school and from studies on subliminal biases) that female attorneys are more likely to be taken seriously if they have straight hair and wear makeup, skirts and heels. This is not a norm I want to perpetuate. However, I know that I have an ethical responsibility to represent my clients to the best of my ability. But do I have to conform to gender norms I find oppressive if there is a chance it will help my client? NAME WITHHELD

I would agree that you have an ethical responsibility to represent your clients to the fullest extent of your potential. But there are limits to what you are obligated to do, and this situation falls right on the cusp of that territory.

The fact that a lawyer’s attire should not matter to an intelligent jury is not relevant — you concede that it does, rightly or wrongly. But I don’t think this necessarily means you must dress in any specific way. “Serious attire” can mean different things to different people. Obviously, it would not serve your clients’ interests if you purposefully dressed in a manner that upended traditional definitions of professionalism — if you showed up in the courtroom wearing a “Frankie Says Relax” T-shirt and hemp pants, you’d force the jury to view you unconventionally (which is what you’re trying to avoid). But there are many shades between not caring at all and wholly conforming to an inflexible dress code. You do not, for example, need to wear makeup, particularly if doing so makes you uncomfortable with yourself (which might hurt your client far more than appearing as your regular self). You’re ethically responsible to present yourself professionally, but the details that define that professionalism are myriad.

That said, I do think you need to prioritize your goals here. What is more important to you: the representation of your client or your discomfort with antiquated gender norms? Almost all occupations require the mild subjugation of certain personal freedoms. If you believe that dressing in a specific manner would serve your client most effectively, your reasons for not doing so must matter more than the consequences of possibly losing a case for reasons unrelated to actual evidence.

While reading the question and the response I had a few questions pop up in my head. First, is the woman African American? Second, what does she find oppressive? I would want to know her ethnicity because if she is told to straighten her hair because of her race, it is no longer a gender norm, but is also an expectation for women of her race as well, which adds another type of prejudice. My second question refers specifically to what makes her uncomfortable, wearing heels and straightening her hair or doing that to follow antiquated gender norms. Another question that popped up in my head when reading the question was whether the lawyer she was going against was a man or a woman. If it were a woman who straightens her hair and conforms to the norm, the differences between the two would be more obvious and thus could harm her a lot. However, if it were a man the norms would change (for each gender) so the difference would not be as visible. That doesn’t mean, on the other hand, that she wouldn’t be subjected to gender norms.

Regarding the ethicist’s response, I feel like it somewhat reflects the idea that the “end justifies the means.” Conforming to gender norms would be okay if she ends up helping her client. The problem I have with that logical is that, when applied to other things it wouldn’t be ethical, so why would this situation be? Let’s use omission, for example. If the lawyer knew that her client committed murder but still defended him and he ended up not going to jail, would that still justify her omission? I think most people would agree that is morally wrong. Yes, ethically everyone has the right to be defended but omission of certain facts could become a lie, which would be morally and ethically wrong.

The ethicist let’s the lawyer make a decision on whether her discomfort is bigger than her will to help her client. But the problem with this logic is that (at least ideally) she shouldn’t have to make a choice. On the other hand, if I were her client, my hope would be that my lawyer would be going above and beyond to ensure my innocence and if that meant straightening her hair then I would want her to do so.

I don’t necessarily disagree with the Ethicist’s response. I don’t think it was well constructed but my answer would be the same: she should choose what to do and what is more important to her. I disagree with his logic that the end justifies the means, however. My logic when looking at this question is that she should choose which battles are worth fighting; is it worth fighting against gender norms while fighting (supposedly) an injustice? In my opinion she has a life time to fight gender norms and I don’t think that conforming to them to defend someone else is something to be ashamed of since she is (supposedly) giving up her opinion to fight for the “greater good.”