Real women make their own decisions about what to wear and why, and they are entitled to dress how they please for whatever reason they please.
Fictional women are subject to the whims, desires and biases of everyone involved in their production, and self-serving, gratuitous BS is often the cornerstone of the result. There are very few examples of female characters who are dressed in a revealing manner because it reflects their motivations and personality (this would be the ‘appropriate’ situation you describe); they are most often dressed that way because they are female, and female characters must be served on a platter to the heterosexual male audience’s gaze or else they’re just not worth the effort! (Here’s lookin’ at you, Mass Effect.)
I call it “honesty”. An honest character design is one where the presentation of the character is aligned with the motivations and personality of the character established in the narrative. The appearance of the character serves the character.
So many character designs featuring boob windows are dishonest in that the presentation of the character serves the viewer and NOT the character.
Bless those words.
Quoting the creencapped text, a reply to this old post by @costumecommunityservice, for clarity:
Boob windows may seem like a trope, but it’s also a preference. There are women who actually do chose to dress like that, and they are proud of it. In fact, I feel sometimes it can add to a character’s personality where appropriate.
This is the topic we disputed many times over the years, and that’s the oldest post I reblogged that’s specifically about character agency (aka fictional women “choosing” to run around in skimpy and/or sexualized costumes, no matter how little sense those make in the context of their stories). And yes, we still keep facing rhetoric exactly like that ?
Time to bring this back, at the very least to illustrate how evergreen the subject is and how ours (and other people’s) response remains the same.
Rule of thumb is: whatever example you want to give of a female character with great reason for a boob window (or any other absurdly sexualized costuming choice), it’s probably not as good as you think.
Examine that better instead of being as flippant as this commenter was.
~Ozzie