Is it truly a luxury for clothing to have deep and effective pockets? Many men would say no. Almost all women would answer yes. When someone shows off a new dress, pants, or other pair of bottoms, chances are they’ll stuff their hands into their pockets and grin, going- “and it has pockets!”

Having working pockets that you can actually fit things in like your phone or wallet should be a right, not a privilege yet the majority of women’s clothing is lacking in the pocket department. The average men’s pocket is both deeper and wider than the average pocket for women if they’re lucky enough to have them.

Pockets may seem trivial but they’re a symbol of misogyny in the modern world and the patriarchy’s grip on our society.

If you wear women’s clothing, how many times have you gone to put something in your pocket only to find that there was either no pocket at all or a tiny sliver of space where you could barely slot a penny? Odds are, more often than not.

As high schoolers and women, the inconveniences that may seem minor, start to build up. Like handing your phone and wallet to your male friend at prom because your dress is lacking pockets, or even better, having to lug around a purse to hold your belongings that could easily fit in the pockets of your dad’s dress pants.

This obvious pattern has been around for centuries, but why?

Purses, marketed almost exclusively toward women, are a key player in this issue. The expectation that women will carry around a purse, clutch, or other bag is something that dates back hundreds of years. But it’s oftentimes inconvenient to haul around a purse just to carry your necessary objects like car keys, an ID, a phone and wallet.

Yet fashion designers continue pumping out bag after bag and ignoring the need for deep pockets. It’s a smart marketing strategy for sure- more money is raked in as more people continue to buy purses for both aesthetic and utilitarian reasons. It’s understandable that designers wouldn’t want to change this and there’s no reason to discontinue the production of purses, which serve as a cute accessory and available resource to shove things into when your hands are better off empty. But would the addition of deeper pockets really leave the bag industry turning its pockets inside out for spare change? No! People will always be buying bags to hold their items and spice up their outfits, leaving no reason for women’s pockets to be as shallow as they are.

Another thing barring women’s clothing from having real pockets is the silhouette. Bulky pockets aren’t exactly the most flattering on the figure, and one way the fashion industry has chosen to avoid this is to simply cut them out. Leggings for example would look oddly bulky around the thighs and hips if they had pockets incorporated into them and would take away from their skin-tight fashion. Some athleisure pieces do actually include slim pockets along the outer thigh. For example, tennis skirts and some yoga pants feature side pockets where one can put their phone while working out or put an extra tennis ball while practicing. However, this still fails to account for anything other than those select pieces and it’s a little hard to wear a tennis skirt in single-digit weather.

A good middle ground could be cargo pants: sturdy pants fit for cooler temperatures that have deep and usable pockets. The only problem is that sometimes the pockets are only meant for decorative purposes and don’t actually open. Also, not everyone wants to wear a pair of cargo pants every single day or on every outing in which they’d need to carry only a few things that don’t require a bag. It’d be a lot more convenient to just have several bottoms of varying styles that include pockets with real function.

Pants aren’t the only article of clothing that should have pockets, either- skirts, shorts and dresses should also have pockets sewn into the sides. When deciding between wearing a skirt or pants I never feel like continuously having to take my phone in and out of my backpack, so I often choose pants just for the sake of having a back pocket to slip my phone into. This also fails to account for when I sit down and then have to again take my phone out of my back pocket and drop it into my bag because my front pockets are either essentially nonexistent or barely an inch deep. Just give us real pockets!