What is a modest swimsuit? 
What does a modest swimsuit have to cover to be called a modest swimsuit?
The answer differs depending on your community's definitions of modesty for women's dress, and where you swim.Orthodox Jewish women
will generally only go swimming at a "separate" beach or pool which provides hours for "women only" swimming. When going on a family outing to a beach or other bathing site, they will enter the water in their clothes rather than transgress their standards of modesty by wearing a bathing suit in front of men, even the men in their own family.Even at "women's only" pools and beaches, orthodox women will generally wear a shirt over their swimsuit for more coverage, although the according to Torah law there is no requirement for women to dress modestly in front of other women. There is no separate standard of modesty for Jewish swimsuits that differs from everyday clothing (see our ).
So why do we need a modest swimsuit? Because we are emotionally attached to our modesty! And the modest swimsuit is truly much more attractive than a skimpy flesh (and flab) revealing swimsuit.
Also, we want to educate our daughters to be sensitive to modesty. If they uncover themselves by wearing a skimpy swimsuit in public, or see their mothers exposed in public, even in a separate swimming situation, they will gain a level of comfort with immodest dress that they will not acquire if their modesty and their mother's modesty is carefully guarded.