Originally Posted by
kiki1982
The argument that people are distracted by what the other is wearing, to me, is ridiculous. It would also apply to normal people, and that is clearly not the case.
About age: a twelve-year-old is practically a child. I agree that they need guidance, I disagree that that guidance needs to be general and always the same. Even a twelve-year-old can distinguish between a necessary rule and an unnecessary one. I'd say the worst age is 15 (with girls), however, if you treat them fairly, they are fair back. They can think, you know. We had an issue once, when we were fifteen, with a poster tha had been ripped off the wall because it was 'too sexual'. We didn't think it was justified, as we didn't think so as it was a lovely advert of Levis (I seem to remember) with a woman, topless, with a jeans on, photographed from the back. Nothing to be seen and there were no boys in my year so no-one to be distracted by it. As what was on there, would have been what we had ourselves. On top of that, it had been ripped off, so the corners were torn off. We got our right to put it up in the end and the person who had ripped it, was told to rip more carefully next ime because that it was not the policy of the school to destroy people's property. I support that. We had never problems with rules. Ther was no mass-detention, because we were treated with reason. If teachers were destracted with the picture, they were allowed to put something in front of it. That was for us just fine. We didn't want to terrorise the teacher, we just wanted it up in the class because we liked it. We found it uchworse that the corners were ripped off than that the picture (maybe) had to go.
Applying your argument, all students should walk around in safety-goggles and a white jacket for the one possible chemistry class. We do not require that of students, so there is also no need to ban people from having dangly earrings 'because it might harm them during sports class'. It is just not justified to be always forbidden. I agree that they are dangerous in sports, but that is about it. Maybe also in chemistry if experiments with fire are being done, but then you also consequently need to prohibit synthetic clothing (melting on the skin), long hair, etc. How hard can it be to have them stuck somewhere or have them taken out? How hard can it be to ask students to put their hair in a safety cap or otherwise in a braid or pony tail... For the time being. I am sure they will not object to it. Rugby players do it, so it cannot be hard.
I wanted to show that the penal code is a bad argument, because the penal code does not punish or forbid anything that is unnecessary. Forbidding dangly earrings during French class is ridiculous, because there is no argument as there is no danger. Of course car crime is committed by the small minority, and? Does that mean that everyone needs to be punished for it? What does it have to do with for example dangly earrings. I am punished and cannot wear them because they might be dangerous for about two hours a week? With regard to the penal code, it would be the equivalent of putting everyone in jail in case someone commits a crime. That is ridiculous.
I come from Belgium where there are rules, but still in a fair way. The problem in the UK is that there is too much of 'general rules' to prevent evil that work paralysing. One is not allowed to take pictures of children in case one is a paedophile (no joke, I encountered this in Manchester), one is not allowed to take pictures of London buildings without being asked what one is doing in case one is a terrorist, one is not allowed to enter Downing street in case of the same, one is not allowed to get on a plain without being put virtually naked on a screen in case one is a terrorist, one is not allowed to have too hot water for tea because one might burn oneself. So one is not allowed various things in school, for the whole day becasue one might harm oneself for that one hour??? It is too much. When are they going to prohibit staircases? The children might fall off, potentially die. Sports classes, too dangerous (people might break their legs, twist their ankles). Play-grounds, too dangerous. Paved places where children can play, too dangerous, if thy fal over they might hurt their knee.
Those rules are not justified. One needs to trust, within boundaries, a child's judgment. Otherwise they end up stupid and empty-headed.
You talked about your school where hair was supposed to be short or worn up. Kasie agreed with it being short with the argument of head lice. I was not the one who started that.
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