British school bans short skirts
June 23rd 2010 13:13
VYOOS EDITORIAL
A British school has banned teenage girls from wearing skirts.
St Aidan's Church of England High School in Harrogate, North Yorkshire, has decreed that all girls aged 15 and younger must from now on wear trousers.
The reason given by the school is that it wishes to save the girls from attracting unwanted attention. “Very young children, and even more disturbingly, special needs children are clearly wholly unaware of the signals they are giving out,'' it said in a statement
We wish to inform St Aidan’s School that the attention is not unwanted. It is entirely wanted. We would also like to notify St Aidans that becoming aware of the signals sent out by our actions is a crucial part of growing up.
Short skirts were shocking in the early 1960s. They have been part of the fashionscape ever since. That one group of teachers in a small town in Yorkshire should decide to impose a minority, blinkered view and say short skirts are unacceptable is to fly in the face of 50 years of conventional western acceptance.
More important, however, is finding the balance between tolerance and guidance in dealing with teenagers.
The school is saying it doesn’t like the decisions its teenagers are making. It is missing the point that all decisions have repercussions, and we all learn from those repercussions. It’s a fundamental of life in a community. That process is more important for teenagers than any other age group. They stand on the threshold of adulthood, and it is crucial that they be given the freedom, within the relative safety of their home and school environments, to interact with the world and, thereby, learn what works and what doesn’t.
Schools are for learning. If teenagers can not learn there how to think for themselves, they will have to learn later in a less-forgiving environment.
news.com.au
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Comment by Journeywoman
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While some girls would be wearing little skirts for attention, certainly, others just wear them because they're fashionable and/or they like how the skirts look to them. I tend to believe that most women don't dress for men, and as such, young teenage girls don't even consider that what they're wearing might be sending "objectify me!" signals to male onlookers. I know I never did; in fact I was largely oblivious to male attention as a teenager because it was irrelevant to me.
It's a tough issue though as it's taking away liberties in the name of protection. But then, schools over here have been doing that forever with uniform requirements, and we all just accepted it for what it was. Come to think of it, I thought they wore school uniforms in England too...?
Comment by Chris Champion
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I note, though, that this is the only school taking such action. That's why it made the news. That places them on the far right, so to speak, of dress dictators.