I still think this is a silly rule. I am not sure whether this is a public or private institution, but if it is public I would definitely hope that they would do anything to hinder such sexist stereotype as do exist in society. Especially pre-kindergarten, which obviously is much more about developing a good social backing and an open mind than learning hard facts about any subject, should not try to enforce the underlying sexism of such a rule in the first place, and I find it somewhat right that the parents refuse to abide by this rule as it should be discussed and best abolished. I would hope though that the stubborness on either side does not affect the kid in future years. It would be rather tragic if his life was negatively impacted by something that happened to him when he was 4, no matter which side you are on.
Originally posted by King Kandy
Yeah, except now they have to provide for the foster children which will counteract the whole thing.
No, I was right in what I said from the very beginning.
Foster parents get paid by the state to provide their care. It's not much, but it is a little something to help. On top of that, there are tax breaks for the dependents.
And, the premise for a middle-class family assumes that they could afford a little bit extra, but not enough to send their child off to college.
A poor person would not have that little extra, would have less luxuries, and have meager dwellings.
In other words, you should learn to trust me. evillaugh
On Ushgarak's comments:
Doesn't the distraction lie with the judgmental teachers/school staff, and not the children, themselves? And, how does this teach our children to cope with the real world where variations from what children assume is the "norm" occur in every place, all over the world?
Isn't it illogical, from a teaching perspective, to foster the idea of homogeneity instead diversity? That does nothing to prepare the nascent social minds of the children for the real world where they WILL have to work with a man that dresses and looks like a woman, a woman that walks acts and talks like a man, etc. As a teacher, you do know that young children (assuming their parents haven't gotten to them too severely with bigotry) are much more accepting than adults? Children are mostly socially innocent. There's been plenty of studies done on the sociological interaction and development of children. The idea that it is distracting for the children is borderline silly and somewhat ignorant.
This type of conformance to some arbitrary and even religiously originating idea of gender appearance is one of social detriment. At that young and formidable age, they SHOULD be exposed to and taught as much about differences in both appearance and general culture. That would better prepare them to function in society, as they get older and gain more social responsibility.
The parents and the child are not the problem, the board of eduction, teachers, and school staff are the problem. When did we lose sight of actually 'teaching" and focused too much on illogical and actually socially detrimental sets of rules? Why fly in the face of and reject the idea teaching our children (in this particular facet, of course)?
Now that I said that, I may have opened a can of worms: where do you draw that line? Obviously, not sex or sexual acts, violence, etc. etc. You can be who are you are and where you come from, in a public school, as long as it doesn't physically harm others. (There are other lines such as mental harm, i.e. jumping out of corners and scaring the other children.)
Re: Boy suspended for long hair
Originally posted by Ushgarak
Sorry, Robtard, but the answer to that is- yes it does (or at least, yes it can). Long hair on a girl does not cause the distraction that long hair on a boy does, because it is less usual on a boy. The thinking behind the rule is to prevent the distracton caused by people continually mocking or discussing unusual appearance. Agree or disagree, there is a logic there- kids DEFINITELY do such things- and there are many times that classes have been disrupted in this way. Hence, a school has a right to make rules to try to prevent such disruption. If any of you think this rule makes no sense because it does not apply to girls as well as boys, [b]you are simply wrong. Long experience speaks to the contrary.I am with the "they knew the rules; stick to them" crowd here. You can petition to have rules changed but it is not appropriate to simply break them, and if you think a rule about hair length is worth getting into such a tizz about then you are simply a fool. I actually have a general contempt for those convinced that this is some sort of moral 'fight the nazi power' issue. [/B]
Originally posted by inimalist
once again showing the most important lesson of institutional education: Follow rules that don't make sense or we will ruin your future.
Originally posted by Ushgarak
Well, thanks for the mature post full of good points. Really put me in my place, that has. Especially your "I know of many people who are older than you" bit. That was really classy. Also your attempt to argue that relative experience on my part has anything to do with it, when this is obviously a cultural norm. Like I say, if you don't think that boys having long hair in school are more likely to draw attention than girls, then you are such so wrong it's not even worth arguing with you, and I couldn't give a damn whether you think that is good enough for you or not- you may as well be arguing that the moon is made of cheese.
Argumentum ad Verecundiam. Please acknowledge my points rather than you're own brand of mocking. I wasn't trying to put you 'in your place' or any other such things. If you're going to bring something up (ie. your experience), you're using it in an argument and it's fair game to dissect it and ultimately discard it.
(And to re-iterate- that's not to say I even think the law is a good idea. But there is a reasoning behind it, and in a debate like this there must be a certain level of maturity in recognising all the issues involved.)
OK, so you think the law is a silly idea, then? Recognizing the issues involved is one thing, but understanding them is a completely different matter. It's understandable as to why the rules are in place, but let's face it: These rules are so stale that it's questionable if we should even keep them. In this day and age diversity is a growing factor at an astronomical rate -- are we really going to hinder someone just because of a silly rule that causes more problems? Public school staff (not the very best of possible staff) can be very rude and downright beligerent about rule-enforcing -- that's probably the worst case scenario and it's not rare for it to happen. I'd even hazard to say that it's the staff who will cause the most problems and not other children.
As for thinking before posting, I am serious. Your last post was basically a lie, implying I had not given any support to my argument when in fact I had. If you keep posting like that it eventually becomes trolling or flaming... so don't post like that. [/B]
I mean if we're going to go back to how things should be, then we'd realize that hair is meant to grow (in most cases), in that sense it's 'right' to keep long hair. It's basically the same silly argument that the staff and several posters on here are making -- silly rules are just hindering education. I can clearly see why dress codes are enforced, but let's face it -- most of these staff probably don't even question as to why there's a dress code, they just enforce it because they have to and because they like being dicks.
Several posters on here already stated why the actual rule is more disruptive rather than conducive to a learning environment. Whether one chooses to follow the rules simply because they're rules and they should be followed is pretty retarded to say the least. "WELL, WE HAVE RULES SO WE SHUD FOLLOW DEM". The rhetoric is actually very similar to what (dare I say it) an extreme racist would say. They would argue that it's wrong to be a different color and that rules should be enforced to keep our schools clean and white; different = bad.
I can appreciate how our society is generally going against these practices which will foster diversity, but it's unfortunate that some will disagree just because of how they think things should be (have been, and should be left untouched by the occasional anomaly).
Originally posted by One Free Man
I call that the "RN" tactic because I attribute it to your success as a genius.
Silliness. If every argument could be torn down simply because of a grammatical issue, then more than half of the posters here would be without arguments.
Ushgarak himself made a typo in his initial post, but that didn't discredit his arguments or his posts.
Silly, silly games. The only reasons I pointed out an error in one of your posts was because you were insulting me (ad hominem) and I couldn't figure out what is was you were trying to convey -- the whole sentence seemed lopsided. The post I made with the typo was pretty impromptu, at that. I made it right after I woke up with a major hangover while getting dressed for work.
To stay on the actual subject of the thread: Silly rules are silly. I think silly is my word of the day!!! =D
Originally posted by leonheartmm
the purpose of schools is brainwashing and assimilation + giving you the necessary skills to be a tool of the power centres. THOUGHT or KNOWLEDGE was never the point of the educational system.i was EXPELLED for having hair to my chin in o levels.
You should have tried for higher level classes or mabye just moved out of Pakistan.