In my opinion, school uniforms are TOTALLY wrong. They are mostly ugly, impractical, outdated, discriminating, freedom-robbing, outrageously expensive, a tool for intimidation and oppression and totally unnecessary.
Since school has restarted nearly two weeks ago, you see them everywhere again and it is just unbelievable how ugly most of them are. The colours, the cut, the “worn-outness” are turning them in the ugliest possible clothing for kids. It turns them to sheep in a herd instead of giving them the opportunity to become young individuals. The uniform is used to oppress them and to punish them if they don’t have the right one and it is also used for one-upmanship where some school insist on crests on their tops because they feel they are better than others. And I just can’t believe that in the 21st century, girls in Ireland are still FORCED to wear skirts. How outdated is that?
This rant all started when I saw a “my child has started school again” picture on Facebook that was posted by a friend recently, her daughter was shown in her new school uniform and it must have been the worst I ever saw. The poor little girl even had to wear a totally unnecessary tie that was to 80% covered by the ugliest “dress”-thing you could imagine. It really makes you wonder how twisted the people must be that decide how a school uniform has to look like and what idiocy made them to add a tie even for girls.
Hey, nobody wants to wear ties, not even the grown ups and they do it less and less, so why do we have to force our six year olds to wear them? And really, would you wear an excrement coloured skirt? Well, if you wouldn’t why do we make our kids to to it?
Where I grew up, uniforms didn’t exist. So we had an opportunity to be different, there were some goths in my school and some really well dressed kids and anything in between. We all had a uniform, but it was our own uniform. Not one prescribed by the school management or the principal and we used this uniform to express our individuality.
I would love a country full of self-reliant, independently thinking, individuals, not full of sheep that need a leader to follow him/her, that have ever learned to oblige all the time, to surrender their individuality and to be dismissive,
Does the school-uniform-induced brain washing support more the first or second set of characteristics?
But now comes the kicker: Maybe times have changed so dramatically, that individualism isn’t even possible anymore. Because the (very valid!!) argument of supporters of school uniforms is that the uniform takes the pressure off kids’ back to compete with each other on clothing. Maybe kids NEED uniforms, which is why they all would want to wear the same clothes from certain clothes labels. Maybe today’s generation just can’t handle individuality anymore?
But then, “No School Uniform” still works in other countries! So is this lack of individuality maybe an Irish problem?
I can’t answer that question and still find the need of school uniforms odd! ….but I can also see that they can make sense in certain contexts.
