High school forces girl to wear shame suit for dress code violation

[SpunkyTWS]

I was at Overton from 85-89. Lucky you getting to go to Hume Fogg.

[cleveremi]

At my high school in the late 80s the rule was “no words on shirts” unless it was a that school’s branded shirt. If you wore a shirt with words, you had to turn it inside out.

[benjaminterry]

Can you imagine a dress code that could apply to girls that isn’t misogynistic and “slut shaming”, or is it only possible to have dress codes that apply to boys (and not be troubling in their implications)? Could you describe what form it would take? According to your statements, a dress code that applies equally to both genders does not qualify, but you’ve not offered any alternative.

[noahdjango]

eh, I never was very academic-minded, but it was a great school. If I’d gone to Pearl Cohn, I probably could’ve slept through all my classes and still 4.0’d, and I’d probably have a career in something I liked right after school.

but

I’m pretty sure I would’ve gotten beat up a lot.

[Ignatius]

@miasm

Is it reasonable to fake a coughing fit and ask to go home? Every time someone starts talking to you; “Bleaueargh-ough-coughcough!!!”

“Sorry, allergic to petty tyrants. *coughassholescough* Have to see my doctor immediately.”

@SpunkyTWS

In my experience such a protest will only occur if the girl is popular and well-liked by most of the students.

From what I’ve seen in years of watching TV and movies, I believe just about no one is popular in their first three days at a new school.

If I was in Florida and this happened to be one of the schools with a giant statue of an old white guy, I would totally give the statue a concrete skirt that goes above the knee. Since a popular uprising seems unlikely.

Which brings up another point, really. Given that she’s probably not already popular, getting punished this way is likely to turn her into a pariah and thus constitutes a form of harassment. Which is to say the school itself is guilty of harassment and bullying. Precisely how you put an institution on trial for a criminal offense, I’m not sure.

Though as a Discordian, I’d sure like to see it. A few dozen times at least.

@go_robot_go

It’s interesting that half of the outrage here seems to be over the dress code in general. That’s fair, but I can’t imagine that the dress code isn’t published. If this girl’s parents were doing their job, they’d either be ensuring that their daughter is dressed to conform to the code, or lobbying the school to change it if they disagree with it (or both).

There are a number of reasons I’m not a parent (and perhaps this is one of them) but I can very easily imagine why a responsible parent might not read every single piece of paper their child’s school sends home.

I use filters on my email to put things not directed specifically to me somewhere I don’t have to look at them and the vast majority of my snail mail ends up either straight in the bin or in the bin after a brief visit with the shredder. If I read every single thing anyone tried to obligate me to read, I’d get nothing else done and have very little enjoyment left in life.

Try reading everything for a week.

But back to the parents here … if they had no reason to suspect that the school dress code had anything their well-behaved daughter was likely to violate, I can’t see why it should be on them. As opposed to being on the school for having something that “well-behaved children” are likely to inadvertently violate.

@daneel

What the actual fuck? Corporal punishment at school is still a thing? And it’s ‘opt-out’?

I noticed that too. Ridiculously common in the south. If I had a kid and someone beat them, I’d be down at wherever you do such things demanding that assault charges be filed, laws and school policies be damned.

This goes back to something I said earlier in this post … if I didn’t know this was common, I wouldn’t expect to need to check every single piece of paper the school sends me. Is it then my fault if the school beats my hypothetical child? I would continue to argue no. The onus is on them to make special announcement of the things they do that reasonably well-informed people wouldn’t suspect of them.

@noahdjango

The third time, my buddy was like “why do you keep doing the write-offs? take the licks, it’s over in a few seconds and the sting goes away after a minute or two.” and he was right, it was the preferable option, by far. so… yay for corporal punishment?

Maybe it’s a reaction to my abusive upbringing, but I don’t feel physical violence against kids is ever ok even if it is somehow preferable to the kids to “writing lines.”

[marc45]

So would a student get a “dress code violation” for wearing the outfit of shame and what would be the punishment?
(my head is spinning)

[noahdjango]

I think the right to choose is key. but in retrospect, it is a totally weird thing.

[Jardine]

@go_robot_go

I recall my high school having some similar solution for dress code violations, though one that was far more neutral and less blatantly shaming. A gray t-shirt and sweatpants, IIRC.

My high school would loan the offender clothes with the school logo on them. The same ones you could buy to show school spirit or whatever. The dress code there was much more concerned with swearing and such on shirts than revealing too much skin. What I was always curious about is what would have happened if I violated the dress code. I’m tall and have a long back. Even a 2XL t-shirt would have been a borderline belly shirt and I think they only went up to XL.

[Ignatius]

I suspect weighing the fact that the authority figure probably liked spanking kids meant the fact that they had a choice meant the spankings couldn’t be particularly hard. That said, even if the spankings were mild, putting kids in the position of choosing between the two is its own kind of fucked up and put additional stress on you as a kid before your friend let you know the spankings were a joke.

[daneel]

[geargab]

In 4th Grade (1976) my teacher would make boys who picked on girls wear pig-tales. They were made from the hair of a classmate who cut off her long locks by weaving them into pig-tales and then cutting them off. They were then attached to clothes pins and pinned either to the boys shirt collar or hair.

[adonai]

So, uh, when did ‘detention’ go out of fashion for students breaking rules*?

*rules may be ridiculous & stupid, but then, the punishments seem to be as well.

[Woodchuck45]

The article states there are three options given to students in the case of dress code violations:

1. In-school suspension
2. relative brings clothes
3. the student wears the school’s clothes

Any of the three takes care of the dress code violation.

[Jardine]

When do you have detention? At the end of the day? For my high school, the buses left about 10 minutes after the last period ended. Google maps tells me that walking home would’ve taken about 3 hours.

[catgrin]

@Ignatius

Which is to say the school itself is guilty of harassment and bullying.

What’s really funny about that (and I don’t mean “ha ha”) is that Oakleaf High School (or at least Clay County School Board) has a non-discrimination policy. I found it while earlier hunting down the dress code. They even expand on their policy at this location. Unfortunately, they seem more worried about HR than their students. There is no separate bullying policy listed for the school or the district (at least not one I could find).

About the dress code itself - it’s contained within the student handbook, and the punishment clothing is described there (including charges for non-return). I linked to it earlier. Here it is again. While parents will overlook a lot of paperwork, typically student handbooks do get read by new students and their parents. They include important dates and school policies.

A lot of schools have a “below the fingertips” rule for skirts. Miranda’s skirt is just above the knee, but longer than her arms. The dress code says:

• Skirt length should be to the knee or below (including slits)

She may have believed (as I probably would have) that a skirt at the top of the knee, but longer than outstretched fingers, met the “to the knee” instruction.

I was really relieved that @daneel noticed “corporal punishment” (CP) was included in the list of possible punishments. I wanted to make sure people realized this is a school that’s taking their discipline seriously (read “aggressively?”). About CP, this article (from March 2014) gives a fairly good overview of just how prevalent it is - even today. 19 states still allow CP in their public schools.

[catgrin]

@Woodchuck45

Any of the three takes care of the dress code violation.

The article says that’s what the school claimed they offered as options. Miranda says she was only offered the alternate clothing, and the student handbook - that I’ve provided two links to in this thread - say only one punishment is listed for Dress Code Violations. That punishment is listed separately from other punishments - including detention and all-day work detention.

[teapot]

Florida, yet again living up to it’s name of America’s Wang.

[anon37332521]

I know the high school I went to had a similar rule about swear words, but there was a lot of leeway around many other things. Wearing a t-shirt like this and your girlfriend’s striped tights raised some eyebrows, but not much beyond that.

Seems that should have been more “distracting” than showing a little kneecap but we apparently all got an education anyway.

[Ignatius]

@catgrin

About the dress code itself - it’s contained within the student handbook, and the punishment clothing is described there (including charges for non-return). I linked to it earlier. Here it is again.

Yep, I saw you link it a number of times. It doesn’t have an effect on the substance of my argument particularly given that the Scarlet A treatment is in a separate section that isn’t headlined anything remarkable. In journalism, it’s referred to as burying the lede.

In normal documentation, you could call it fine print if you wanted. I go back to my previous argument: If they’re going to have something that a reasonably well-informed person wouldn’t expect, it’s incumbent on them to make their target audience aware that they’re doing something absurd/egregious.

The fact that they take their punishment very seriously is not, in my mind, a sufficient excuse for the policy or its enforcement levels.

[teapot]

People overdo it ridiculously here, but shorts are a necessity in summer. Shorts and boat shoes - I’m right with you on that one. Actually just boat shoes in general.