On Monday’s 6 PM news and then later on the 10 o’clock news,
a suburb of Dallas came out with a new dress code for their school district. The new changes were:
- No hoodies (on shirts, pullovers, sweaters, sweatshirts, jackets, heavy coats, etc.)
- No dresses, skirts or skorts past the 4th grade
Their explanation? To enhance safety.
To enhance safety? Whaaat?!! Is someone trying to pull the wool hoodie over my eyes in the middle of a hot Texas summer?
Cuz I don’t get it. Apparently, a lot of the school district’s parents don’t get it either and they don’t like it. They’re protesting.
It doesn’t affect me, my loved ones or anyone else I know, so I don’t have any skin in this one way or the other. Still, I’m trying to make sense out of this because it just sounds…odd. It doesn’t pass the sniff test for me. It smells funky bordering on rotten…and now I’d like to know what’s really going on.
Odd changes in anything tend to give me a reason to pause. While I’m not paranoid, I’m also no one’s fool. Well, except when I’m fooled. It happens. Not often, but on occasion. That’s besides the point. Let’s just say I have a healthy dose of skepticism.
Of course, maybe these new dress restrictions really do enhance safety in a way that I’ve never thought about before. Or maybe this new dress code has been enacted for reasons the school district doesn’t really want to admit to, so they’re using “enhanced safety” as a way to get around doing something that they know wouldn’t fly otherwise.
It’s a head scratcher for sure.
Can y’all enlighten me how hoodies and dresses, skorts and skirts pose any kind of safety issue? If you don’t think this is the real reason for these new changes, what do you think the real reason may be? I think weird stuff like this probably happens all over the place…not just in a school district in Texas.
Thoughts?
I hope you and yours have a safe and wonderful 4th of July weekend!
TTFN,
Mona
PS: Almost forgot music! Sorry, y’all!
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I’m left where you are … or, at least, I’m where I imagine anyone scratching their heads might be … hoodies being perceived as an undesirable minority-embraced cultural garment associated with hiding weapons (yes, I KNOW, but) and the dresses/skirts/skorts thing being an enshrinement of a deeply held cultural belief, in the deep recesses of the brains of school board members, in that “well, what was she wearing at the time?” thing. I’m kind of stuck on, “Wait, y’all said that out loud?”
“Safety.” Yes, girl, this one reeks. I can smell it all the way up here.
Lille,
What you said sounds much more plausible than the reasons presented. Thanks for your thoughts. The only follow up question I have is: you can hide a weapon in a hoodie? How? and Why? Mona
I’m scratching my head as well.
Although, I can ALMOST see why hoodies would be an issue…they pretty much can cover most of your face which makes it hard to identify friend or foe. Or on a camera later if that person is a foe.
But WTH with skirts, dresses, skorts? Are we trying to CONTROL boys’s emotions when they see a girl in a skirt?
Weird.
Hey Suz,
I wonder what the drill team and the cheerleaders are going to wear this year? LOL. Mona
The no-hoods-skirts-dresses-skorts rule makes no sense to me. One at a time:
Hoods/hoodies — I LIKE a hood on a jacket. If it rains unexpectedly I have a head covering right there. I can see requesting that kids not wear them up indoors (you can hide your face more easily in them — but no one cared about not being able to see faces when face masks were all the rage) but I don’t see how even that is a safety issue. What is a kid going to do – hide a gun in a hood?
Skirts/dresses — are we that far down the dark/inappropriate path that we have kids exposing themselves and/or reaching to touch others’ bodies in places that are private? We used to deal with that sort of thing by calling out the deviant, not by forcing the rest of the kids to change their own norms on account of the deviant. I can see this “safety concern” in a juvie facility where all things deviant are expected, but not in public school. Or is anything-goes okay — except when the anything is what we all thought was normal five minutes ago?
And presumably shorts are okay? So what exactly can be the functional difference between a skort and a pair of shorts? That one seems to me to be trying to erase femininity. Maybe a girl wants to look like a girl — how is this different from a girl wanting to not look like a girl and why is the one allowed and not the other? This policy veers toward unisex (which probably isn’t even a word anymore) or other-sex (hey, maybe you want to consider being something other than you are) — let’s make it easier to be both/fluid/unsure, let’s muddle the biological differences by making it harder for you to be seen for what you are based on your clothes. Call it safety so no one can argue against it and then they push their agenda further and further. I find it sick and sad and scary.
Patricia,
I like a hoodie too! As to everything else, you may be on to something. It’s all too much for me, and I’m still scratching my head. Mona
Mona ,
I guess I’m the only one on here that agrees with the new rules.
Hoodies can hide some ones face for starters. There’s nothing wrong with a hoodie. It’s a shame that it’s a bad thing. The world we live in now is not the 50’s and 60’s I grew up in. Criminals now wear hoodies big time.
As for no skirts … I would say it may keep a girl a little safer. Do I have to explain?
I could go on and on but do I have too?
I am shocked that you don’t get it .
Love you 😘
jp
Anonymous,
No judgments here. I’m not sure that the clothes make the criminal, but I could be wrong. I guess I don’t know enough criminals. Thanks for your thoughts. 🙂 Mona
Mona, I think it’s an unfortunate thing but I do believe hoodies are now often associated with crime by a lot of folks. That’s just the way things have gone in recent years for that garment.
Bruce,
So it would seem. I’m not giving mine up, though! Mona
That story raised enough eyebrows that I heard them talking about it on the local radio just yesterday. My thoughts are that a) they want to mandate a school uniform but don’t think that would fly (which honestly, would fly better than this mess) or b) something happened – that they somehow were able to keep quiet (how, in this day and age, I don’t know) and this is the knee jerk reaction to whatever that situation was.
A friend of mine’s son absolutely REFUSED to wear basketball shorts to school when he was in elementary/middle school – even though that’s what all the boys were wearing at the time, because he was afraid he’d get “pantsed” – which I guess was a real thing. If I were to go back in time, I bet eventually, those basketball shorts got banned.
Gigi,
It does raise a ton of questions.
When I was in school, (small town), we didn’t have a dress code that I can remember. Most of us just wore jeans and decent shirts. The football players wore suits on Fridays and the cheerleaders and drill team wore their uniforms. Back then (boy, I sound old), if Coach Page didn’t like something you were wearing or the way you were wearing something, he’d tell you to your face as he walked up and down the halls…and you’d better do something about it pdq or face the paddle. Didn’t much agree with most of what Coach Page stood for, but today, so much doesn’t feel straightforward. I don’t like that much either. So, you’re hearing about a small school district in Texas in North Carolina? Or is there something similar happening in North Carolina? Thanks for your input! Mona
Yep, I heard about it in North Carolina – granted from a syndicated show; but the show is based in NC. When I was in middle school, certain shoes (for girls) had to be banned (what were those shoes that were wedges but had holes in the middle of the wedge? Remember those? Who’s showing her age now?) because girls kept falling down the stairs while wearing them. That’s why I think something occurred that caused this particular “dress code.”
I don’t remember the wedges you’re talking about, but I used to have a pair of Candies! Did you have a pair? I wonder what I did with those? Mona
This takes me back to when my high school would have “Opposite Day” and we had a few guys who came in dresses which caused shock and horror among the principals who made those guys go straight–no pun intended–home and put on regular clothes. The school dress code also expressly forbade shorts but there were a few days in the early fall and late spring when we were allowed to wear shorts. It was the school’s version of casual day. Around that same time I heard a comedian on TV talk about picking up his kids at middle school and how disturbed he was that he couldn’t tell the boys and girls apart and to make it worse the kids were wearing shirts that said “Guess”.
Even then I found it kind of creepy that a grown man was so interested in telling early teen boys and girls apart, and even then the song “Lola” by The Kinks had been out for so long that Weird Al had just released his parody, “Yoda”.
I have no idea where I’m going with any of this except that I think the hoodies are in there just to provide cover–no pun intended.
So you think school officials might be trying to keep LGBTQ students from wearing traditionally feminine clothing…that they’re trying to head them off at the pass, so they don’t have to deal with gender identity issues regarding clothing? Then throwing hoodies into the mix as a red herring, so to speak? Could be. Makes sense as a real reason to me. Thanks for your input, Chris! Mona
Sounds like more school rules bullshit. They never have made sense and never will
Sarah,
The hell you say! Personally, I think they have their reasons. In this day and age, they just can’t admit to what they’re trying to do; otherwise, they’d get dinged for discrimination. I have no way to prove that, but that’s what I think, my friend! I hope you have a wonderful 4th of July! BTW, how are your tomatoes this year? Mona
First off, just to say “hi” and I found you via LA.
I wondered if the no skirt rule is to do with preventing the taking of pictures or “up-skirting” as it’s referred to in the UK. Over here, it’s a practice most commonly found among adult males, with a sub-culture of them taking “up skirt” pictures of school girls. I don’t know if this phenomena has crossed the Atlantic, but that could be a contributory factor.
Hey Debs,
Welcome to Wayward Sparkles! I love LA’s blog. She always has content that’s thought-provoking.
Upskirting, huh? You may be right. That may be part or all of the reason for this school board’s decision. Because it’s a very conservative and small school district, though, my thoughts are they don’t want to have to deal with increasing gender identity issues, which has become a hot button issue in the last few years. Most importantly, my guess is that they don’t want to have to deal with biological males wearing skirts, skorts or dresses to school, but they really can’t admit to that or else they’d have to deal with discrimination lawsuits. Of course, I could be wrong.
Anyway, I’m glad you found my blog and I look forward to finding yours as well! Have a great week ahead! 🙂 Mona
I don’t believe in dress codes. Period.
LA,
It’s probably good that you don’t have to go to school in 2022 in Texas. You’d be in so much trouble, you rebel rouser, you! Mona
This was a really interesting question to bring up and discuss here. I’m with Suz, as I think w/hoodies especially when you think of cameras placed where they may catch a crime of some sort, they can cover so much of a person’s face that they are near impossible to identify later. As far as the skorts and dresses crap, that’s just sexism. Like the girls should “best cover up because we can’t possibly expect those boys to keep their cool” kind of stuff.
Hey Rhonda,
Still not giving up my hoodies. Baseball caps and other types of hats/head coverings can cover faces as well. Don’t see those being banned. Still think this is more about trying to stop biological males from wearing dresses, skorts and skirts. Still want to see how the cheerleaders and drill team are supposed to get around this new turn of events. LOL. Mona