Surely there are more important things that hair colour ?

[Serial_Apologist]

I can well understand that ...

Presumably you would prefer a Marxist system of order?

Marxism isn't a system of order. But you knew that, of course...

[P. G. Tipps]

As I mentioned previously, in Germany school uniforms are basically unknown, and the same is true of much of Europe, as well as most of the USA. It seems to me to be largely a British obsession, leaving aside societies like Japan whose institutional pressure towards conformity is presumably not thought of as worth emulating. Children at primary school age really don't much care about fashion anyway. (Unless their parents are obsessed with it I suppose.) Mind you Germany is also less unequal than the UK.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4753623.stm

[Serial_Apologist]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4753623.stm

As Frank Zappa responded to an indecipherable heckler, "Don't kid yourself - everyone here's wearing a uniform".

[ahinton]

I'm somewhat in 2 minds about compulsory school uniforms. Were the schools to provide them free (i.e. paid for by the taxpayer, ahinton) this would avoid the expense issue

Yes, I know what that means and indeed indicated as much when I referred to it above; what it wouln't avoid is the very real risk of understandably vociferous and widespread taxpayer complaints about misappropriation of their contributions to the education budget in allocating them to the purchase, supply (and perhaps maintenance and periodic replacement) of millions of garments instead of towards teachers, teacher training, school buildings, books, other teaching aids and materials and services directly connected with education.

The alternative, as of now, after all, is throwing them into the melting pot of fashion, which is all about appearance and anything BUT encouraging of individuality.

Quite.

[ahinton]

Daydreaming about an imaginary world is all very well but we still find ourselves having to deal with the one that actually exists?

So you would favour the forcing of school attendees to wear uniforms above encouraging the development of their individual imaginations, then? Who (besides you) said anything about "daydreaming"? Are you content with maintaining the status quo at all costs and is that what you mean by finding ourselves "having to deal with the (world) that actaully exists". I hope that you would have plentiful supplies of aspic; you'd need them to achieve what you appear to advocate!

That's what I keep discovering, anyway ...

Does that mean that you do so every time you try to exercise your imagination?

[ahinton]

When there are so many genuinely important and urgent things needing disciplined knowledgeable people to be done, one can understand why intelligent young people rebel against pointlessness, unless by that stage one had already been brainwashed into blind submissive obedience.

Indeed. Just one or two people here seem, however, to express the view that the wearing of school uniform is not "pointless" and, as I observed earlier, everyone will agree on this.

Another aspect of this which seems to be ignored by those who favour school uniforms regardless of anyone else's views on them is that of who decides what that school uniform should be and why? - and for how long will it be the school uniform of the day. How inconvenient and expensive will it be when someone in authority over such matters decides that the uniform in this school or that must be changed for a different one?

[teamsaint]

I think I'd acquire automatic self-discipline in order to practise something I loved doing and to receive regular royalty payments through the post as well!!

Real self-discipline involves doing things you don't particularly want to do and you might even think are silly at times, in a compromise pact with the rest of society.

If we don't do that it has to be enforced from 'above' so as to maintain some sort of order.

maybe the problems of a complex technological society could begin to be better addressed if those " above" tried a little less control and enforcement, and tried a bit more example setting and involvement of the population in decision making.

actually no, changed my mind.i think they have it right. All those commuters and saturday shoppers at waterloo probably do need controlling by police with automatic weapons. Lovely smart uniforms too......

[ahinton]

Real self-discipline involves doing things you don't particularly want to do and you might even think are silly at times, in a compromise pact with the rest of society.

No it doesn't - at least not necessarily; "real self-discipline" involves doing all sorts of things under one's own motivation rather than being asked, told or recommended to do them. When I suddenly became aware of music and, at the same time, aware that this is what I just had to do, I depended almost entirely upon self-motivation and self-discpline - and I can tell you that when discovering, as I approached the age of 12, that many people much younger than I had been working with music almost since as far back as they could remember, that self-motivation and self-discipline became stronger still when I realised just how much catching up I had to do! (by which I don't mean to suggest any sense of competitiveness but the need to make up for the years that I'd felt that I'd wasted without knowing fact number one about it).

If we don't do that it has to be enforced from 'above' so as to maintain some sort of order.

Like Richard Barrett in #103, "I don't really see what's so great about your idea of "order"" either - but I also note that you yourself seem not to be entirely certain about it, given the sheer vagueness of your reference to "some sort" thereof. "Ordering" what? - you don't achieve anything that could realistically be described as "order" simply by tryiing to ensure that a bunch of people dress similarly to one another just because they happen to attend the same school! - they can act in as orderly or disorderly a fashion as they please but neither on account of nor in any other way related to what they happen to be wearing at the time and whether or not it's similar to what their colleagues are wearing or whether their clothes might identify them as attending a particular school.

[ahinton]

maybe the problems of a complex technological society could begin to be better addressed if those " above" tried a little less control and enforcement, and tried a bit more example setting and involvement of the population in decision making.

Too true!

actually no, changed my mind.i think they have it right. All those commuters and saturday shoppers at waterloo probably do need controlling by police with automatic weapons. Lovely smart uniforms too......

As has been poined out earlier, police and certain other people when on duty do need to wear uniforms in order to identify who they are and what they do; this, however, is hardly applicable to school attendees when at school and certainly not when they aren't at school!

[Richard Barrett]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4753623.stm

And your point is?

[ahinton]

And your point is?

Given that the article to which our resident Tippster linked contains
"Germany's justice minister['s]...proposal has been rejected by the teachers' union.

School uniforms are still associated by some in Germany with the Nazi era and especially the Hitler Youth.

Critics argue that school uniforms suppress individualism and are typical of authoritarian regimes such as the Third Reich.

It is completely unrealistic to believe that a school uniform can resolve integration problems or can combat fashion obsessions (Heinz-Peter Meidinger, German teachers' union)

Justice Minister Brigitte Zypries[' call that..."All school pupils should wear the same school uniform,"...has been backed by German Education Minister Annette Schavan...But the teachers' union voiced its opposition to the proposal.

"It is completely unrealistic to believe that a school uniform can resolve integration problems or can combat fashion obsessions," the union's chairman Heinz-Peter Meidinger told Germany's Die Tageszeitung newspaper.

Mr Meidinger also said that historically the school uniform issue in Germany was not free of controversy.

Unlike in Britain, the image of uniformed youths in the Nazi era led to a well-founded rejection of school uniforms in post-war Germany, he said.

A few German schools have tried introducing uniforms to test the public mood.

One such experiment took place in 2003 at Herkenrath school in Bergisch Gladbach, near Cologne in North Rhine-Westphalia.

"It was a complete success," schoolteacher Monika Thilo told Germany's ZDF television.

"Nobody was ridiculed," she said, adding that the whole school had wanted to adopt the uniform and a sponsor had been found to provide the clothes.

"But the district authority had to reject this request on legal grounds," she said

it is far from clear (to me, at least, what his point might be, if any). This not only demonstrates that there are the differences of opinion on the subject in Germany just as there are in Britain and elsewhere but also makes reference to a call that "all school pupils should wear the same school uniform" which is fundamentally different to PGT's idea that all pupils at each school should wear the uniform of that school; furthermore, the report of Herkenrath experiment states that "the whole school had wanted to adopt the uniform" which, again, is quite different from a situation in which head teachers and other school staff members seek to impose the wearing of school uniforms on all pupils at a school.

[Beef Oven!]

Given that the article to which our resident Tippster linked contains
"Germany's justice minister['s]...proposal has been rejected by the teachers' union.

School uniforms are still associated by some in Germany with the Nazi era and especially the Hitler Youth.

Critics argue that school uniforms suppress individualism and are typical of authoritarian regimes such as the Third Reich.

It is completely unrealistic to believe that a school uniform can resolve integration problems or can combat fashion obsessions (Heinz-Peter Meidinger, German teachers' union)

Justice Minister Brigitte Zypries[' call that..."All school pupils should wear the same school uniform,"...has been backed by German Education Minister Annette Schavan...But the teachers' union voiced its opposition to the proposal.

"It is completely unrealistic to believe that a school uniform can resolve integration problems or can combat fashion obsessions," the union's chairman Heinz-Peter Meidinger told Germany's Die Tageszeitung newspaper.

Mr Meidinger also said that historically the school uniform issue in Germany was not free of controversy.

Unlike in Britain, the image of uniformed youths in the Nazi era led to a well-founded rejection of school uniforms in post-war Germany, he said.

A few German schools have tried introducing uniforms to test the public mood.

One such experiment took place in 2003 at Herkenrath school in Bergisch Gladbach, near Cologne in North Rhine-Westphalia.

"It was a complete success," schoolteacher Monika Thilo told Germany's ZDF television.

"Nobody was ridiculed," she said, adding that the whole school had wanted to adopt the uniform and a sponsor had been found to provide the clothes.

"But the district authority had to reject this request on legal grounds," she said

it is far from clear (to me, at least, what his point might be, if any). This not only demonstrates that there are the differences of opinion on the subject in Germany just as there are in Britain and elsewhere but also makes reference to a call that "all school pupils should wear the same school uniform" which is fundamentally different to PGT's idea that all pupils at each school should wear the uniform of that school; furthermore, the report of Herkenrath experiment states that "the whole school had wanted to adopt the uniform" which, again, is quite different from a situation in which head teachers and other school staff members seek to impose the wearing of school uniforms on all pupils at a school.

Brilllliant!

If that doesn't get you into RB's good book, give up.

[ahinton]

Briliant!

If that doesn't get you into RB's good book, give up.

Several issues here.

Apart from his #115, what does this have to do with RB? It was P.G. Tipps who posted the link and it was I who sought to question the point of his doing so, merely echoing RB's question as to what that point might be.

For what reason do you suppose that I might wish to "get into RB's good book" and, even if I did, why would I dissect some of the text of P.G.Tipps's link in order to try to do so? and, if by so doing I did not succeed in this exercise, why do you supposed that I should "give up"? Some very confused ideas here, methinks

Do you believe that RB has only one book? If so, your belief must surely be sadly misplaced!

"Brilliant" has two "l"s - but I perceive no brilliance my manner of questioning the point that P. G. Tipps might have thought that he was making in any case.

Anyway, assuming you to favour the notion of school uniform, do you think that all school pupils should wear the same school uniform or that there should be one for each school that should be worn? - and on what grounds might you draw the conclusion (if indeed you do) that the wearing of school uniform is somehow commensurate with and evidentially representative of some kind of externally imposed "discipline" or "order"?

[P. G. Tipps]

And your point is?

:-)

[Beef Oven!]

Several issues here.

Apart from his #115, what does this have to do with RB? It was P.G. Tipps who posted the link and it was I who sought to question the point of his doing so, merely echoing RB's question as to what that point might be.

For what reason do you suppose that I might wish to "get into RB's good book" and, even if I did, why would I dissect some of the text of P.G.Tipps's link in order to try to do so? and, if by so doing I did not succeed in this exercise, why do you supposed that I should "give up"? Some very confused ideas here, methinks

Do you believe that RB has only one book? If so, your belief must surely be sadly misplaced!

"Brilliant" has two "l"s - but I perceive no brilliance my manner of questioning the point that P. G. Tipps might have thought that he was making in any case.

Anyway, assuming you to favour the notion of school uniform, do you think that all school pupils should wear the same school uniform or that there should be one for each school that should be worn? - and on what grounds might you draw the conclusion (if indeed you do) that the wearing of school uniform is somehow commensurate with and evidentially representative of some kind of externally imposed "discipline" or "order"?

I was genuinely surprised to hear that people had a bad experience with school uniforms. Obviously a bit myopic of me. I have given my reasons earlier, but it was a leveller and a God-send, in my and my fellow pupils' case.

In terms of stifling individuality, I think it might even accelerate it.