Jackass T-shirt

[MJB_919]

Some teachers will have no tolorance for clothes that offends them regardless of whether or not its against the dress code. There was a time when one of my teachers made me turn my MTV Jackass shirt inside out when it wasn't even against the dress code. Has anything like that ever happened to anyone?

[KPalicz]

It happened to me all the time in high school. I had an "inapropriate" wardrobe of T-shirts. Always having to turn them inside out or go home. Junior or Senior year I went to picture day with my dirtiest shirt, one I bought in Italy that translates horribly dirty words and phrases from Italian to English, so that shirt was on my ID card for the year. Hehe.

One interesting story though on the tactics employed by schools involves a Metallica shirt of mine. On the front was an eagle perched on the earth digging in its claws - very cool. A conservative Christian teacher of mine one day came up to me and said something to the effect of "do you know what that figure on the arm means?" I didn't. He said it was some satanic symbol, I looked into it, he was right, and I gave the shirt to a friend of mine some days later.

He didn't demand i turn it inside out, didn't send me home or try to punish me. He just informed me what something on it meant, and it was something I decided I didn't want to wear. Of course it wouldn't have dissuaded me from wearing my Big Johnson or Shit Happens shirts, but those are funny. I just think it is an example of how education and discussion, not censorship, is the best way for addressing these "problems".

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-Alex Koroknay-Palicz
NYRA President
www.youthrights.org


(http://www.youthrights.org


)

[KPalicz]

It happened to me all the time in high school. I had an "inapropriate" wardrobe of T-shirts. Always having to turn them inside out or go home. Junior or Senior year I went to picture day with my dirtiest shirt, one I bought in Italy that translates horribly dirty words and phrases from Italian to English, so that shirt was on my ID card for the year. Hehe.

One interesting story though on the tactics employed by schools involves a Metallica shirt of mine. On the front was an eagle perched on the earth digging in its claws - very cool. A conservative Christian teacher of mine one day came up to me and said something to the effect of "do you know what that figure on the arm means?" I didn't. He said it was some satanic symbol, I looked into it, he was right, and I gave the shirt to a friend of mine some days later.

He didn't demand i turn it inside out, didn't send me home or try to punish me. He just informed me what something on it meant, and it was something I decided I didn't want to wear. Of course it wouldn't have dissuaded me from wearing my Big Johnson or Shit Happens shirts, but those are funny. I just think it is an example of how education and discussion, not censorship, is the best way for addressing these "problems".

------------------
-Alex Koroknay-Palicz
NYRA President
www.youthrights.org


(http://www.youthrights.org


)

[Yasha]

i had things like that happen to me all the time, but never let them win on any of the arguments about it. for example, on the first day of school my senior year, i was one of two seniors who were helping with freshman orientation. i was wearing a shirt that on the front said "hello, my name is satan" and on the back said "this is a fuct shirt". one of the teachers, who most of the time was much more intelligent about things, "didnt approve" and wanted me to go change my shirt. after a brief argument it was settled by *me* taking *him* to the principal and having him chewed out.

[colonel]

In Toronto schools, before the last premier introduced mandatory dress code regulations for the entire province of Ontario, schools could not enforce dress codes unless articles of clothing went against health or safety and maybe also if clothes were offensive (racist, crude and so on; however, teachers sometimes might have enforced their own rules. I know of a situation a number of years ago when a lad kept his hat on in class, even though a substitute teacher had asked him to remove it. Another passing teacher said "the lady asked you to remove your hat" and slapped him on the back of the head, even though another little something - corporal discipline - is also prohibited in Toronto schools! I think many teachers did not allow students to wear hats, even though there was no dress code.

Colonel John Doe
Commanding Officer, the Cameron Highlanders
Militia for Freedom and Democracy

[katydid]

i think students need to gain a healthy dose of principled non-compliance. learn that they dont have to either conply or defy. they can simply do what is right on their own and put others in a position where if they are going to go out of their way to violate a students basic rights, they must do so by overextending themselves over and over and over again.

what is truly a greater disruption of the educational process? a student not complying with a silly useless dress code, or a teacher taking a student away from their own education, to the point of suspension, way too many times?

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vice prez, NYRA (http://www.youthrights.org)
board member, Oblivion (http://www.oblivion.net)

[KPalicz]

When I was in high school the neighboring cities' high school in Zeeland, MI caused quite a stir when they banned Korn T-Shirts. Even shirts that said nothing other than the name of the band. A few students challenged it, and it got a lot of media attention.

MTV gave it some attention, it was in all the papers, my radio station in fact set up across the street from the high school and broadcast from a cornfield there during school hours. Me and my friends skipped school and went down there to join the radio station and protest the school, it was great. This was quite a buzz for 5,000 person Zeeland.

All over a shirt that said "Korn"

------------------
-Alex Koroknay-Palicz
NYRA President
www.youthrights.org


(http://www.youthrights.org


)