Do you think school uniforms are a form of authoritarianism?
Seems very much like indoctrination to get kids to "fall in line" and enforced conformity, to try to remove independent thinking.
I've always hated the idea of that. What do you think about it?
There are valid arguments for and against, but I really don't think the word 'authoritarianism' is at all applicable here.
Definitely applicable.
Entire atmosphere feels a lot more weirder because everyone is forced to wear the same thing. Reminds me of when I was in China, where they forced little kids to wear the little red scarf, which symbolized communism.
For me, the uniform was liberating. People who wanted to bully me needed to find something more substantive than just my clothes. Bullies tend to be stupid, so this was hard for them.
If your individuality is all tied up in your physical appearance, try to develop your mind a bit. I am nonconformist in a thousand ways, each of which is more important than how i dress.
If your individuality is all tied up in your physical appearance, try to develop your mind a bit.
Kind of condescending, no? Also, they're kids. Teenagers especially are all about their phsyical appearance.... and their minds are developing.
I suppose it probably seems strange to an outsider but in a country where it’s the norm for every school, it didn’t feel like that to me at all. I see it more as an equaliser? In a way I also kind of miss not having to decide what to wear every day.
Honestly, my main concern about school uniforms is that I think they ought to be standardised and subsidised, because the expense can sometimes be a problem.
Counterpoint: Americans would say the same - "I suppose it probably seems strange to an outsider but in a country where it’s the norm for every school, it didn’t feel like that to me at all." - about pledging their undying loyalty every morning to the flag on the wall of every single classroom starting at the age of 6.
Not to say that it's the same thing at all, indoctrination on that scale is completely different from a freaking school uniform, but the base is the same - it doesn't seem weird because it's what you were told was normal.
As an adult, I can see some good arguments for uniforms in this thread, but as a kid, I stopped saying the Pledge of Allegiance in middle school and swore that nobody could make me wear a tie like my dad had to for school. One of the big things that bothered me about school dress codes as I got older was the inherent misogyny on display. Some rules from my high school dress code, for example:
During Spring/Summer, boys may wear t-shirts and shorts. Girls must wear pants or skirts. Skirts must be below the knee. Girls are allowed to wear t-shirts, but only if the sleeves are at least 4 inches long and must be a unisex crew neck shirt. Shirts with a v neck or that show the collarbone are too revealing and are not allowed.
Also in the US is the issue that school uniforms are universally a private school thing, and so create a divide of elitism as a clear signal of those whose parents are wealthy enough to send their kids to a private school vs kids who go to public schools. Those divides start at home, though, and I don't know how much a school uniform does to deprogram that kind of rhetoric from your parents and their friends.
Americans would say the same … about pledging their undying loyalty every morning to the flag on the wall of every single classroom starting at the age of 6.
Except they don’t. I and everyone I’ve ever discussed it with think it’s weird as hell.
Also in the US is the issue that school uniforms are universally a private school thing
As a non-American who watched The Wire, I know that is not true. So I looked it up and apparently 19% of US public schools use school uniforms (risen from 3% in the mid 1990s). Source: https://www.uniformmarket.com/statistics/school-uniform-statistics
Not at all. On the contrary, I found them quite liberating, for 2 main reasons:
The only downside is that we had to pay for the uniforms, and they were quite expensive compared to the awful materials they were made of. I had 3 sets on rotation.
It's only authoritarian if the teachers / administration also wear a similar uniform, but slightly different to denote rank.
Otherwise, it's actually accidentally kind of socialistic, in that the divisions of class between your peers becomes less obvious, and there's more cohesion with your fellow students versus those in authority. It's easier for the students to rally together against something when they're all wearing the same thing.
Otherwise, it's actually beneficial to authoritarians to have no dress code, because student cliques would strengthen, and infighting would be more common.
For the USA, think about how both major parties use color to help separate people. If the colors of Democrats and Republicans were the same though, the division would be weaker.
Uniforms have historically been used to unify groups rather than to control them.
Socialism isn’t the opposite of authoritarian. It’s always authoritarian to mandate uniforms, it has benefits as you and others have outlined but you are stripping people of their individuality and mandating what people can do that’s classic authoritarianism
I think there's a line where mandates are authoritarian and where they aren't, and it comes down the house beneficial for society or a group it is, but in particular also how exclusionary it is. Your view on determining it by face value is too simple for this.
For example, if you mandate only Hispanic kids to wear uniforms, by your logic, that is more moral and less authoritarian because less students are being made to wear a uniform as opposed to all of them.
Yet, it's obvious that is not the case, despite fitting into your statement.
Likewise, individualism has limits before it's simply chaos too, and therefore should also be looked as to what point it instead brings harm. People here have, for example, listed many reasons not having a uniform code can be detrimental as well (wealth class divisions, strengthening of cliques, weakening of the student body's efforts against things an administration will do).
Not to mention, even in your call for a lack of uniforms, you are still technically imposing mandates: not only against those who do wish to have them, but likely against what people want to actually wear. I doubt you want students going in boxers or bikinis for example.
And lastly, I'd like to mention that socialism is counter to authoritarianism. Authoritarianism might use some socialist aspects sometimes, but socialism itself isn't in the same spectrum as authoritarianism.
It's still forcing people to wear something they don't want.
I loved school uniforms as a deeply autistic young man who really, REALLY struggled with all the silent peer pressures of fashion.
There was an outfit I could wear without half a thought every day and no one cared.
I work in schools. Pre-uniforms, there were so so many girls who arrived in appropriate clothes and then removed the top layer. Children shouldnt wear clothes to school that are more revealing than what you'd see in a bar. Social media teaches them that the goal is attention and it doesn't matter if it's positive or negative.
I was actually going to say I hated how misogynistic teachers were at school when it came to any dress code. They hyper focused on what girls were wearing, were their straps too narrow, were their shorts/skirts too high, etc. I have had teachers harass me about my clothes during my entire schooling starting from elementary school. We are drilled into us that our bodies are too revealing, scandalous, and dirty, so we should be ashamed. But then you become an adult and no one really gives a fuck what you wear. The only place that cares is where you end up working, and that can really be anything ranging from a fast food uniform to a suit to whatever you want to wear, etc. I'm not sure what your age is, but schools have made girls feel responsible for how other boys and men feel about their clothes since before social media. It's our fault for being a "distraction" and ruining the learning environment. I had a male teacher fixate on me at one point, he said he turned his a/c on 24/7 to force all the girls to cover up but when I wouldn't since I liked the a/c then it became his mission to stop lessons to tell me to cover up aka put a jacket on and make a big deal if I did not have one that day. Your comment reminded me of that teacher, and how much I was slut-shamed because my tank tops revealed my shoulders - gasp!
My post history and reputation will back that I am left as fuck, but I love uniforms because I hate clothes and all the stupid ass stipulations society has purposely and inadvertently put on them. Spending any more than 5 secs selecting what's gonna cover me for the day is already too long.
Don't get me wrong, I appreciate all the ideological arguments made against them, and don't counter them, I simply yearn to live in a world where we're ALL on the same team and working together, and what one wears means fuck and all.
Then we should work towards the goal that every kid has enough so they can wear whatever they want and it being accepted by the others rather then going the shortcut with uniforms and robing the kids, who want to express them self through cloths, of that choice.
False dichotomy.
and it being accepted by the others
You can change policy, but it's extremely hard to change people. Burying your head in the sand and pouting that people should be the ones to change is going to achieve nothing.
I love uniforms because I hate clothes and all the stupid ass stipulations society has purposely and inadvertently put on them.
But uniforms still reflect the social expectations. I don't trust the designers of the cloth to reflect everyone's needs. My clothing for example needs to be flexible and durable enough for me to climb a tree and fall back down without worry.
Spending any more than 5 secs selecting what's gonna cover me for the day is already too long.
There are 2 questions I ask myself when selecting cloth for the day:
Soccer uniforms have to be same color too it's not "authoritarianism."
Also idk about psychology but just a tiny bit of cohesion is much better over extreme individualism no?
They're definitely a form of oppression.
I'd say school in general is a form of authoritarianism. Take a look at US schools compared to schools in North Korea, and they are extremely similar.
Idk about North Korea but I went to school in mainland China and I definitely notice a lot of similarities.
China does a ceremony where they raise the flag ceremonies every week and sing national anthem every day, they do this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young_Pioneers_of_China
The US also does national anthems and pledge of allegiance.
Very similar rituals. Both teaches obedience. To mold people into wage slaves, to always obey your future employers.
Imo it's much better than a cult of clothing brands.
Funny enough, my US schools didn't regulate shoes, so kids would just get thousand-dollar designer shoes and "show off" anyways. Also, backpacks are not regulated. You could get bullied if your shoes or backback looks "cheap".
Also, the Android vs iPhone thing.
I didn't have good casual clothes in school.
On the other hand, the uniforms were priced to the point of extortion, so I'd say they came off as elitist flexing, if not authoritarian.
The only winner is getting kids decent clothes that aren't expensive or drab. And yes, there absolutely is a middle ground for that.
Yep. They also seem to completely ignore neurodiverse people; I don't know what I'd have done if my school had uniforms.
You just suffer then.
Yeah I kinda figured out it'd have been that.
Oh absolutely can be, and is absolutely often used as such.
However, as usual depends on the context. Properly subsidized it can help students not only gave greater pride in their appearance and success in classes if you aren't having to worry about not getting good clothes or any that fit properly.
On the other hand it can be cripplingly over expensive and cheap ass.
Not inherently, but I went to a school where the enforcement of the uniform code was overly Draconian. For example, there was a rule that boots were not allowed, so at the beginning of term, they had students line up and pull their trousers legs up so that an assistant headteacher could measure how high the shoes went (because that was one of the ways they defined shoes Vs boots). My step-brother's new school shoes were 1cm too tall, and they sent him home with a note saying that boots weren't permitted.
My step-mum called up the school and went ballistic at them for it, refusing to buy another pair of shoes. This was a socioeconomically poor area in which many families would struggle to afford one pair of shoes at the beginning of the year, so this assholish enforcement of the rules was absurd. If you can only tell that the shoes aren't permitted when a student pulls up their trouser legs, what is the problem?
I think that some of the logic behind the strict uniform code was that there was a perception that higher performing schools in better areas would have nicer school uniforms, and I wonder whether they were trying to work backwards from that, as if maintaining the uniform code could defy all the socioeconomic adversity that families in this area faced.
Aside from the excessive enforcement, I like the uniform code. It can mask income disparities within the student body if everyone is wearing the same thing. I felt insecure about how poor my family was, and it would've been worse without the uniform, I think. I also liked not having to think about what to wear, and it seemed to make it easier for my mum to strategise laundry to ensure we always had clean uniform to wear.
I also liked wearing a blazer because it meant I always had reliable pockets. Important things like my phone and my bus pass went in my inside pocket, which had a zip. Then there were two large exterior pocket which were good for pens and the like. It made it easier to avoid losing or forgetting things.
I think a happy medium would be possible. School uniforms could act as a blank canvas on which students could experiment with other forms of self expression.
That's a reasonable take. I like your point with the pockets. They are not universal on all clothes sadly.
They're about training children to comform and obbey arbitrary rules created by people in position of authority and to value impression more than behaviour.
Of the countries I lived in, Britain was the one that had most of this shit and was also the one with the strongest "know your place" and "keep up appearences" mindsets of them all, especially amongst the middle and upper classes which were the ones were this shit was more common (there was a time of working class cultural significance during the 70s and 80s, which were a veritable explosion of creativity with movements like "punk", but the social mobility and freedom that created it were crushed in the meanwhile, so working class kids can't make it in the Arts anymore and that whole class is back at being culturally irrelevant outside fighting each other after football games).
Things a common grade school essay question which I think we’re helping OP answer
No, it is not all these words.
When all the kids are dressed equally, they are (partially) freed from the pressure of modern fashion life, vanity, comparing their parents' money etc.
In elementary school we had a cheap (literally cheap, 5 euro) uniform that covered everything so it would protect the underneath clothes from inks, foods, spills. Also it didn't matter if someone wore some expensive clothes as they were covered.
I noticed immediately from the first days in high school how something like that would have been useful as bullies would pick anyone about their clothing appearance. So there was an "unofficial" uniform, if you didn't wear a brand name sweater then you were a loser to bully.
Now, I saw the elite schools uniform, expensive shirt under an expensive cardigan and a tie... that is ridiculous and I feel a way to take more money from the rich families as the expensive uniform can be bought only from them and need to purchase multiple sets to wear over a week
In my experience it seemed like uniforms were kinda another grift. You gotta buy everything just so from this specific place and you might never wear any of it again afterwards. I also got in trouble fairly frequently for accidentally having some part of my uniform out of order, which had more to do with forgetfulness or neurodivergence than anything.
At the same time, I didn't really feel like it interfered with my ability to think critically or independently, but that might just be me. I was always weird enough that anyone who would have bullied me over clothes would've bullied me over other stuff, and my head was in the clouds anyway so I hardly noticed what I was wearing.
If anything, perhaps things like that biased my thinking in a libertarian direction, out of rebellion. It's very easy to think that way when you're young, and tired of parents and teachers telling you what to do.
My mind works differently from most people's and my experiences may be atypical. But when I googled for studies I found mixed results, it doesn't appear that there are conclusive results showing a correlation between uniforms and academic performance.
In any case, I think it's that big of a deal. It is messed up, generally speaking, how little control kids have over their lives in the US and how people's intrensic motivation is often killed off and they're pushed around by extrensic motivators, rather than cooperating with what they actually want. I would say that uniforms can potentially contribute to that larger problem.
I was vaguely aware of them being a thing elsewhere as a kid. Back then someone even thought they were cool because of Harry Potter films. Never thought of it as authoritarianism, just pointless.
But now that you say it, placing restrictions to make people look the same is kind of authoritarian.
As far as i know, main motivation is to reduce mobbing but it doesn't work like that.
But it seems school uniforms do happen more in more authorithan countries. But that can be a side-effect too.
Schools in my area had a dress code, and my school almost succeeded at requiring a select jacket model as a must (done by a single local company connected to a school admin, wink-wink), but faced backlash over poor price/quality balance 🙃
One of the unusual upsides, many men well in their 20s, who otherwise couldn't be bothered, had their high school formal suits to wear on future funerals and weddings. I was one of them and that was handy.
If the uniform should be there, to ensure it's not hostile, it may be:
I’m very anti-authoritarian, but man I wish we had uniforms in school where I grew up. At the time I would have hated it, but in hindsight it would have saved me a lot of bullying. Equality != authoritarian in this case.
No. The uniformity somewhat eliminates kids being picked on for being poor and not having the best department store clothes. Children will always be little shits to each other but uniforms at least removes one reason.
My view is the right to dress or undress as one desires is a right of basic human expression so yes I would describe this as a minor form of authoritarianism.
I absolutely do, within reason and within legal limits, school kids should be able to wear whatever they want as it's a big part of their self expression.
Also, for things like art class, which can and will get very messy, very fast, especially with younger kids, school uniforms are just flat-out impractical vs. wearing old clothes you don't care about, eg. for clay day or for paper mache day or anything else like that, although ideally for stuff like this, you'd provide some old slightly oversized shirts to begin with that can be smudged with paint or clay or whatever without fear, effectively acting as smocks.
No.
I agree completely.
Equality is NOT the same as teaching people to be the same as everyone else. From what I understand, the intent is to discourage bullying, because: How can you make fun of someone for their clothes, if you're wearing the same thing? But as soon as they leave school and there is no global dress code, they are pre programmed to consider anything outside the norm as "wrong" or "punishable".
The ONE argument for uniforms I could get behind is that they ensure that the poor kids are dressed just as well as the rich kids, but as far as I know, those uniforms aren't typically provided to the students, and you'd still end up with some kids in designer uniforms, and others in thrift store finds and hand me downs.
No not authoritarian
I think all schools in Brazil have uniform, even private ones. No such thing as "physical education uniform", tho, you sweat on the same shirt you stay in class, so everyone is kind of forced to have 5 fucking uniform shirts and 2-3 pairs of pants and shorts, which makes it feel more like free money extortion rather than anything else.
I don't know enough about school history in my country to really tell whether this is some form of authoritarian bullshit or not, since there was some sort of education reform during the dictatorship (1964-1985) which led to a significant increase in private schools since, as "public school" became synonymous with "shit education", but I wouldn't be surprised if it originated from that line of thought. I mean, schools here operate on assembly line logic, so uniforms make perfect sense.
I think it is. It's a capitalist attempt to break the spirit of the young and get people ready for having to wear uniforms for work.
Yes, as is a lot if stuff schools do
Honestly I kinda liked our school uniforms when I was a kid. Course for us it was just like jeans and a solid color Polo. Maybe khakis were allowed as well, I don't recall. Made things easy made things simple.
Fortunately they didn't start doing uniforms where I was until after I left school. The reasoning our school district used was that income disparity was a form of bullying and kids whose parents couldn't afford designer clothes and shoes should not be constantly exposed to kids whose parents never had to worry about a paycheck as evidenced through their kids. Of course, they also didn't like certain T-shirts (like those featuring bands like Metallica, Megadeth, and Iron Maiden).
It's fine if the school provides the uniforms and offers a subsidy on their care and upkeep (or covers it entirely, like uniforms are traded for clean ones at the end of each week). Less so if the parents have to actually buy them. Because then the problem is being shifted, since the rich kids will have the same uniform but in higher quality. Income disparity can't really be hidden and I don't really think that was the actual goal (though some PTA mom probably brought it up, making it a convenient excuse).
Income disparity can't really be hidden
This falls under false dichotomy. Just because you can't remove it 100% doesn't mean it can't be reduced significantly
I always hated it growing up, too. My school didn't even have a uniform, only a dress code, and I hated that, too.
But my kids go to a school with a uniform, and now I can see the advantages:
And to address your criticism: Yes, uniforms tend to promote group cohesion but that's not always a bad thing. It encourages collaboration over competition, for example.
Point 3 has always been a great equaliser. I grew up in a household that was tight for money, and I never felt that my school wear defined my "class", quite the opposite.
Now I'm older and am in a comparatively fortunate position financially, I'm happy to kit out my kids in a uniform. I don't really want them flashing brand names or in an arms race to look the most fashionable, and I don't want the less fortunate folk in the class to feel left behind.
If a uniform is plain and inexpensive, I think the positives outweigh the negatives.
As a parent of 2 kids under 10, at this age they don’t care about brands. The school uniforms are much more expensive than any t shirts or shorts or track pants from Kmart or bigW (Aussie retailers). Poorer kids still get hand me downs and second hand, whereas richer kids get brand new. Most kids are only-child these days, so the concept of hand me downs is less prevalent within a family.
For teens, I can understand that point, but for teens I think self expression and exploring identity are key parts of growing up.