Making A Dress Code Violator Wear A Neon Shame Suit Is A Bigger Distraction Than A Short Skirt
Each school year, as constant as the tides, we hear about some kind of hullaballoo when it comes to the most important thing of all: dress codes. Because we live in dangerous times, where skanks ensnare and entrap unsuspecting teenage boys with their beguiling thigh skin and leggings — or as I like to call them, Satan’s Saran Wrap — it becomes necessary for schools to step in and put those girls in their places.
After all, things like knee skin can be downright salacious, not to mention distracting for the boys in school who have stuff like math and science to do. Boys have a right to learn, ladies, free of distraction. So dress with their boner in mind, or you might have to wear today’s equivelent of a dunce cap only for shirt skirts and decolletage.
That’s what Miranda Larkin of Oakleaf High School in Orange Park, Florida had to do, according to USA Today.
When 15-year-old Miranda Larkin went to Oakleaf High School in a black skirt about three to four inches above her knees on the third day of school, she didn’t know she was in violation of the dress code.
She says a teacher sent her to the school nurse who said she had to put on a neon yellow T-shirt and bright red sweat pants with the words ‘DRESS CODE VIOLATION’ written across both.
“She just points at me from across the hall, and says, ‘Your skirt is too short,’ ” Miranda said.
Miranda just moved to Clay County from Seattle and was on her third day at a new school.
In all seriousness, can we talk for a moment about how completely dumb this is? First let’s take a look at the two outfits. Here’s the first, which shows the length of her skirt. I’m getting distracted already:
Do you need to sit down? Are you okay? Can you remember the quadratic equation? So given the scandalous nature of the skirt and it’s potential for distracting other students, the school gave her this outfit, which is much less distracting;
See? Problem solved.
Ok, I know what you’re thinking. You’re probably thinking exactly what I was thinking, which is “how the fuck is that not about a billion times more distracting than a short skirt?”
It’s not, which I kind of think is the point. I have often thought that the whole thing with dress codes, as long as they unfairly target girls, is more about shaming anyway. That outfit up there is pretty much the best way to accomplish that goal, and Miranda’s mother rightfully calls it a “Shame Suit”.
“I feel that by putting a kid in an outfit that says what they did wrong across their chest and down their leg is taking their private records and making them public and that’s a clear violation of their privacy rights.” added the teen’s mother.
Larkin was able to leave school early and not face suspension. She says she’s filing a complaint with FERPA, the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, for making her daughter’s discipline public.
Now, I don’t know about a FERPA violation, because I don’t really know anything about FERPA, but I do think I’d be pretty pissed. Here’s this poor girl, third day of school in a new place, and she’s got one teacher shouting that her skirt is too short and another having her don the world’s ugliest replacement gear. Is this really necessary? According to the school the kids have other options; they can take an in-school suspension, wear the shame suit, or have someone bring them clothing. Miranda says she never even knew about the other options.
Can we just stop? Please? Her outfit looked fine. Barring some kind of hot pants/nipple pasty combo, can we just stop handing out these arbitrary judgements on girl’s bodies and clothing? It’s humiliating. Even when I was in middle school I had these big, porny boobs that always got me in trouble, no matter what kind of shirt I was wearing. It was awful.
If they can’t stop, I wish they would at least admit that this isn’t about creating a distraction, because that bright-ass yellow just shows that that argument is total bullshit. It almost seems like they want to bring attention to the violation.
If they get slapped with a FERPA violation I won’t be surprised at all. When you have clothing like that, you’re really just asking for it, anyway.
(Images: USA Today)
