The policy probably wasn’t against the military, but this decision was. So this was a distraction against the “real issues” What is or are the real issues then, in this case??
1) Nearly every teacher in this nation was trained by godless Marxists in Marxist-run colleges of education. Even if those responsible for this nutty action were fired they would soon be replaced by similarly trained people. Even if the teachers and principal are not Marxists themselves the college of education training will bleed through into their decisions.
2) Would hairstyle or uniforms be a source of conflict among parents and the schools if all schooling in this nation were delivered privately. When was the last time we saw a newspaper article about dress standards or haircuts when a private school was involved?
3) How people dress ( or wear their hair) is a form of speech and a reflection of fundamental religious, cultural, and political beliefs. It is **impossible** for any school to accommodate all the various belief-systems of every family in any community. This is true even if school districts were the size of a small suburban housing division. Compulsory-attendance and compulsory-funding of single-payer government schools **will** inevitably set neighbor against neighbor as the more powerful lobbying groups impose their NON-neutral worldview onto the hearts and minds of other people's children.
4) Prison-like, single-payer and socialist-entitlement schooling is a new phenomena in the history of humankind. Nearly 150,000 years of our human ancestors would share their heads in wonderment that we treat children as we do today in the typical factory-like and prison-like school.
5) The above can NOT be fixed! It must be abolished. It can't be fixed because it is fundamental to the system.
6) What is needed is complete separation of school and state. Vouchers, tax credits, on-line schooling, homeschooling, and charters will help in weaning the public from the single-payer and socialist-entitlement school teat. The goal, though, should be privately delivered schooling ( K- college).
Wake up! There are no “real issue” in this case. Even if the school was making all of the boys wear exactly the same haircut and cute little suits it would still not be “soul crushing”.
I doubt whether there are any people here who are bigger supporters of military personnel than my wife and I. She was recently presented with an award for her work honoring and supporting military personnel by Maj. Gen. Thomas R. Tempel Jr., and Command Sgt. Maj. Marshall L. Huffman who are currently the Western Regional Medical Corps Command Team... this is basically everything west of the Mississippi including Alaska and Hawaii. We spend a large percentage of our time honoring and helping military personnel.
The article was written in a way that makes it appear that the principal was taking some kind of anti-military stance by enforcing the district's policy against “extreme” haircuts. Similar dress code policies can be found at schools in other conservative communities that are supportive of the military. My wife and I both initially got worked up when we read the article.
After taking the time to find other articles written about the situation we realized that we were most definitely manipulated by the author of this piece. The first clue should have been the byline, “Why is it okay for public school officials to place totally unnecessary, soul-crushing restrictions on students?” When was the last time you heard a dress code described as “soul crushing”?
If continuing to make a mountain out of a mole hill helps make you and nearly everyone else here feel like they are supporting the military without actually doing anything... then go ahead and keep it up. Have you all forgotten that the military itself has the same kind of “soul crushing” dress codes for most personnel; they also have weight restrictions that a large percentage of civilians do not meet. My wife used to teach “fat boy” exercise and nutrition classes on base to help keep people from getting discharged. Maybe everyone here should be protesting that as well? This boys mother is not doing him any favors by making the kid feel like he is being victimized by the school. My wife's dad who was a combat veteran of WWII and Korea, and a drill sergeant during Vietnam would be laughing his butt off over this. The article was written to be inflammatory. It is a little shocking to me how easily we can be manipulated and worked up over a non-event such as this.