AIBU to challenge the school’s wording about pupils rolling skirts up?

Then the school should send parents a list of acceptable styles of trousers. If they don’t conform, then their child needs to go to another school.

This isn’t just about sex as a female I don’t know where to look when I see skirts skimming arse cheeks it’s not appropriate in school after school it’s up to them the rules are there for a reason. imagine if boys wore shorts up there arse boys shorts are a decent length. There is no need to have so much skin on show in schools full stop a teacher wouldn’t be allowed to wear them. It’s embarrassing.

Just sanction the girls and give them detention for violating school uniform policy

Good point. This can often be an issue at girls only schools too. Because it’s not just about pandering to the male gaze(one way or another).

The problem is that so many girls just refuse to accept and comply with the uniform rules without insisting on pushing the boundaries.

For those girls, if the school bans skirts and makes it trousers only for everybody, they'll wear the ultra tight ones, extremely low-slung at the back, or even just leggings instead.

And if they're told off for the completely unacceptable styles, they'll kick off and insist "We have to wear black trousers - and these are black trousers" and then probably accuse the teachers of being perverts for 'deliberately' looking at the outlines of their crotches.

We have the same problem at our local girls’ school. And as one insightful
mum said… “There are no boys at the school to look at their legs, only dirty old
men who stand at various crossing points on the way and stare at the girls butt cheeks as they walk to school. Are those the sorts of people you want looking at your girls?

Oh fuck off, you seriously don’t look in front of you when you walk upstairs? Im pretty sure you’d fucking notice a bare arse in front of your face or do you turn a blind eye to that because you think it’s okay? You think people need to look at the floor and potentially hurt themselves by falling flat on their face as they aren’t looking where they are going just so they aren’t looking at something right in front of them? All because you think it’s okay for girls to wear skirts barely covering their arses?

You keep being up ‘men’s feelings’ as if women don’t think it’s not right either, many women understand that you don’t have a skirt that shows your arse off. you might be happy for your daughter to walk around showing her arse off but many woman have something you lack…respect.

Trousers can cause issues too and they’re trickier to police due to so much choice. Most schools that allow trousers only bypass that by picking one type from a school supplier and offering that. Already it causes a discrepancy, because you can’t just buy them anywhere and they tend to be more expensive. They’re also shit for any girl that is a different body shape. DD for example, has quite wide hips but a very narrow waist,to fit the waist, trousers are very very tight on her hips , to fit her hips they are gaping at the waist. I buy a lot of those waist cincher clips online. The high street has options , but it would not be regulation trousers.

Tbf I don’t really get the English obsession with school uniforms anyway, but that’s a whole other thread.

It’s not. That’s what some posters jumped straight to. Maybe because they can’t think of any other reasons? However, that’s on them.

I'd ask them to clarify because its giving 'women being responsible for men's behaviour/she was asking for it' vibes and surely that's not what they mean, especially in the context of children.

Dd used to roll her skirt up, but it was just a bit of rolling up and she always / even in ghe height of summer - wore thick black tights.

However, I was driving through a nearby town at 3pm and - omg - the skirt rolling was on another level. There were two girls with bare bottoms on display (I assume they were wearing thongs). It was frankly really, really grim. Actually I could hardly believe that they could walk down the street in such a state.

Yes - I think skirts are the issue. My children are in their 20s now, so I'm not up-to-speed on teenagers, but I'm guessing that teenage girls would choose to wear jeans in their leisure time over a skirt or a dress?

It seems to be the need to wear a skirt which causes the rebelliousness, in various ways. So put them all in trousers - problem solved.

I know a pp mentioned that trousers were not great for all young women and cited thick sanitary protection as a reason. But - surely that would apply with skirts too? I mean, you'd have to wear a considerably longer skirt to conceal sanitary protection than is 'fashionably acceptable to you peers etc'.

There are plenty of different trouser styles and these could be offered: slim (but not tight), or looser, so that no-one is forced to wear something clingy and revealing.

I've voted YANBU OP, but really because I think it's a bit lame for the school to palm off coming up with reasons "why it's not a good idea".

It's not a good idea because
• school isn't a fashion runway
• school isn't the beach, or a swimming pool
• school uniform isn't fashion wear or for sunbathing in
• everyone that wears the uniform carries the school's image out into their wider community
• the school does not want their image to be of unclad juvenile bottoms
• the same standard is required of boys and girls - the boys' uniform requires their bottoms to be covered too
• the uniform code states very clearly that skirts should be worn no higher than X above the knee
• workplaces have dress codes as well as schools, and this dress code is not extreme or unusual, and all pupils are expected to follow it, or for further action to be taken - this is the same that would happen in a workplace with a dress code & is not unreasonable. Anyone who feels so strongly about the dress code that they don't want to spend their weeks in that environment is welcome to find a place elsewhere - the same as with any employer dress code.
• this isn't about sexism or policing girls' bodies, it is about maintaining consistent standards for how the school is represented across the wider community, both during and outside school hours. When pupils are on their own time & outside school, the school has got no interest in what pupils choose to wear, but in school uniform, it needs to be worn to meet the uniform rules.

It would help a lot of parents to actually put that unwritten bit into writing, so there is leas kickback about 'my body, my choice'. Of course it is.... but their uniform, their choice too. If you don't like that, find a different school.

We didn’t have that issue either. In fact we “made” our own uniform of jeans and tops/shirts . Very few girls actually wore skirts and none as short as we see today. Probably because it wasn’t such a big deal like non uniform days are here or trying adjust a set uniform.

In a lot of places in Europe where they don't have uniform, it seems to mainly revert to an unofficial uniform of jeans and t-shirts/unremarkable tops.

One thing I never understood - if Neighbours and Home & Away are accurate(?!) - is why Australian schools have uniforms for girls but not for boys? Weird.

That’s a completely different issue and definitely worthy of an email/complaint. Pull them up on their lack of action .

But they haven’t been flashing their arses.

Belgium here. Most schools don't have uniform and despite what a lot of people think, it doesn't turn going to school into a fashion parade. They all seem happy to wear sensible clothes to school.

It’s not sexist it’s completely appropriate to call this out. Anyone who thinks otherwise obviously hasn’t seen naked arse cheeks walking down the road like I have outside the local comp. And as others have said - boys (or those who wear shorts) are called out for having them ride too low at school too,

when I was at school in Oz decades ago boys were told to wear proper fitting underwear not boxers under their baggy school shorts as the teachers (and us girls) did not want to see their genitalia escaping. Same principle.

EvangelicalAboutButteredToast · Today 12:26
Because what a lot of them are doing IS very much flashing. Whatever their motives, they know what they're doing and they think that their right to do so overrides everybody else's right not to have to see it.
id never viewed it like that. You’re right! We have the right to not have people exposing themselves to us. I feel the same if people have their full cleavage on display whilst simultaneously being outraged that people have looked at their chest. Put it away then!

Excellently put. Yes, I get the same sensation when exposed to areas normally covered up as if I were being flashed at. It's highly intrusive - and forces you into a situation find very uncomfortable.

Fine, discuss welfare concerns but try to use appropriate language or else it all looks like total mockery. Taking the piss out of young girls 'sweaty arse cheeks' in the guise of concerns for men's 'uncomfortable feelings' is not a good look.

Oh, for God's sake, Gloriia, stop with the 'men's feelings'.

It's not about men's feelings! No-one wants to look at a random person's arse. At least, no-one you'd be comfortable knowing.

Why is that so hard to understand? When I see a bare bottom I tend to associate it with visits to the lavvy. It does not make me sexually aroused. I particularly dislike big fat bottoms (I have one - no judgement). No, I don't want to sit in the chair after a bare backside, thanks.

It's such a glib and silly response to claim it's about men. It's not! It's about anyone who has taste, discretion and consideration for others.

That can be solved via a simple block

Ah, but boys and men tend not to want to expose their testicles as a fashion statement, do they?

It's only females who somehow want to display their erogenous zones - which I think is the result of (unconscious or unacknowledged) pressure from pornography which increasingly affects the male gaze.

Once the male gaze just demanded women looked 'pretty' but now it expects raunchiness. Don't fall for it, young women!

Because what a lot of them are doing IS very much flashing. Whatever their motives, they know what they're doing and they think that their right to do so overrides everybody else's right not to have to see it.

id never viewed it like that. You’re right! We have the right to not have people exposing themselves to us. I feel the same if people have their full cleavage on display whilst simultaneously being outraged that people have looked at their chest. Put it away then!

Stop looking up girls skirts as they walk upstairs and any men that 'feel uncomfortable' are the problem. Not the young girls.

Unless you're a hypocrite, I can only assume you view the creepy, pervy men in the park who deliberately show you their privates in the exact same way? Because what a lot of them are doing IS very much flashing. Whatever their motives, they know what they're doing and they think that their right to do so overrides everybody else's right not to have to see it.

Stop looking at the flashers - and any women who get flashed at who 'feel uncomfortable' are the problem. Not the flashers.