Middle Class problem, but AIBU?!

[Maffy]

Apologies... Nancy Mitford would be proud.

However, my DC's school insists on polo shirt top buttons being done up for school photos.

They have no ties, it is a primary school, there is no school policy about it, and no children do up their top buttons normally.

Yet for every school photo, all my morning requests and pleading from DC goes unheeded. My DC come home upset and are captured for eternity looking like Bolsheviks.

AIBU?!

I think school photos were a good thing before about 1940. After that there were lots of photo opportunities for most people to be photographed. Now we have reached peak photo there is no point at all, for individual ones at least.

My DS is lovely, but he always manages to look slightly insane in school photographs. His tie is always askew, his hair is like a cockatoo... at least he smiles.

Like he's escaped from a very naice sanitarium....

it is a strange thing that comes over chn having their school photo taken. The photographer points the camera and they always do this weird, deranged smile. We try to make them laugh about something else but they get so stiff that nothing works!

My DS had a massive zit for his first school photo. Aged 4. He has not had one before or since and he had no other spots at the time, just a massive one on his cheek. We didn't buy the photo.

Yes @MsHarry school photographers bring out weird, deranged smiles in DS2.

The class teacher can take perfectly nice photos of him with a bloody iPad. But a professional photographer will have him looking both deranged and undead.

Nope, still not seeing how it's a middle class thing. Someone spell it out to me?

I don’t think anyone actually thinks it’s a MC problem.

I didn't know it was wrong to have the top bottom done up... any other memos I missed!?!?

Going to school isn’t actually a middle class persuit

My DS had a massive zit for his first school photo. Aged 4. He has not had one before or since and he had no other spots at the time, just a massive one on his cheek. We didn't buy the photo.

My fifth form photo was like that. I didn't get acne as a teenager, but specialised in one humungous boil-like thing every so often. This one was in the middle of my forehead. Just like a bullet hole.
Then there was my hair. I'd fairly recently has the one and only perm I've ever had, a root perm, on the top of my head, that fell out to lank wavy things in about two weeks (I later got so pissed off with it I chopped it off myself. The perming solution was left on too long so half had broken off. I looked like I had a coconut fibre doormat on my head for about six months.)

This was not a good photo.

Nope, still not seeing how it's a middle class thing. Someone spell it out to me?

I think maybe OP meant to say "First world problem" as in, it's not really an issue, more of an annoyance.

How is this middle class though? Do working class kids not wear the same shirt?

I just don’t bother with school photos. They are a huge swizz and I much prefer the ones I take at home. Plus they never behave for them and end up looking like they don’t belong to anybody!

I didn't know Bolsheviks wore polo shirts. Mensheviks, yes I can see that ... although weren't polo shirts invented by Fred Perry, some years after the Russian revolution?

The school may want buttons done up because with small kids in particular polo shirt collars can take on a life of their own and present (en masse) a disorderly appearance, and doing up all the buttons tends to be neater. It's a bit of a strange thing to worry about though (that the school require buttons to be done up - so what if they do?): Can the kids read and write? Do they enjoy school? Aren't these a wee bit more important?

On his latest school photo ds1 has wonky glasses. They are someone else's glasses.

Does anyone actually care about school photos? The funnier the better. My best one is from my first year of secondary school, before I'd had my braces and while I was growing out my fringe, the flash massively startled me and I drew back, eyes bugging out, double chin going on. I looked like Steve Buscemi after 6 lines of coke, sporting a David Cassidy haircut.
My top button was done up though.

We had really strange pictures from ds's scbool a couple of years in a row. They did the whole class as a group - special needs school so small class - and I think they'd photo shopped the background out so there are these disabled kids floating in mid air.on a totally white background. The first one wasn't too bad but the next year they did the same except they seem to have taken it as two separate photos and then put them on the same background, along with a caption that has the wrong year group on it! We ordered one for grandma for the xmas (taken around october). It didn't arrive, we missed mothers day and Easter and turned up in the summer term! Gave it to Mil for her birthday in August!!!

KittenBeast that really made me laugh!
My worst one; I had a face like I was simultaneously sucking a lemon and sniffing a fresh dump. I really can't remember why I was so disgusted but I'm looking forward to seeing my kids ones over the years

I go down the line and straighten collars, brush hair, wipe faces and do what I can to sort my class out before photos. Shame that so many of them have toothpaste, gravy or food down their jumpers.

Tbh I don’t understand what it’s gotta do with them, they offer the service but we have to pay, they don’t keep a copy of the photos. I hate the way they try to guilt trip the kids. On several occasions I’ve had to send DS with a different jumper due to broken washing machine or he’s lost one. But a few tim3s he’s point blank refused because apparently on the other occasions the teacher has made comments and he was scared to do it again. If never happened often and they know I’m not one of them parents that sends thier kids in whatever they feel like, as the school know my family well. I always tell him if the teacher says anything then tell the, to come and talk to me.

My DS likes to gel his own hair which usually results in a big clump in the middle 🙈

Ours always look the same. I didn't buy the last one of them all together before DD left primary as it was identical to the previous one.

My favourite however is the one where DD is 6, DS1 is 5 and DS2 is 3. DD had a wobbly top front tooth and was worried about it ruining her smile. I explained that a photo captures how you look at that moment in time. It was fine to show her tooth and celebrate it- no need to hide it, I said. So when the photo arrives, there she is with just the one wobbly tooth sticking out at a strange angle through closed lips. "But Mummy, you said I should show my tooth!" And yes. Yes I did. But that wasn't quite how I imagined it!!

Top button done up is trendy at the moment and has been for a few years.

Or is that the problem? OP is a hipster and this trend is too old now?

You do not wear a button up shirt with all the buttons done up unless you are also wearing a tie.

I don’t think polo shirts are an issue given that even with adults they are a type of uniform, it’s the lack of a tie that’s the issue