Taylor Pugh, 4, (known as Tater Tot) is a bit too hairy for Floyd Elementary School’s principal. Taylor and his Dad are growing their hair to donate it for wigs for cancer patients. The suburban Dallas school district, however, insists that boys cannot have long hair and it has suspended him from classes since last month.
Remarkably, the school district is sticking to its position. Mesquite Independent School District spokesman Ian Halperin “We expect students … to adhere to the code of conduct.”
The short hair requirement always struck me as a bit sexist since girls are allowed to have longer hair than boys. So long as the hair is clean and not a danger to the child, why should a boy be required to have shorter hair than a girl? Looking at the picture with the article below, Taylor does not even appear to have particularly long hair.
Even if you agree with the requirement, it is bizarre that the school would not want to encourage such a selfless act of charity. One of my nieces at eight was part of this program and I was very proud of her. It is a wonderful message of giving that has now been replaced with a conflicting message of a senseless bureaucracy imposing arbitrary rules on children.
Not only would George Mifflin Dallas (left) not appear able to attend the school under the hair rules, but some other famous individual would find themselves suspended if they showed up for class.
For the full story, click here.
Hi there i am kavin, its my first occasion to commenting anyplace, when i read this post i thought i could also make comment due
to this good article.
I think that the school should impose on the colour of the hair too… For girls, blonde and for boys black. Anyone who does not meet the compliance should be considered undesirable and expelled from that school. I hope that after 3 years, the situation is resolved and the kid is going to a normal school!
Gyges:
old habits die hard. I actually don’t like the word liberal being applied to people that want to control other people. As you say it is misapplied.
By the way the beer turned out OK, it is carbonated and doesn’t taste spoiled so I consider it to be a success. Modest though it may be.
Byron,
They’re not liberal anything. They’re Neo-cons. Liberal has a couple of meanings depending on context, None of those four guys come close to either of them. They aren’t what used to be meant by American Conservatives (I could make a pretty convincing argument that they managed to redefine the popular usage of Conservative in this country, but that’s beside the point) either, but they’re not liberal.
This is the whole point I was trying to make to Tootie with the Fascist thing. If we want to have an actual discussion about politics in this country, we need words that have the same meaning to both sides. It’s a pet peeve of mine, and the reason I link to that Orwell Essay repeatedly. I may not agree with Orwell on everything politically, but the man knew how important words are.
As to the Health Care bill: My whole point was that this bill may have been rushed, but nowhere near to the point of the Patriot act. The PATRIOT ACT was signed into law in less than two months after Sept. 11th, will little to no debate, and huge majority in both houses (If I remember correctly, only one senator voted against it). The Health care debate has been going on since at least March, with much of it public. Could it have been done better, yes. It just is not analogous to the literally blind rush to pass ANYTHING that might help that surrounded the passing of the PATRIOT Act. That has nothing to do with the actual quality of the current bill, I was just pointing out that comparing the two is a stretch.
Byron–
“The republicans screw us and the democrats screw us.”
You won’t get any argument from me on that point.
“The president has packed his economic team with Wall Street insiders intent on turning the bailout into an all-out giveaway.”
Byron–
“That was the same line that Paulson and Bush gave about Main st and Wall st. It is pure horse shit.”
I don’t know what you’re making reference to.
Swarthmore mom
If you have a pre-existing condition you would rather have this healthcare bill than none at all.
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You’re probably right about that. I don’t think that that outweighs the downside of this bill though.
As for this bill being a start to be improved later, I doubt I’ll live to see it. The prescription drug plan for Medicare which built in a ‘hole’ in coverage that literally kills people that came out of Congress a couple of years ago was passed with the same promise. The only tinkering that bill has received is in this current insurance giveaway bill and it is inadequate to the point of being a farce from the numbers I read. Creeping incrementalism in lawmaking is just an opportunity to do a bad job, take lobby money and ignore or weaken what you pass later.