1. One commenter asked why girls don't want to be children anymore. A better question might be: when did children EVER want to be children? They play at dolls, or construction equipment, or war not realizing that the adult reality is quite different from what they imagine. They sit around bored in idle moments not realizing that someday they'll miss having nothing to do. When given the chance to do so, they frequently choose to wear the same clothing that they see the adults they look up to wearing. If that clothing happens to be butt-huggers and wife-beaters, or thongs and low-rise jeans, so be it. This has been going on for as long as adults and children have worn different clothing. It is nothing new.

2. While comparisons between dress codes and burkhas are overblown, they do have a basis in reality.

Think about it, what does one typically hear from traditional Muslims in response to the notion of women wearing something more revealing than burkhas (or the local equivalent thereof)? Usually something along the lines of "What?! If they don't cover themselves, then men will be unable to control themselves, their minds filled with lustful thoughts!".

Compare that with "She can't wear that to school! It'll be a distraction to the other students and a disruption of learning!". Somehow, we Western adults get along quite well without shapeless robes; most of the time, we're even able to control ourselves and conduct professional business. Likewise, my memories of teenagehood are of being able to go about business quite nicely even with supposedly 'distracting' clothing being worn by my fellow students.

If you're used to seeing a particular style of clothing, either on a single person, or on most of the people around you, it ceases to be a distraction. It becomes part of the lay of the land.

I agree that other students won't notice provocative clothing if it is just like everyone else's clothing. But, there are other people around besides other students. I wore uniforms to high school. I had a ride home most days, but from time to time I had to walk several blocks through city streets in an area with high unemployment. This meant that there were adult men lounging on the street corners. When I walked along these streets in my uniform, no one ever spoke a word to me. On the one occasion when we had had "free dress" at school, and I walked dressed like a normal teenager, several people spoke to me--nothing shocking, just "hi," "how ya doin'," "lookin' good," etc. I was not threatened or harassed, but I was uncomfortable having these strangers take notice of me. I realized that I enjoyed the invisibility that the uniform provided. Not all teen or tween girls want to be invisible--many if not most want to be anything but--but they are not yet experienced enough to realize that they can't pick and choose, noticed by the football captain while still safely ignored by the 24-year-old buying beer at 7-11.

. . . that's an aspect of this debate everyone (myself included) seems to ignore: what happens before and after school. It's an aspect that plays to both sides of the school uniform debate. Uniforms reduce gang tensions. . . until they find other ways to express their affiliations, or are recognized from prior incidents. Uniforms reduce class tensions. . . unless they're bought outside the school (in which case people will notice uniform origins a'la Draco and Ron in HP) or they enounter each other out of uniform someplace. Uniforms obscure body differences. . . IF they're designed correctly, not altered, and the kids aren't required to change in locker rooms or running into each other outside of school. Uniforms can make you invisible outside of school (unless a predator is targeting school kids directly). . . or they can make you hyper visible in school (you've modified your uniform, worn another school's uniform, don't have a uniform).

The core questions of the uniform debate seem to be: "is the uniform policy done right?" and "Will the benefits be worth the cost of doing the policy right?".

All very true. We certainly had a uniform hierarchy at my high school, with the "best" uniform being a hand-me-down from a particular prior era. Kids don't really worry that much about how they are perceived when out of school anyhow, at least during the school year--school is the center of their universes. Parents and teachers, though, are usually well aware that schoolchildren inhabit the wider world--look at all the discussion about how to teach kids not to post items they'll later regret to Myspace or Facebook.

I have some concerns with the concept that woman should dress modestly to ensure men are not distracted. The next step in that line of thinking is a blame the victim mentality… “she was asking for it just look at what she was wearing”. Suggestive clothing is a personal choice, and moderation might be a wiser choice – but it’s still (an adult) individuals choice and not a choice that should be made out of fear. Children on the other hand need guidance, at what age they become independent in those choices probably varies widely (and should) depending on the family and culture etc…

Did you really just compare burkhas to 'tween clothing? Burkahs symbolize the oppression of women in traditional Islamic culture; these are grown women being told they are unequal to their male counterparts, that they are the cause of sin, and that, therefore, their dress must be regulated. That is HARDLY similar to a parent telling a child they can't wear sexually provocative clothing.

It's time for parents to be parents. You can't be afraid of a 12 year old girl, you're her mother for God's sake. Mothers may be think that this clothing is cute, but the message that little girls send by wearing it is that they are sexual objects. I may sound like a ranting feminist, but I'm not. I'm just a college student that grew up way too fast. I had an adult body by the time I was 14; I would regularly get approached by men in their 20s and 30s. Most of them honestly thought I was of legal age and when I corrected them, quickly hurried off, but more than one seemed unphased when I told them how young I was. Dressing provocatively and wearing lots of makeup only fuels this behavior and puts young girls in compromising situations that most don't have the mental capacity to deal with. Just today in the news there was a story about a 9 year old girl who had sex with an 8 year old boy (whether it was a case of sexual assault or if she consented is being disputed). Last year the controversy about the 4th and 5th graders who had sex in the classroom while classmates stood guard broke out. To me, its indisputable that sexing of young girls is a major component of these stories. In retrospect, I wish my mother would have been stricter in regulating what I wore. Of course kids don't want to be told what to wear. They don't want to do their homework or have curfews either but you make them because you know what they don't. That's why you're the parent and they're the child.

And as for uniforms, the uniform I had to wear for my private high school was the best thing that ever happened to my personal style. I really believe if I had had a uniform my whole life, I could have bypassed the whole trashy looking phase I went through. Despite how I bitterly complained about the uniform when I had to wear it, to this day I wear an oxford and loafers to class almost every day. Dressing appropriately for school paves the way for dressing appropriately for the corporate world.

Read my top post again; I said the comparisons had a basis in reality, not that they're necessarily valid in their conclusions about policy. The point I was trying to make is that this situation isn't particularly new and that kids CAN grow up to be normal, healthy people without wearing school uniforms.

Read, too, the other replies to my top post. One thread points up one limitation to any uniform policy; they don't effect areas outside of school. They aren't a substitute for parental judgement.

Truthfully, what really erks me about school uniform policies isn't the uniforms at all. If done right, a uniform policy could do good by saving parents money on school clothes and reducing (though NOT eliminating) differences between students. It's the zeal of the people pushing it that erks me. Some push it for ideological reasons and don't see the limitations and risks involved. Some push it as yet another educational fad to be pounced on blindly in hopes of seeing improvement (or at least of looking like they're trying to accomplish something). Some, like you, take their own LEGITIMATELY bad memories and project them onto all teenagers, forgetting that some tweener fashions are relatively innocuous. All get cranky when you point out that generations of American school kids did without uniforms.

I have a very beautiful 14 year old niece who has a very high i.q. I told her once she could be a model and she stared at me for a minute and said she planned on being a doctor. I went to an all girl's high school and was taught that appearance is superficial. Nothing wrong with looking great but if you act like an object you'll be treated as one. It's all about how the girls are raised.

Since kids cost over $380,000 to raise ( see <link> ), on average, you would think that they would show some appreciation by dressing appropriately.