Hmm. I wrote something for the College Herald. I want $250. I WANT IT WE WANTS IT


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Yesterday, I heard from one of my friends that a student somewhere in New Zealand was suspended from the school he attended. Why? Because he fashioned his hair after our New Zealand Idol and his famous shaved haircut.

Of course, he only said this to me because of my own hair, which passes the top of my shirt collar – an offence of my school’s uniform rules or so teachers tell me every day. As much as I love being a rebel, disobeying the school is not something I or most students enjoy doing. So “what gives”, you ask?

Common sense tells us that school rules are created to protect students and encourage a positive environment for learning and education. Keeping that in mind, how does having hair past the collar on your shirt stop you from solving a mathematical equation or writing an essay? The weight of my hair is not enough to force my head backwards or slow me down, and does not house head lice (or at least I hope not).

Although it may not seem like it, I think that most of my school’s rules are reasonable. No smoking and alcohol? I support that – usage is illegal for most of the student population anyway. No makeup? I would not be using makeup anyway, as much fun as it would be to attend school with lipstick and eyeliner. It is when a school forbids its male students to have their hair past their collar that I object.

All I really want is to have my hair long – today’s society is all about freedom of choice and having rights, after all. Most normal people would give in to the pressure and spend ten dollars or more to get their hair cut. But I am not a normal person so I stand up for my rights.

The next step for me if I was to try to keep my current hairstyle meant finding out what would happen if I refused to get my hair cut and ignored the teachers. Apart from the typical school fare of detentions and essays, a quick internet search showed me that according to the YouthLaw website (www.youthlaw.co.nz), a student can be stood down or suspended on the grounds of continual disobedience where he or she is “deliberately and regularly failing to do what [they] are told”.

My heart sinks. I do not want to be stood down, and as strange as it may sound I really do enjoy school and the people I meet there. But I read on. “As well as being...’continual disobedience’, [the] behaviour must set a harmful or dangerous example to other students. The behaviour must be likely to cause serious harm, not just to be harmful.”

Having my hair past my collar has definitely not been harmful and has not set a dangerous example to other students. Nobody seems to have suddenly started growing their hair just because I have. Although it would have been very flattering, I am glad nobody has since it is part of what defines me and my individuality. In the same way, a Ben Lummis hairstyle does no harm to anyone, but as it got a student suspended it must be harmful in a way. Maybe the school I heard about got it all wrong. Perhaps the suspension was unjustified.

To take away the right of education of a student because their hair looks different to everyone else’s seems unfair. Suspension on the basis of looks sounds a lot like discrimination. YouthLaw states that “students have the legal right not only to attend school but to be educated.” What a student’s choice about their hairstyle has to do their right to schooling bewilders me.

School rules are like society – most of them work well for the good of us all, but a few of them are unhelpful and negative. A school rule should be for the good of all students, and all other reasons are secondary. I hope that in the future, schools will look past shallow appearances and focus on the important things. However, until they do, I will probably remain a rule-breaker.

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Critique as much as you want, I want that $250.

Also I have to hand in my money for the ball...man I'm so poor it's not fair. Stupid fucking corporate world we live in.