Actually, you sound kinda like a Muslim.
Does anybody else think this sounds like the plot of an episode of “South Park”? Adults ridiculously over-reacting to something a kid did, in the process making themselves look more childish than the children? My suspicion was the girl was not really offended, she was trying to wind up the coach and is probably as surprised as anyone as to how far it went. A simple “Hey, guys don’t wear shirts in hot weather, suck it up, bitch!” would have solved so many problems.
Or, you know, when they’re engaged in sports. We’re not arguing here about whether it’s appropriate for a guy to whip off his T-shirt in the middle of a high school chemistry lab.
The ruling and the policy are ridiculous.
Something like that actually happened in my senior chemistry class. It was the end of the year and our chemistry teacher let two male students (both football players) test the emergency shower (she made some kind of deal involving them keeping their averages at a certain level). They both wore swimsuits under there clothes; one wore a speedo instead of boardshorts. Nobody had a problem with that.
Well, sounds like that was an exceptional occurrence. The point is, though, that in the normal course of events a chemistry teacher would be justified in insisting that students have shirts on in class - because that’s a context appropriate rule, for whatever reason. Track practice is a different context, different set of norms.
I think it’s reasonable to be considerate of others, when doing so doesn’t even involve any effort or inconvenience – though I don’t know about making it a policy unless asking for voluntary consideration fails. Ideally, people should be nice to each other because they want to be, but if they don’t wanna then I guess that’s where policy would have to come in. But I’d like to know why the hammer fell on the coach, who had apparently been implementing the policy, and not the student who flouted it.
I mean, come on. Kids are always going to break rules. Having a policy against cheating on tests hasn’t eradicated cheating yet, either; so should we start firing teachers? You can hand down consequences if kids break the rules, but you can’t 100% control someone else so as to guarantee they won’t do it in the first place.
There are either substantial missing details, or the finger is pointed way in the wrong direction.
Exactly what I thought! 
It is puritanical to rearrange whole policies because of those young girls. Understanding that young girls may be uncomfortable around semi-naked men does not automatically lead to declaring that guys doing sports need to have all skin covered. It can, and perhaps should, lead to young girls learning to live in the real world.
You dont think its good, I bet he thinks its awesome…
One possibility that struck me for such a ridiculous policy, if they let the male track members go topless wouldn’t they theoretically have to let the female track members do it also should they so choose? Could be a policy trying to avoid the possibility of some girl on the track team trying to thumb her nose at administrators.
As a blanket policy with no real-life reason, I think it’s stupid. However, in the article I see some of the girls on the team had expressed discomfort and the coach had already been warned about it.
Being a teenager is difficult and confusing. I agree that grown-ups should be able to deal with people exercising shirtless in places like gyms that are aimed specifically at exercising, but I think telling high school girls (age 14-18 in the US, right?) “you are required to be comfortable with half-naked boys or else you should drop the team” is neither productive nor empathetic. Is it so hard for these kids to keep their shirts on on school grounds?
I grew up in Houston during the 70s-80s, and I think I spent most of my childhood running around shirtless. I was on the track team and the swimming team, and did most of my running without a shirt. Both were coed teams.
I don’t recall anyone complaining.
No, it’s not hard. It’s also not hard to tell the girls that their concerns, while understandable, are the concerns of small children, and they should be beyond them now. That running track is not a sexual situation, and therefore the lack of shirts on the boys is not inappropriate or threatening, and as burgeoning adults, they’re going to have to come to terms with that. We’re going to help them come to terms with it by exposure, not by coddling their immature views.
I mean, think about it - what does delaying seeing bodies in a non-sexual context really accomplish, other than making more prudes and more sexualization of non-sexual situations? It’s not going to get easier to deal with if you delay it, it’s going to get harder to deal with. Phobias and aversions become stronger the more you delay dealing with them, not weaker.
And yes, all these same arguments apply if the girls want to run topless and that’s legal in their state. The boys should be told to get over it and not treat it as a sexual situation, in compassionate but no-nonsense words and tone.
When is “now” for them? How old are the team members anyway? Is it cross-year (ie are 14-year-olds and 17- and 18-year-olds running together)?
I think where we disagree is that I see high school age as a time when people are still in the process of maturing learning how to feel comfortable with themselves, their bodies, the bodies of other people, being dressed, being undressed, being half-dressed around other people, being around other people who are half-dressed, etc. And I don’t think rushing that process, or, again, saying “Become comfortable with something you’re not comfortable with or else”, is helpful. They’re on their way to being adults, but they’re not yet.
Oh, come on, they’re teenagers, anything about peers’ bodies is going to have a hint of sexuality whether adults want it to or not. If real people are uncomfortable, they are uncomfortable. I didn’t see anything about “threatening”, but can’t you imagine a 14-year-old girl being a bit intimidated by regular semi-enforced contact with several shirtless 18-year-old boys, at least?
As far as I can tell, it isn’t about “phobias” or “aversion”, it’s about young teenagers learning how to become adults. Someone may be uncomfortable with a shirtless peer at 14 and comfortable with it at 16 or 17. These kids are still growing up and I see no way in which telling them, “either you acquire the emotional maturity of an adult immediately or quit the team” is a way to help them do that, especially when it’s in the context of whether their comfort level is respected by the adults around them.
And anyway, IMO it take much more maturity to go to an adult and say “You know, I’m not comfortable with this” rather than keeping quiet out of peer pressure or lack of self-awareness.
I don’t know whether to chastise you for needless hyperbole or applaud your son’s tenacity
I agree, but I think the more productive way to help them become comfortable with all sorts of uncomfortable things they’re going to be exposed to in high school, college and life is to gently but firmly expose them to those things, not hide them. I’d be just as frustrated at a school that forbids the mention of gay people, or single parents, or contraception, or war and genocide. These are not things you learn about by hiding them, and neither are abs.
Huh. Color me confused, because growing up in some sweltering summer areas, I’d see just about anybody male going shirtless in public, from little kids to old beer-bellied men. About the only complaint I’ve ever heard before this is how it was a double-standard that women couldn’t do the same.
You’d also think most guys would like it if the girls did so, but that is frowned upon, too.
I can get people saying it’s no big deal, but not if you are sexualizing it. How is that different than female breasts being sexualized and thus not shown? I actually think we are more likely to move towards guys being required to where shirts like women are before women will be allowed to go topless.
The fact that you think guys look attractive without shirts is a bigger reason not to allow it. School’s all over the country have dress codes based on this concept. You’re not going to get very far arguing that women should like to look at topless men.
That said, if the situation happened as described, the athletic director and principal are idiots. The kid broke the rules, not the coach. And the girls on the track team need something more than feeling uncomfortable to back up the policy. But if they succeed in making this about sex, the guys will lose, and lose big.
Hey, I think I hear the year 1896calling you. It wants you back.
Slee
You are not alone. My first thought was this policy (everyone wears a shirt) probably existed to prevent situation as mentioned above. Personally, it’s always irked me that men can go around topless more places than women.
I can just see Zulema standing up at a boxing match and yelling “put on some clothes!”
