All through middle school and high school, I don’t remember anybody having to shower. We had stalls, not a communal shower. I don’t think they even worked. The fixtures and the drains were actually rusty.
Where I live me have mandatory gym in 7-9. in 7th and 8th grade we had to take showers, but we could use our swimming trunks. The showers consisted of getting your chest wet and saying your number to the gym teacher. In 9th grade no one ever showered. I don’t think the gym teacher ever mentioned showering, the showers were for the sports teams.
Maybe this is more of a GD question, but I can’t help but wonder about these schools that make you shower. What do they expect you to get out of it? Is it supposed to make you more well-rounded if you’ve seen other people naked? More mature, perhaps?
(BTW, at my high school, there are showers, which are always running for some reason, but there’s no time to use them. I think they’re for the athletic teams.)
In Zoggie’s school, (aka, mine), we have showers, but I don’t know if anyone uses them even for the afterschool sports. Usually there’s equipment stored there, and there’s really no time to shower. We change clothes and a lot of times we have gym right before school lets out, so if we really wanted to, we could just go home and shower.
I know there’s nothing wrong with nudity; its a natural and healthy thing. But I just don’t think its right for you to “force” (not sure if that’s the best word) middle/high schoolers to shower. You feel insecure about the way that you look. Your body’s developing and all. Someone mentioned that Americans do have sort of a hang up about nudity which to some extent is true, but IMO, I’d be extremely uncomfortable exposing myself. Its just that at this age, there’s so much changing, and having to be traumitized by something like this is just wrong. You’re supposed (theoretically…!) go to gym class to maybe escape the intellectual education part of the day, get a little bit de-stressed. Its not fair that kids (like Jeff) should be even more agonized through this. I don’t think naked-ness is wrong or offensive, but i’d feel bad about having to shower w/ so many other people around anyway…
We didn’t have to shower in my high school PE class. There was never enough time (or desire, for that matter).
PE class was a joke to me in middle school and high school. I would have much preferred fitness lessons (i.e. how to build cardiovascular endurance, how to lift weights properly, etc.) over the miscellaneous sports we played most days. The only part I liked was the two weeks we were in the weight room instead of the gymnasium. I know the basics of weight lifting thanks to those two weeks, but to this day I don’t know how to play (don’t know all the rules to) basketball, football, soccer, hockey, baseball or any other major sport (nor do I care).
Lets see. I was in the 6th grade in 1984 and the coach made everyone take showers for the first few weeks. He actually came out with a paddle and gave a few ‘licks’ to the guys who tried to skip a shower. After the first few weeks he stopped forcing us to shower and we mostly stopped taking them.
The really strange part was that at the beginning of the year each kid was required to bring 3 bars of soap to PE class. Then each week the coach would place 2-3 bars in the shower for us to use. That right we were supposed to share a bar of soap with each other. Ugggh.
Hell, in my high school the guys on the football team didn’t even shower after games. It never bothered me, even though I got a hell of a lot of zits during football season.
Primarily, basic hygiene, and indirectly, life-long fitness and body acceptance. It’s just a pity that the implementation is often grossly insensitive.
I attended both a private system in which showers were mandatory from the git go, and a public system in which showers were not available until highschool, and not required during highschool.
In the private system, mandatory phys ed was twice per week, and mandatory sports took place for two or more hours per day, six days per week, in the middle of each school day. No slacking was permitted, and kids were grouped by ability to ensure that everyone could succeed. Shower time was set aside after every physical activity. The kids in the private system grew up used to public showers, and I honestly can not recall any of my schoolmates having any qualms. Public showering was as natural as going to class or sitting down to dinner, simply because it was a pattern developed well prior to any self-consciousness over genitalia. If someone was tardy and missed a shower, the peer pressure was significant, particularly as the kids grew older and actually needed showers.
The public system, however, was another matter. Phys ed was twice per week, but certainly not strenuous. It was quite possible to attend without working up a sweat. Phys ed was not compulsory after grade 10. There were no compulsory sports, just optional high school teams after school, in which only athletic (read faster developing) kids participated. By the time highschool rolled around, many of the kids who actually participated fully in phys ed needed showers after exercise, but not having become accustomed to their own and other’s bodies, they shunned showering en masse. Quite simply, they stank. Some recognized this, but rather than showering, they simply avoided exercise. A great pity, for the result was that sports were really only for the jocks, and some of them were pretty ripe. Meanwhile, most kids were not involved in sports.
So here we are with a lamentably sedentary society in which many health issues result from lack of exercise, and a society with a fair bit off embarrassment and even negativity concerning bodies. I believe that promoting far more physical activity throughout public and high school, and getting kids used to basic hygiene prior to their becoming self-conscious, can help address both these issues. If one is seriously involved in sports in the formative years, then I expect that there will be a greater chance of attention to fitness in later life. If one is comfortable with one’s own body from early on, and is used to seeing people of all shapes and sizes, then I expect that there will be more acceptance of body variations in later life, and more comfort with one’s own body in later life.
With that having been said, I’m going to go skiing for the afternoon and then soak in a hot tub with some friends. I’m turning 40 tomorrow. I believe that my lifelong joy in physical activity (note that I say joy, not ability) is an important dimension to my overall well being, and my having been comfortable with my body since day one has helped me accept changes in my body without any concern or embarrassment, and helped me accept other people’s bodies as being wonderful despite whatever shape, size or age they might be.
Anyone else a Freaks and Geeks fan? Sam, the freshman geek, tries as hard as he can to avoid showering after PE, but eventually has to bite the bullet and do it. He works up his courage, and marches towartd the showers - until his path is blocked by the bullies. In response to their taunts, Sam announces he’s proud of his body, so they shove him out of the locker room in just his towel. As he bangs on the door, an arm reaches out and snatches his towel. He’s stuck in the hallway, naked, as the bell rings and students begin filling the halls.
That’s pretty much what high school showering was like for most of us, or at least that was the big fear.
I had a friend who had keloid scars. She had a major scar on her upper chest, and it would show in the nasty polyester, scoop neck bathing suits we had to wear. She and her parents went to the principal with her problem, and it was agreed that she wouldn’t have to wear the school bathing suits. She told everyone she was allergic to them, and the teacher never blew her cover. (We weren’t in the same class, so I’m not sure how she managed to change without people seeing the scar, but I guess that’s beside the point.) It’s terrible that Jeff’s parents or the school administration didn’t make a similar accomodation for him. His condition sounds much more emotionally distrubing than my friend’s scar.
I, too, went to a private school for much of the grade range of the OP. PE was mandatory, every day. We had three days per term we could forego “dressing out” for whatever reason. However, if we dressed out, we showered after gym class.
I don’t remember any big hang-ups. You sweat, you shower, you get dressed and go to class. Our showers were communal, although I think the girls’ locker room had stalls and/or curtains. Our facilities were very nice–more like a fitness center than a gym. None of these stinking hellholes some others here had to endure.
There was this boy, freshman year in my (private,Catholic)HS that was really into Duran Duran and dressed fopishly and talked with a pronounced femininity. Everyone called him fag and the like, though some us sparingly and only so we weren’t called one ourselves. This kid was absent almost every day after the first of the term because the thought of torment scared him away. This only added to the suspicion that he was gay. Well, we never saw him again after that. Years later some kids who ran into him found out he was indeed gay and it was torture to shower and be taunted. It really changed his life for the worst for many years. Drugs, etc. I wonder where he is now? I also often wonder if my brother’s experience was similar. He’s gay. I don’t think showering in front of peers is inherently bad or wrong, but there should be a way of exemption.
Yeah, it’s JROTC. Is it because of your name that you’re so sensitive to the absence of a “J”?
Thank you.
BTW, Spoons, the condition Jeff had is called ‘concealed penis’, ‘buried penis’, or ‘trapped penis’ (depending on the exact particulars and the source of the problem). It isn’t really that uncommon, though it usually resolves in infancy-to-early-childhood. The penis is intact, but retained internally, and there is an apparent small hole through which they can urinate. The scrotum may appear different depending on whether the surface tissue is pulled up internally or not, and at what angle the shaft is retained. In most ‘natural’ cases (those not caused by unusual scarring after circumcision), the problem resolves when puberty starts. Some cases require reconstructive surgery (as when significant scarring or extensive natural webbing exists, or if the child is born with insufficient skin surface, including foreskin). Some doctors recommend reconstruction in infancy, others prefer to wait to see if the problem resolves in adolescence (and therefore can also reconstruct based on adult size, which can’t be predicted from infancy).
Jeff is now probably indistinguishable from everyone else in the locker room, and in all likelihood, didn’t have to do anything special to get there. Just thought you’d like to know.
And I’d bet that the teacher did get reprimanded (especially since the kid left the school), but a lot of schools have a policy against passing that info on to the students. Like the teacher was going to tell you that he got his wrist slapped and a mark on his permanent record?
It’s nice to think that Jeff might be having a better time of it now.
However, I think the problem with the teacher and disciplining him MIGHT have been the privacy factor. Maybe Jeff’s family didn’t want the incident and word to get out about their son.
Hedra, thank you for that explanation. I had no idea that such a condition existed.
And I’m kind of glad to know that Jeff is, in all likelihood, no different from anybody else now. I never really knew him, and I haven’t seen or heard of him since that day, but I’ve always wondered.
Thanks again for the info!
I was in middle school from 1990 to 1993, and i never everrecalled anyone ever taking a shower. In fact, it seemed like everyone was scared to. The farthest undressed we got was down to our underwear, but no one cared about that.
The only things they were used for were pushing people in after someone turned the shwoer on, so they got sopping wet in their gym clothes. The showers were nasty anyway, it looked like they constantly leaked so there were mildewy floors. I never recall anyone smelling, or anyone saying someone did (and I had gym 1st period.
The coach, even though he seemed gruff and rough was actually a nice guy. I was one of the unathletic types and he never made me feel bad about it,and was quite nice to me (he had all daughters, so i think that helped). We did have this scary woman coach who the girls claimed would watch them in their locker room. No one liked her at all. Best description of her would be “butch”. Showers were also not enforced because we would get called in 5 minutes before the bell rang, so we never had time.
In high school, i never found out if they had to take showers. Reason is, I took JROTC for two years (PE was mandatory your freshman and sophomore years, after that it was an elective). I’m thinking it was optional because I dont recall classmates with wet hair in classes. In JROTC, we never broke much of a sweat because it was mostly training for the physical fitness assessment at the end of each semester. We did have to change in a communal area into our PT clothes, but we only stripped down to underwear (there was this one kid who was in the Special Ed classes who would consistently touch and bother the guys, who we all disliked for that reason. He never ever got beaten up for doing the things he did (which would have happened if he was just some other kid).
Being gay, i can only imagine the horror of showering in either Middle School (when i really became aware), and High school, where if I popped a woody, which would have happened, proably, i would have probably been called fag, or whatnot. It would really have been compounded had I been effeminate, or out at that time. (i’m pretty sure of it, because i’d observe many of the guys who took it, who were usually hoodlums, wannabe gangsters, or just punks and assholes, and I knew what their attitudes about it).
My main reasons for not taking PE in HS was because all of the assholes took gym, and i was never (and still arent) good at team/traditional sports. At least in JROTC, people tended to be nicer, and actually cheer you on.
PE student from 7th to 12th grad (elective PE in 11th and 12th - what a great way to start the morning). Showered after every class. Why on earth wouldn’t you want to? Who wants to go through the day stinking to high heaven? Never understood the kids who were deathly afraid to shower in gym class.
To the best of my recollection no one was ever emotionally traumatized by taking showers in front of the other guys. What we objected to was the
!!! COLD FRIGGIN WATER !!!
In eighth grade, we elected a class president who campaigned on a platform of optional showers after gym, and amazingly enough he was able to make it happen.
(No hijack intended/impemented, but I do think that those of you that are parents of children that are school age as mentioned in these postings just might like to share the input of this thread with with your local school board gurus.
If you had problems with the shower arrangement you grew up with, I’d suggest that a review of these inputs just might make a change; if not in your childrens life,… well, maybe, just maybe somewhere down the road.)