A middle school in El Paso, Texas, has banned its students from wearing all-black clothing, citing the color as being “associated with depression and mental health issues.”
According to a local news channel KFOX14Charles Middle School sent parents a letter They were informed that school uniform regulations would no longer allow students to wear all black clothing. Instead, the school’s dress code was changed so that students could only wear khaki or blue jeans and black or green polo shirts and sweaters.
The changes are necessary to “eliminate a look that has become prevalent on campus where students wear black tops and black bottoms, and which is associated with depression and mental health issues and/or criminality rather than with happy and healthy children ready to learn,” the letter said, according to KFOX14.
“They don’t allow students to wear black clothing from top to bottom,” said Norma De La Rosa, president of the El Paso Teachers Association, in a clarifying statement. “They can wear black shorts to gym class. And they can wear them on days when they don’t have a dress code, but they can’t wear them from top to bottom.”
This measure met with fierce resistance from parents almost immediately, who claimed it was unfair and senseless.
“Getting students to wear a different color doesn’t magically turn them into a completely different person,” one parent commented online.
Officials at the El Paso Independent School District appeared to distance themselves from the decision following the heated reactions. “The campus was quick to communicate the dress code change as a final decision and not a recommendation. We regret the miscommunication, especially the intent behind the changes,” one school district said. opinion, Read: The BBC has received it.
This dress code change is one of the strangest attempts to address rising rates of depression and anxiety among teens. It is ridiculous to think that clothing is the cause of a student’s behavioral or mental health issues, rather than having some meaningless connection to them.
This decision reflects a kind of safety mindset among school officials. Rather than trying to address the root causes of student behavior problems, school officials are needlessly interfering with students’ harmless self-expression — exactly the kind of thing that prevents mental health problems rather than causing them.
