Baggy Pants Aren’t the Problem

Editor’s note: This is the latest winning entry in a monthly essay contest for Ventura County high school students sponsored by The Times. Look for details on the Education Page, published each Monday on B2.

This month’s topic: Many schools limit how students dress--banning baggy pants, for example--to curb gang activity. Do such rules infringe unnecessarily on student rights, or are they important to keep campuses safe?

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In the past several years, many schools have implemented dress codes that limit the attire of students. The dress codes have one primary purpose: student safety.

Schools have banned apparel associated with gangs--such as baggy pants, hats and bandannas--hoping that the removal of such clothing from campuses will somehow keep students with violent tendencies from causing problems. That, however, is wishful thinking.

While it is true that gang-related clothing can, and does, provoke rival gang members, it is unreasonable to think that simply removing this attire from campuses will eliminate the problem of violent students.

Dress codes are a superficial solution to a much deeper problem. To think that a gang member will leave his gang affiliations at home with his baggy pants is illogical.

Although a dress code is designed to target violent students, it instead infringes upon the average student who finds his right to dress however he wishes taken away. Dress codes that ban specific types of clothing prevent nonviolent students from expressing their personality.

The freedom to express oneself through clothing is protected by the Supreme Court, which ruled in 1969 that clothing is included in one’s 1st Amendment rights. Clothing is the most visible way of representing oneself, and to have this limited is an unnecessary infringement on a student’s rights.

If a dress code actually prevented violence at school, its limitations would be justified. If it does not, then no matter how rigid the dress code, it is essentially useless unless the root problems behind the violence are solved.

It is clear that clothing is not a root problem behind school violence. According to Ronald J. Maki, a senior clinical psychologist for San Diego County: “The root causes of gangs can be found in modern society’s urbanization, in the breakdown of the family and other social and cultural institutions. These causes are also related to poverty, stress, overwhelmed families, lack of education, overcrowding, housing projects, ghettos, substance dependency, domestic violence and ethnic and cultural differences.”

True, hats and bandannas may provoke an altercation but the hat or the bandanna is not the cause of the fight. It is the cause of the fight that must be addressed--not the piece of clothing that provokes it.

Instead of limiting attire, schools need to remove violent students from the classroom and deal with them appropriately, even if that means counseling or alternative placement.

Schools will not become safe until gangs are nonexistent, and unfortunately it will take a strong, concentrated effort to eliminate gangs. Students have the right to learn in a safe and protected environment, an environment that cannot be achieved with a simple dress code.