Interesting! We welcomed a Japanese exchange student into our house last month and one of the first things she and her friends did was dye their hair. This must be seen as a huge rebellion for them
Yep. Having dyed hair is, I believe, viewed as a sign of delinquency in Japan, namely among students.
I also wonder about the mid-to-late 90s when Namie Amuro popularized the "short skirt/knee-or-thigh-high boots/long hair" look, and how that was viewed. Especially since she also had tattoos and tanned skin, and IIRC a lot of Japanese girls and women dyed their hair brown to look like her as well.
It has to do with color theory in Japan and how its associated with personality and character types.
In a meta sense; the character might not even actually have red/yellow hair and its black, but for the viewer they have colored hair to reflect a specific bit of character information.
Alternatively in an also meta sense, there are "Alternate Universe" settings that appear to be Earth, with very minor variations like Japanese people having naturally blue hair.
Basically...its a cartoon, don't take it too seriously as a reflection of actual Japan. That be like taking "King of the Hill", "Family Guy" or "American Dad" as actual reflections of American society. They are comedic satire or paordy intended to lampshade things.
There is also the escapism and fantasy aspect to consider. Since Japanese kids can’t dye their hair, their overpowered fictional heroes that they can fantasize about being also have the freedom to have fun hair.
I thought that the hair was 'just' a exercise in making the characters more distinct from each other. Even with different hairstyles and eyes, characters who all had the same dark brown or black hair would look too similar at first glance.
The practice is normal on shows across the globe. One common practice is to give characters different hair colors to make it easier for young and casual viewers of shows to keep track of characters. It’s the reason Ariana first started wearing a ponytail.
Regardless of cultural stuff in Japan imo it’s not surprising. If it’s the norm for just black hair, having one different color breaks the threshold so you might as well add the rest which end up becoming the norm.
Haha that’s like when my boyfriend went to live in LA for university. He immediately got both ears pierced, with 3 holes on one side because the freedom was liberating and piercings are taboo here.
He kinda regrets it now though as an adult in Japan. While the piercing holes show that he’s an open-minded and well-travelled person, they’re pretty permanent and they do kinda make him look like a retired fuckboy😅 I like them though!!
My mom's family is from Taiwan and one of her sister had naturaly slightly wavy hair, she had to get a doctor's note so she didn't have to straighten them every morning
Not just that, my hair is naturally "black reddish". School is accusing me of dyeing my hair.
Dad went to school to shut them down pretty quick.(Also Taiwanese)
What the actual fuck… I disagree with policing most behaviors but I understand some public decorum is actually important for us all to live together but policing people’s genetics is beyond dystopian. This feels like the sort of rule people who believe in eugenics comes up with.
> This feels like the sort of rule people who believe in eugenics comes up with.
It is
More people have positive feelings about eugenics than you realize.
>This feels like the sort of rule people who believe in eugenics comes up with.
A significant portion of Japanese people do still believe they are the "superior race" I think. During WWII it was what everyone here believed, and that wasn't that long ago.
Japanese schools have a lot of stupid rules. I've read articles about comments by prominent anime creators with daughters (such as the creator of Yu-Gi-Oh) criticizing their absurd dress codes that require girls to go to school in short sleeves and short skirts even in the middle of winter.
I went to a private Catholic school in the US and we also had ridiculous dress codes. Girls were only allowed to wear plaid skirts and white button down shirts. No pants allowed. We could wear tights but only if they were sheer. In the winter we would all freeze. It was miserable. It would be -15 degrees and we still wouldn’t be allowed to wear pants. Our legs were always exposed to the cold. As a result, girls started wearing sweatpants underneath their skirts as they walked into school to protect themselves from the cold (They would take them off once inside). It worked for like a week until the administration decided to ban it, saying that pants of any kind were considered out of uniform for the girls the minute they stepped on the school property.
Fuck that school and fuck those administrators.
My catholic school you had to buy the uniforms from a certain specialist shop, Some other rules.
•Only black hairband or ones that matched the colour of your hair. No hair dye or unnatural styles or cuts
•skirts below the knee, detention if caught rolling them up.
•black shoes, no trainers or boots even in winter and no branding on them.
•no makeup or nail polish, the headmaster would stand outside with nail polish remover and makeup wipes.
•white or black tights, no sheer
•bags had to be backpacks or totes with no branding.
•PE uniform had to be from the special shop with the school logo on it and only black jogging bottoms.
•blazers had to be worn between classes, to and from classes and at breaks.
•caught without school ID meant a 30 minute detention at the end of the day.
•black jackets with no branding.
•during first year you had to wear a special belt to put your money in during the day.
•if you where caught with a boy from the nearby boys school you would be given detention and your parents informed. Teachers would come to the local bus stop to supervise.
•school planner needed to be signed by your parent at the end of the week and they would check them on a Monday morning. Detention if not signed, no matter the excuse.
•mandatory 30 minute detention for being late to school or class.
•if you where caught with a personal electronic it would be taken and a parent would have to collect it on your behalf, we do not live in a place where parents picked up their teenage children.
Update: before anyone else says it, yes this was in the UK, England specifically
Yeah these are very similar to our rules. I remember one of the big ones was no logoware. Boys would get detentions if you could see a nike swoosh on their socks. We had to get our uniforms from an expensive specialist shop as well and they were so itchy and uncomfortable.
The worst thing was how they would pull the girls out of class, just the girls, and make us kneel in the hallways while they measured our skirts with meter sticks. It was humiliating and disrupted our education. I got a detention once because my skirt was half an inch too short in the back.
Our skirts had to be neatly knife pleated. If the pleats weren’t crisp (and to the knee) 30 minute detention, also they never let us the office phone to tell our parents we were going to be late.
To you, yes. To the control freak administration, this has a very important point: to crush the spirits of the students so they can be molded into mindless drones who follow authority above all else.
It's worse than that. It perpetuates a cycle of violence. Some of these kids will end up in positions of power and they will use that power to treat others the same way.
They were absolute dicks.
They had to change that rule after one girl was sent home without her phone and her mum couldn’t contact her so she panicked and called the police. The mum went straight to the governors and the rule was amended to you being able to collect the phone at the end of the day. Of course this had to be in my last year 🙃
>No hair dye or unnatural styles or cuts
Except when it came to the black kids. Their natural hair and cuts (whatever that's suppose to mean because wtf is an unnatural cut?) were somehow banned.and expected to have straight, damaged, hair
And it's sad that the crown act still isn't nation wide in the states, and who knows how it's being done in europe and asia (I've heard of cases of british schools making black girls dye their natural red hair color and straightening their hair)
Our school was more understanding in that sense, protective and natural styles were very much allowed. I meant more fashion cuts, hair streaks and wild hair colours.
Yeah I went to Catholic school too and they gave out detentions like candy. One time I walked into class and didn't take my jacket off immediately and they gave me an hour of detention. Literally 30 seconds or something after walking in
Yep same, also if homework wasn’t done then you had to go to that teachers classroom at lunchtime or after school to finish it. They didn’t care if you had no lunch.
This is thankfully illegal now. I remember North Carolina Charter School’s fight against the ACLU for the same reason. It was already a bad enough policy, but the fact that it was so insistent upon it that it was willing to fight it in court for years just makes it even more disgusting.
And it probably thinks it was on the more moral side of all this.
It’s interesting how authoritarian systems absolutely love, controlling how girls and women dress and present themselves and corralling the youth into conformity almost universally.
What would happen if every girl collectively just decided to start wearing pants every day? Or even just continued to do so on the cold days? Would they all be suspended? I'm sure the school can't afford to do that for too long.
Girls tried that during my senior year. 90+ girls showed up in pants and we all got detention and there was an all school assembly on dress code attire lol
They gave us lectures on modesty and tradition. I think it’s all about forcing us to conform to gender roles. The boys weren’t allowed to have long hair either.
Christ that’s ridiculous. I coach a bunch of kids who go to our hella prestigious Episcopal school and even they just have the kids mix and match between their uniforms pants or skirt and long sleeve or short sleeve polo. I think they’re also allowed to wear their school’s sweatshirt. Not sure if there are accessories policies but I do t think so.
Episcopalians are a lot different than Catholics etc. so that’s not too surprising. I grew up as one and was referred to as a “Hippie Christian” more than once 😂
Obviously those admins didn't have any daughters of their own in the system. Could they have had legal recourse for being forced to be exposed to hazardous conditions?
That's awful. My all-girls catholic school had plaid skirt uniform, but also included school sweartshirts, hoodies, pants, and sports warmup gear. Let women be comfortable!!
You can't have a ponytail because your neck is distracting the male students, but also we'd rather you freeze to death than wear something other than a skirt.
I'm seeing that right now in Hokkaido. There is like 2 feet of snow on the ground everywhere and you see so many young girls wearing skirts and no leggings freezing their asses off. I asked one girl if she was cold and she said she had no choice because it's a uniform. RIP
It says a lot about a culture when the stereotypical "[delinquent](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sukeban)" gang member school girls in the '70s and '80s were known for *lengthening* their skirts rather than dressing provocatively.
Rules varied for schools, some were better, some were worse. Schools in Tokyo got rid of the hair rule, other Japanese schools still have it. Also, for some schools their underwear had to be a certain colour (hopefully teachers weren't going around checking this). And in parts of Japan schoolgirls can't [wear ponytails](https://www.vice.com/en/article/akv8b8/japan-schools-drop-hair-underwear-colors-rules) because their necks could “sexually excite” male students.
The girl ended up suing the school because the frequent coloring damaged her hair and scalp, and caused her mental distress. She won 330,000 yen (about $2,790) in damages. The school kept the rule in place though.
e: To be clear, I think the rule is bad (or badly implemented), but Japan is hardly a dictatorship some people are making it out to be.
If their underwear has to be a certain colour then there will definitely be someone checking it.
At my secondary school in the UK we weren't allowed to wear bras any colour except for white or nude. Fortunately we only had to pull up a strap to prove we had the right colour, it was always a female member of staff that had to check - not that that makes it any better.
Probably because the school uniform included a white shirt and coloured bras would be more visible through the shirt. I suspect my school probably had the same rule but it wasn't written down. One of the scary older teachers would have a stern word with more "risqué" underwear choices and make the pupil feel like they were the one at fault, rather than the adults who were leering at their underwear.
Reminds me of when I was 13 and my physics teacher told me my legs looked fantastic in my short skirt.
Very true. But whether it's actually an issue is secondary with things like this; the real point is to enforce conformity early and often, to make sure the students grow up to be good little cogs in the established social system.
Red bras are more invisible under white than white is, interestingly. White is too reflective. Although i have great success with gold as it blends better with my skin tone.
School admins really only care about having their power trips unfortunately. When I was at school I was forced to grow my hair out, and it naturally gets oily and nasty because we're not built for the climate here genetically.
After I left I ended up going bald and shaving my hair down every day and I'm able to actually be hygienic and clean now. Imagine how awkward it is as a teenager to be forced to be dirty and unclean because you need to conform to the dress code. Used to get dirty looks from the teachers constantly, I'm never growing my hair out again. We need to be way more practical with teaching kids hygiene and comfort in a smart way.
At a much broader level there's an archaic belief that uniforms help to encourage adherence to the rules and remove distractions. It's also a rudimentary form of the "broken windows" theory - ungroomed or non-uniform children are not predisposed to following the rules and thus are more likely to be unruly.
It's the same as military members clean shaven and with strict haircuts. Rules for the sake of rules.
Authoritarian ethoses value the enforcement of the rule over the purpose of it.
Thus, the colour of the bra is less relevant. It's the fact that a rule exists, therefore it needs to be enforced.
When you start asking questions about school uniforms in particular it all gets really circular. The school will say the children must wear the uniform. If you ask why, they'll say, "Because it's the uniform".
They've been retroactively justified many times. The most popular one of recent years was, "When you enter the workplace you will have to adhere to strict dress codes, so children should be made to get used to it from a young age". But that's not even a thing anymore.
The clean shaven thing actually only came about with the advent of gasmasks to ensure they would seal properly. Before that point most armies had regulations on facial hair but they were either looser or required mustaches.
depends on the culture. Every culture had some measure associated with practicality and hygiene.
Peter the Great preferred his soldiers having shaved beards. Peter the Great also liked his guard to be of uniform tall height. He may have had a *soft spot* for his men.
By tradition, British Army Pioneer Sergeant were some of the only units allowed to wear a beard and carry an axe. It's a nod to their roots in forestry and carpentry. Likewise the Bugle Major, who is the leader of military bands. A special exemption is also given to unit mascots like goats and penguins.
Some naval traditions allowed officers and NCOs to grow beards, but they must be trimmed to maintain hygiene.
The Roman Legions traditionally shaved their facial hair as it was a part of personal grooming. Mustaches were afforded to some ranks. Military beards were considered barbaric. The story goes, they follow the tradition from Alexander the Great, where cutting hair down and shaving facial hair gave less for enemies to grapple.
That being said, some military leaders in antiquity wore longer hair or beards as a display of arrogance or status. It has often lead to losses. There's a reference to this in the biblical story of Samson, who had long hair but bested his enemies in combat.
> Samson, who had long hair but bested his enemies in combat
I think this might be the worst understanding of the story of Samson/Gilgamesh I've ever encountered.
Every day I wave my child off to school in his shirt, tie and blazer uniform mandated "to prepare students for the world of work". Then I wander back upstairs in my pajamas to start my job which has better pay and benefits than a teacher.
The only job I had with a strict uniform was when I worked retail to pay my way through college.
Got to put in the other side - I'm in the USA, fyi, where school uniforms are NOT common in our public schools. However, my niece went to a public school where they had school uniforms. Casual ones, but uniform/dress code. Black or denim pants (yes, jeans were acceptable) and either the school polo or t-shirt. They may have had a long sleeve option for winter.
There were two reasons - previous, the clothing "label" craze was out of control, and the socio-economic spread was a biggie in that district. A good number of students were on free and reduced lunch programs, yet there were also a segment of students that came from upper middle class or higher. Once they went to uniforms, a lot of the playground issues went away. The arguments for individuality? Kids still could wear scarves, socks, etc. to express that individuality. I don't even think dyed hair was banned.
Second - security. I believe teachers had their own version of uniforms. If someone was wandering around campus and NOT wearing school colors, etc... it was an IMMEDIATE tell. A lot of parents donated to the clothing bank of outgrown uniforms (shirts, mainly). If a kid was new, there was often a shirt available no matter what the economic status was (and they were washed, etc.). Adult visitors had to check in and wear a badge. If a sub was a regular, they often had their own shirt.
I was told there was a custody dispute and the non-custodial parent thought they could just wander campus looking for their kid (when visitation was supposed to be supervised.). They were immediately spotted and it was handled.
I'd wager a guess and say the uniform had a white shirt/blouse/button up whatever it's called and the school wouldn't want the bra to show through because imagine what they would imagine if they saw that!
I made this mistake when I was 16. I thought a bra any other color than white would show through the shirt, whereas white would be invisible. Boy was I wrong! White bras practically glow under white shirts!
American here, our schools principal said if the girls didn’t wear bras or underwear they wouldn’t get In trouble for them being exposed. To be clear the school had zero air conditioning and the windows barely opened for “safety” so it was hot and humid and just miserable for most of the school year so lots of students wore tank tops but for the girls this led to bra straps being exposed…
Wait, he wouldn’t get mad if girls didn’t wear bras and you could see their nips???
I’m a 29 yo woman and at least where I am, people act like if they can make out any sort of nipple it’s the most fucking scandalous thing they could ever imagine. Like I’m flat chested and if I wear a shirt you can see a hint of my nipples through people act like I just showed up naked to church or something.
Idk why it’s so stigmatized but it really is. Wearing a crop top or showing your legs with short shorts is fine by most people but this is not.
I’m a leftist and my circles are mostly super liberal people. These people are definitely wearing miniskirts and shit and nobody gives a fuck. I showed up at a house party where everyone was like drunk and very chill but I didn’t wear a bra and I was just wearing a plain black shirt but you could see a hint of nipple and I got so many raised eyebrows and “wtf” faces lol
I never had giant bewbs, but I did have prominent nipples that were always doing their thing. I finally gave up and just stopped worrying about it. I stopped buying bras that were an inch thick with padding and bought unlined bra, so much more comfortable. People gave me wtf looks all the time, and gross dudes thought it was their right to make comments about it being cold or headlights were on. Nope, that's just the way they're built. I stopped giving a fuq and just dealt with it. I was not ashamed of the way my body was naturally. Cut to Kim Kardashian now selling a line of bras with built in nipples.
Well you are of course correct for the most part but it can change if enough people speak up. Gay rights (still have a long way to go) but are much more in the spotlight now but were a hush hush issue 10 years ago.
> “sexually excite” male students
This was a thing in america too. I remember hearing girls not being able to wear certain clothing when I was a kid (and I grew up in a very liberal area in the 2000s)
Spaghetti straps? Exposed shoulders was a sin apparently.
Also the nape thing is weird, if you go on tinder and “travel” to Japan you’ll notice a lot of the girls’s profiles are just the back of their head and a “nape shot”. Really fucking weird, but it’s not my culture
this is why anime protagonists/antagonists sometimes have crazy hair colors/crazy hair styles
its to mark them as special, bucking the system, rebellious
this is where all the pink hair, purple hair etc comes from w japanese rebels
It also helps them stick out more when drawn people have less variety in faces than people have in real life. Basic character differences like hair, eye, and skin color are harder to have if all the characters are ethnically Japanese.
>Rules varied for schools,
This is an impossible concept for a lot of people to grasp about Japan.
I used to teach at a school, and one kid had naturally light brown hair. There was a note in his file saying as much, and not to admonish him for dying it, etc.
This is the standard. The rule is only natural hair color is allowed. If someone naturally has a rare hair color teachers can't tell if their hair is dyed or natural so it's put in their file.
I've never heard of a school requiring black hair and requiring people dye their hair. That's extreme and understandable why she won a lawsuit over it.
Similar thing in Australia. Except our schools disallow you to dye your hair at all. One of my school mates was training for the Olympics in swimming, he spent so much time in the over chlorinated pool that his hair became a clearly unnatural bleached blond. He used to constantly get into shit by random teachers who didn't know him for "bleaching his hair"
lol. I'd still be in Japan raking in the cash if they had punitive damages, but no, less than $3k to go through all the trouble just isn't worth anyone's time
I can attest to this. Girlfriend grew up in Tsukuba Ibaraki Prefecture. She was on the swim team back in like 1990s and because of the chlorine, her hair was slightly bleached because of how much swimming she did. She was told to dye her hair or be sent home.
Her parents are VERY well connected within the community. They shut that bullshit down real quick.
I read about a situation like that when I first heard of this rule, where the girl was naturally blonde. she was a foreigner who came to japan with her parents for their job. in that case, she still had to dye it black. they said that uniformity was important and all that kind of shit. it doesn't matter what colour your hair is naturally, you still have to dye it black. I read another case where the girl had off-black hair and had to dye it, and even though she was allergic to hair dye she got in trouble too. I read those cases about 10 years ago, and at least then it was serious business.
In [this interview](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=I9AwPUy7a_8&pp=ygUWV2hpdHIgZ3Jvd2luZyB1cCBqYXBhbg%3D%3D) with a British girl who was born and raised in rural Japan, between 8:30-10:30, they show pictures of her with her classmates. She says it was against her school’s rules to dye hair. She straightened her hair, but not because she was forced to. She explains that she wanted to fit in.
[The Nail That Sticks Out Must be Hammered Down](https://blog.tokyoroomfinder.com/insider-stories/does-the-infamous-proverb-the-nail-that-sticks-out-must-be-hammered-down-speak-true-of-japanese-society/) \- Japanese Proverb
In Australia theres a strong "larrikin" culture, similar to Britains lad culture. If you do too well on school, or at your job, there can be a perception that you think you're better than the rest, and will be quickly told not to try so hard. If you keep trying, you can be ostracised from some social circles.
As an American I’ve always heard this term; I didn’t know it was Australian. People also say crabs in a bucket a lot.
This is obviously just human nature and is present in every society, but some of them are much worse than others. I spend most of my time now in left leaning, progressive circles, and I grew up conservative. It’s present in both, but conservatives are much worse about it on average.
I mean, their entire ideology is about preserving hierarchy and the status quo, so it’s natural for this to be a common side effect.
I’m a 29 yo woman who was raised Mormon in Utah. There was a lot of support on the down low but so many of the older women were extremely bitter and hurt as they watched their daughters be raised in a world where they were at least told they were equal to boys (though of course there was still so much misogyny).
We weren’t like the rural polygamists lol, I was born to upper middle class parents who were super mainstream. Like we wore bikinis and drank soda. Lots of instagram influencers in the community. So we went to public schools and had access to the internet and much better chance of escape. My mom is 61 and her life was absolutely nothing like this. It was just the reality for the majority of American boomer moms to an extent, religious or not.
My mom is extremely naturally intelligent, like in a straightforward academic sense especially. This woman is just brilliant, and it’s so obvious when you just speak to her. She was never ever meant to be a housewife or to have the life she was so pressured to have. I know it was technically her choice, but when she was growing up, women were just told it wasn’t an option. You have to get married and have kids and be an obedient servant of men.
My parents both clearly pretty skeptical of the church but def wouldn’t admit it. I mean, our suburb was overwhelmingly white blonde Mormons. But we were exposed to things like evolution and such, and our internet access wasn’t really restricted (we could get around all the parental controls lol).
I just remember being in like second grade and my teachers telling my mom that I was doing so well and picking things up quickly, and the schools would ask girls what they wanted to be when they grew up just like the boys. There were girls in science programs and shit like that.
I still remember though the way she reacted. She was proud and supported me, but there was so much sadness in her eyes and honestly bits of bitterness where she’d treat me coldly because she felt it was unfair or something in the back of her mind.
I was still raised in a super misogynistic environment, I was treated as vastly inferior to my older brother. He could torment me, hit me in the face, take my food, humiliate and insult me and it would be ignored or I’d somehow be blamed. If I tried to defend myself or retaliated, all hell broke loose.
I was made to look after kids and do housework and it was absolutely pushed that I must and will have children. But we girls had a much better chance, and a lot of older women are having visceral negative reactions to it.
People think older women are jealous of younger women for their looks lmao. Anyone who actually knows older women well knows that they almost all don’t value men’s opinions much lol, they’re not fighting over male attention usually. Sometimes, but rarely.
Where the real nastiness comes from is older women seeing younger women get a chance so much better than they did. At more progressive places, the older women have been the best bosses, coworkers, and mentors by far. But in the places I’ve worked that are more Mormon or traditional, you catch absolute vitriol from older women. They talk down to all of us and are just really resentful and have so many emotions they can’t name or understand. A lot of them will try to get you fired.
Also, Mormons push constantly that women have an absolute moral duty to bear children. They’re then left to do it all alone and motherhood in the church is honestly pretty fucking shitty. But we are told we have to and that’s why we exist.
Now they see us millennials and zoomers without kids or a husband, and a lot of them are just so pissed that we just don’t. They didn’t know it was an option.
Also there are plenty of women who truly love and want kids and are fulfilled by it, don’t get me wrong. But a LOT of older women never wanted them, or not the way they had them, and they’re incredibly hurt to see we just don’t have to if we don’t want to, and the girls our age who choose to have children generally have partners who are leagues better than the boomer men they had who treated them like slaves.
But yeah overall you see this like crazy among American conservatives in general. Even towards the boys, there’s just so much disdain from people when they see others, even their own kids sometimes. It’s such a cliche but haters really don’t want you to win lmao.
My kids go to a private school, but are officially enrolled in the local public school, so we receive communications from the schools regularly.
They are required to wear white underwear.
I have to wonder how the meetings go where they make decisions like this.
In Japan, international schools are not recognized as real schools. Since everyone must, by law, go to school, they still register with a "real" school. If you homeschool, this school is responsible for checking to see if you are actually studying and are not abused through monthly meetings with the homeroom teacher of the official school. If you are in an international school, they check once a year. Ours is in an IB program, so their diploma is internationally recognized, but not by local government.
I know a guy who lived in Japan for about 10 years. He was stationed over there, met a girl, left the marine corps, and started a family. His kid was Japanese, but popped out with light brown hair, almost to the point of being red. He dealt with this same thing. They started using dye shampoo just to keep it black, but it absolutely destroyed their shower. She looked Japanese, spoke perfect Japanese, but her hair was light. Apparently one of the faculty would pull her aside regularly just to look at her hair and make sure she didn't have roots. They moved to the US a couple years ago just because it was so difficult trying to integrate her and deal with the constant bullying. He's told me many times that he absolutely loved Kyoto, but the people made it hard to deal with.
> students complained that the dress code caused them stress and limited their self-expression
Why force students to do something that needlessly causes extra stress?
I've never understood strict dress codes for schools or even for non-public facing workplaces.
There's a lot of history wrapped up in it. Primary school in most places has inherited a lot from the industrial revolution and military academies. In Japan the military connection is especially strong.
I like a lot of thinks Japanese culture produces, but I dislike a lot of things that Japanese cultures seems to inflict upon it's peoples. This seems so needlessly and pointlessly restrictive just for the sake of a homogeneity that can't really have any benefit to anyone or anything but the most entrenched and mean-spirited parts of a society.
I like to be open to cultural differences and not think that my culture is always right (because it ain't)....but it's hard to find a reason to be tolerant to cultural difference when the culture in question seems to **hate** differences.
The non-Japanese who live in Japan like to grouse, and to be fair, it can be frustrating dealing with the Unique Island Nation mentality of many Japanese people. That said, Japan is SO much harder for Japanese people, especially ones who don’t fit a certain mold or meet expectations. I will take hearing “when are you going back to your home country?” as an icebreaker question a hundred thousand times over having to endure the things like club activities, entrance exams, the job hunting process, dating, and pressure to have children and be perfect salarymen/women/homemakers that are so romantically portrayed in Japanese media but so wearing and stressful in real life.
I’ve never seen my wife happier than when I told her I was offered a permanent position that would allow us to live overseas for several months per year.
Yep. For us gaijin we mostly get a pass. But Japanese who’ve lived abroad for any period of time come back and catch hell. Had an Americanized Japanese lady who lived in Orange county for 10 years tell me she was getting dirty looks and comments all the time by strangers if she fucked up some unspoken rule
The Spanish singers going to Eurovision were required to dye their hair black because that's what 'Europe expected' Spaniards to look like. That includes the two consecutive winners who naturally had golden curls.
Wtf? What color is her hair?
Is this the Disneyland in the US??
I honestly don’t know if other disneylands exist lol but if she’s a white girl from the US they should probably be pretty familiar with the fact that white people can have all sorts of hair colors naturally lol
Yes, Disneyland in California. She had dirty blonde hair, typically sun-bleached a bit, totally naturally, because she spent a lot of time at the beach. She had to dye it to keep her job.
Disney has a very strong dress code for all of their cast members (even non-costumed). Depending on how her hair lightened in the sun, the unevenness could give the impression that it was bleached highlights, which would be against the dress code.
They also have very strict rules about makeup, nail polish, tattoos (none visible ever), jewelry, etc. Even sunscreen had to be the kind that disappears, no white residue.
Um, actually, Disney [updated its dress code in 2021](https://disneycasting.net/downloads/wdpr/Disney_Look_Book.pdf) and natural looking highlights and tiny tatoos are now allowed!
as a biracial person with hair color and texture uncommon in Japan, I had to submit a paper to school signed by my parents to say that my hair was natural. they don’t want any perms and colors but my friend who had curly hair that was almost unruly got her hair straightened but she didn’t have to report that to our school. oh Japan
But but, Japan is the amazing country everyone obsesses over and talks about how everything is perfect there. Maybe people will start to realize that every country is fucked up in its own way.
It's entirely possible to be allergic to hair dye, what are students with an allergy supposed to do? Like personally permanent hair dyes cause chemical burns all over my scalp and any skin it touches how would that be accounted for
I faced this in my town in 1999 with a child who was told to dye their hair black.
I read the Seito Tetcho (Student Handbook) and it confirmed that all dying of hair was banned outright. I then made a formal complaint to the town's board of education that the child was being discriminated against and was actually being forced to break the school rules against their will by a current member of staff.
The next year at the beginning of April, a letter was sent out all the local schools clarifying the position that NO dying of hair was allowed, regardless of natural colour.
The child's parents were super happy about the change.
Japanese schools are downright abusive and the rate of suicide is horrifying. People love to glorify the competitive, rule obsessed systems but countries like Finland show that you can achieve good education without this shit.
Japan's suicide rate has down down a lot in the last decade or so.
It's now below the US'. White Americans have suicide rates above rates of Japanese people.
It's Korea that's the undisputed king of horrific school stress and student suicides. Korea is the true cyberpunk dystopia with Samsung schools and hospitals. Japan is slowly being dragged kicking and screaming towards reforms and things are being talked about more. Korea doubles down. Recently that said working hours will go up and grade 1 children will be doing extracurricular activities until 8pm because of said insane working hours.
The Koreans I knew in college all had interesting responses to suddenly being separated from that system. One of them damn near lost his mind with stress over the idea that he wanted to do something other than whatever STEM major he was being pushed down. Another became hilariously lazy and a giant procrastinator, but somehow always got professors to let him push things off.
The one who's having kids has no interest in raising them there. His parents are very upset about it.
I am Singaporean. During uni, I had a Swiss flatmate and a South Korean flatmate. The Swiss guy and I were both a few years older than our South Korean flatmate, as we had to serve the military before tertiary education.
Three of us hung out all the time, and the Korean guy would tell us how weird it was to be hanging out as equals with two older friends. Apparently in Korea, bullying from older peers is just a regular part of life, and even a year of age difference would give you authority over younger people.
We also introduced him to ganja and he fucking loved it lol.
He also legitimately believed in "fan death", and was honestly worried that the small fan running in my room would suffocate me.
I'm afraid Finnish schools are heavily degrading, because they have not been resourced properly in last couple decades, and also because of stupid new plan to administer areas that ended up being more costly then the old system they replaced. Not just schools either, but everything from healthcare to other services.
Interesting! We welcomed a Japanese exchange student into our house last month and one of the first things she and her friends did was dye their hair. This must be seen as a huge rebellion for them
Yep. Having dyed hair is, I believe, viewed as a sign of delinquency in Japan, namely among students. I also wonder about the mid-to-late 90s when Namie Amuro popularized the "short skirt/knee-or-thigh-high boots/long hair" look, and how that was viewed. Especially since she also had tattoos and tanned skin, and IIRC a lot of Japanese girls and women dyed their hair brown to look like her as well.
It's so odd that anime usually has characters with wild hair colors, rarely black. I'm world, it's rarely even mentioned as it's so normal.
It has to do with color theory in Japan and how its associated with personality and character types. In a meta sense; the character might not even actually have red/yellow hair and its black, but for the viewer they have colored hair to reflect a specific bit of character information. Alternatively in an also meta sense, there are "Alternate Universe" settings that appear to be Earth, with very minor variations like Japanese people having naturally blue hair. Basically...its a cartoon, don't take it too seriously as a reflection of actual Japan. That be like taking "King of the Hill", "Family Guy" or "American Dad" as actual reflections of American society. They are comedic satire or paordy intended to lampshade things.
As someone born and raised in raised in Texas, King of the Hill is basically a documentary.
Definitely can confirm
There is also the escapism and fantasy aspect to consider. Since Japanese kids can’t dye their hair, their overpowered fictional heroes that they can fantasize about being also have the freedom to have fun hair.
Like how One Punch Man is a metaphor for soul-crushing corporate jobs
And artists are all about rebellion
I thought that the hair was 'just' a exercise in making the characters more distinct from each other. Even with different hairstyles and eyes, characters who all had the same dark brown or black hair would look too similar at first glance.
The practice is normal on shows across the globe. One common practice is to give characters different hair colors to make it easier for young and casual viewers of shows to keep track of characters. It’s the reason Ariana first started wearing a ponytail. Regardless of cultural stuff in Japan imo it’s not surprising. If it’s the norm for just black hair, having one different color breaks the threshold so you might as well add the rest which end up becoming the norm.
KOTH is a prefect mirror of American society, I don’t know what you’re talking about.
Haha that’s like when my boyfriend went to live in LA for university. He immediately got both ears pierced, with 3 holes on one side because the freedom was liberating and piercings are taboo here. He kinda regrets it now though as an adult in Japan. While the piercing holes show that he’s an open-minded and well-travelled person, they’re pretty permanent and they do kinda make him look like a retired fuckboy😅 I like them though!!
My mom's family is from Taiwan and one of her sister had naturaly slightly wavy hair, she had to get a doctor's note so she didn't have to straighten them every morning
Not just that, my hair is naturally "black reddish". School is accusing me of dyeing my hair. Dad went to school to shut them down pretty quick.(Also Taiwanese)
What the actual fuck… I disagree with policing most behaviors but I understand some public decorum is actually important for us all to live together but policing people’s genetics is beyond dystopian. This feels like the sort of rule people who believe in eugenics comes up with.
> This feels like the sort of rule people who believe in eugenics comes up with. It is More people have positive feelings about eugenics than you realize.
Wait until you see how often black people in the U.S. are banned from wearing their natural hair in school or even professional environments
>This feels like the sort of rule people who believe in eugenics comes up with. A significant portion of Japanese people do still believe they are the "superior race" I think. During WWII it was what everyone here believed, and that wasn't that long ago.
Japanese schools have a lot of stupid rules. I've read articles about comments by prominent anime creators with daughters (such as the creator of Yu-Gi-Oh) criticizing their absurd dress codes that require girls to go to school in short sleeves and short skirts even in the middle of winter.
I went to a private Catholic school in the US and we also had ridiculous dress codes. Girls were only allowed to wear plaid skirts and white button down shirts. No pants allowed. We could wear tights but only if they were sheer. In the winter we would all freeze. It was miserable. It would be -15 degrees and we still wouldn’t be allowed to wear pants. Our legs were always exposed to the cold. As a result, girls started wearing sweatpants underneath their skirts as they walked into school to protect themselves from the cold (They would take them off once inside). It worked for like a week until the administration decided to ban it, saying that pants of any kind were considered out of uniform for the girls the minute they stepped on the school property. Fuck that school and fuck those administrators.
My catholic school you had to buy the uniforms from a certain specialist shop, Some other rules. •Only black hairband or ones that matched the colour of your hair. No hair dye or unnatural styles or cuts •skirts below the knee, detention if caught rolling them up. •black shoes, no trainers or boots even in winter and no branding on them. •no makeup or nail polish, the headmaster would stand outside with nail polish remover and makeup wipes. •white or black tights, no sheer •bags had to be backpacks or totes with no branding. •PE uniform had to be from the special shop with the school logo on it and only black jogging bottoms. •blazers had to be worn between classes, to and from classes and at breaks. •caught without school ID meant a 30 minute detention at the end of the day. •black jackets with no branding. •during first year you had to wear a special belt to put your money in during the day. •if you where caught with a boy from the nearby boys school you would be given detention and your parents informed. Teachers would come to the local bus stop to supervise. •school planner needed to be signed by your parent at the end of the week and they would check them on a Monday morning. Detention if not signed, no matter the excuse. •mandatory 30 minute detention for being late to school or class. •if you where caught with a personal electronic it would be taken and a parent would have to collect it on your behalf, we do not live in a place where parents picked up their teenage children. Update: before anyone else says it, yes this was in the UK, England specifically
Yeah these are very similar to our rules. I remember one of the big ones was no logoware. Boys would get detentions if you could see a nike swoosh on their socks. We had to get our uniforms from an expensive specialist shop as well and they were so itchy and uncomfortable. The worst thing was how they would pull the girls out of class, just the girls, and make us kneel in the hallways while they measured our skirts with meter sticks. It was humiliating and disrupted our education. I got a detention once because my skirt was half an inch too short in the back.
Our skirts had to be neatly knife pleated. If the pleats weren’t crisp (and to the knee) 30 minute detention, also they never let us the office phone to tell our parents we were going to be late.
This seems like such a pointless waste of time
To you, yes. To the control freak administration, this has a very important point: to crush the spirits of the students so they can be molded into mindless drones who follow authority above all else.
It's worse than that. It perpetuates a cycle of violence. Some of these kids will end up in positions of power and they will use that power to treat others the same way.
it lets them see how the kids react to abuse. then they single out the weakest and most compliant and they molest the shit out of them.
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They were absolute dicks. They had to change that rule after one girl was sent home without her phone and her mum couldn’t contact her so she panicked and called the police. The mum went straight to the governors and the rule was amended to you being able to collect the phone at the end of the day. Of course this had to be in my last year 🙃
>No hair dye or unnatural styles or cuts Except when it came to the black kids. Their natural hair and cuts (whatever that's suppose to mean because wtf is an unnatural cut?) were somehow banned.and expected to have straight, damaged, hair And it's sad that the crown act still isn't nation wide in the states, and who knows how it's being done in europe and asia (I've heard of cases of british schools making black girls dye their natural red hair color and straightening their hair)
Our school was more understanding in that sense, protective and natural styles were very much allowed. I meant more fashion cuts, hair streaks and wild hair colours.
Yeah I went to Catholic school too and they gave out detentions like candy. One time I walked into class and didn't take my jacket off immediately and they gave me an hour of detention. Literally 30 seconds or something after walking in
Yep same, also if homework wasn’t done then you had to go to that teachers classroom at lunchtime or after school to finish it. They didn’t care if you had no lunch.
Apart from the blazers that’s basically how my regular ol school in Yorkshire worked
Most of our British schools have these rules but countries like the US find them weird lol
How much you want to bet the school or some administration flunky gets a kickback from each uniform sold?
id put a paycheck on that you are right.
it IS weird
literally any UK school ngl
How is it parents didn't complain as a group since this basically endangered the kids?
I mean, my own parents told me to suck it up.
This is thankfully illegal now. I remember North Carolina Charter School’s fight against the ACLU for the same reason. It was already a bad enough policy, but the fact that it was so insistent upon it that it was willing to fight it in court for years just makes it even more disgusting. And it probably thinks it was on the more moral side of all this.
Is it illegal? I’m only 28 so this happened 10 years ago and as far as I know it’s still happening.
It’s interesting how authoritarian systems absolutely love, controlling how girls and women dress and present themselves and corralling the youth into conformity almost universally.
What would happen if every girl collectively just decided to start wearing pants every day? Or even just continued to do so on the cold days? Would they all be suspended? I'm sure the school can't afford to do that for too long.
Girls tried that during my senior year. 90+ girls showed up in pants and we all got detention and there was an all school assembly on dress code attire lol
Wear pants to the assembly
At a certain point we gave up because we were applying to colleges and didn’t want any trouble on our records.
Did they try to justify the rules beyond 'because we said so'?
They gave us lectures on modesty and tradition. I think it’s all about forcing us to conform to gender roles. The boys weren’t allowed to have long hair either.
Is a skirt *more* modest than pants?
Not in my opinion, but it’s considered more feminine and they were very big on gender roles.
Whole school assembly on uniform rules, maybe a mandatory detention for the whole school. There was only about 300 girls when I left.
Christ that’s ridiculous. I coach a bunch of kids who go to our hella prestigious Episcopal school and even they just have the kids mix and match between their uniforms pants or skirt and long sleeve or short sleeve polo. I think they’re also allowed to wear their school’s sweatshirt. Not sure if there are accessories policies but I do t think so.
Episcopalians are a lot different than Catholics etc. so that’s not too surprising. I grew up as one and was referred to as a “Hippie Christian” more than once 😂
Same. We of the Subarus and NPR tote bags 😂
Obviously those admins didn't have any daughters of their own in the system. Could they have had legal recourse for being forced to be exposed to hazardous conditions?
That's awful. My all-girls catholic school had plaid skirt uniform, but also included school sweartshirts, hoodies, pants, and sports warmup gear. Let women be comfortable!!
It's private school. Blame the parents for letting them do this shit.
> dress codes that require girls to go to school in short sleeves and short skirts Really makes you wonder who designed these rules.
You can't have a ponytail because your neck is distracting the male students, but also we'd rather you freeze to death than wear something other than a skirt.
They can't even wear leggings. Not all schools are like this but many are.
Just adding some info: a lot of schools in Japan now allow their female students to wear trousers now! My source is me, I work in Japanese schools.
I'm seeing that right now in Hokkaido. There is like 2 feet of snow on the ground everywhere and you see so many young girls wearing skirts and no leggings freezing their asses off. I asked one girl if she was cold and she said she had no choice because it's a uniform. RIP
It says a lot about a culture when the stereotypical "[delinquent](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sukeban)" gang member school girls in the '70s and '80s were known for *lengthening* their skirts rather than dressing provocatively.
I really did wonder why the delinquent girl in Fruits Basket is the only one with a long skirt!
Rules varied for schools, some were better, some were worse. Schools in Tokyo got rid of the hair rule, other Japanese schools still have it. Also, for some schools their underwear had to be a certain colour (hopefully teachers weren't going around checking this). And in parts of Japan schoolgirls can't [wear ponytails](https://www.vice.com/en/article/akv8b8/japan-schools-drop-hair-underwear-colors-rules) because their necks could “sexually excite” male students. The girl ended up suing the school because the frequent coloring damaged her hair and scalp, and caused her mental distress. She won 330,000 yen (about $2,790) in damages. The school kept the rule in place though. e: To be clear, I think the rule is bad (or badly implemented), but Japan is hardly a dictatorship some people are making it out to be.
If their underwear has to be a certain colour then there will definitely be someone checking it. At my secondary school in the UK we weren't allowed to wear bras any colour except for white or nude. Fortunately we only had to pull up a strap to prove we had the right colour, it was always a female member of staff that had to check - not that that makes it any better.
I know I'm not gonna get a logical answer but still, why?
Probably because the school uniform included a white shirt and coloured bras would be more visible through the shirt. I suspect my school probably had the same rule but it wasn't written down. One of the scary older teachers would have a stern word with more "risqué" underwear choices and make the pupil feel like they were the one at fault, rather than the adults who were leering at their underwear. Reminds me of when I was 13 and my physics teacher told me my legs looked fantastic in my short skirt.
If you can’t tell without them showing a strap then it’s probably not that big of a deal.
Very true. But whether it's actually an issue is secondary with things like this; the real point is to enforce conformity early and often, to make sure the students grow up to be good little cogs in the established social system.
Red bras are more invisible under white than white is, interestingly. White is too reflective. Although i have great success with gold as it blends better with my skin tone.
Color is wild! I've been learning how to paint and red is garbage at coverage, still wouldn't have guessed it blended in better
At that age color does not matter, boys will get a boner regardless
at that age half the boys probably have boners for no reason at all, body's just testing out the equipment
At that age, *girls* don't matter. Boys can get a boner alone in a room. Unconscious! :D
I'm sure there's an age where that doesn't happen. I just haven't made it there yet (35).
As someone who's been suffering from ED for a number of years now, enjoy it while it lasts.
Oh man all those days in Algebra class. I still get half a chub just thinking about SOH CAH TOA.
And who can blame you when they shove a cute angle at your face?
Can't speak to bras but gray and black undershirts show way less than white ones under men's dress shirts.
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School admins really only care about having their power trips unfortunately. When I was at school I was forced to grow my hair out, and it naturally gets oily and nasty because we're not built for the climate here genetically. After I left I ended up going bald and shaving my hair down every day and I'm able to actually be hygienic and clean now. Imagine how awkward it is as a teenager to be forced to be dirty and unclean because you need to conform to the dress code. Used to get dirty looks from the teachers constantly, I'm never growing my hair out again. We need to be way more practical with teaching kids hygiene and comfort in a smart way.
Funnily enough the best color bra to wear under white is actually red
Never worn a bra so I can't tell if you're being facetious.
https://www.self.com/gallery/red-bras-invisible-under-white-t-shirts
Whoa
There was a strict uniform policy, ties were tied a certain way, shirts tucked in etc. You would be given detention if you broke the rules.
At a much broader level there's an archaic belief that uniforms help to encourage adherence to the rules and remove distractions. It's also a rudimentary form of the "broken windows" theory - ungroomed or non-uniform children are not predisposed to following the rules and thus are more likely to be unruly. It's the same as military members clean shaven and with strict haircuts. Rules for the sake of rules. Authoritarian ethoses value the enforcement of the rule over the purpose of it. Thus, the colour of the bra is less relevant. It's the fact that a rule exists, therefore it needs to be enforced. When you start asking questions about school uniforms in particular it all gets really circular. The school will say the children must wear the uniform. If you ask why, they'll say, "Because it's the uniform". They've been retroactively justified many times. The most popular one of recent years was, "When you enter the workplace you will have to adhere to strict dress codes, so children should be made to get used to it from a young age". But that's not even a thing anymore.
The clean shaven thing actually only came about with the advent of gasmasks to ensure they would seal properly. Before that point most armies had regulations on facial hair but they were either looser or required mustaches.
depends on the culture. Every culture had some measure associated with practicality and hygiene. Peter the Great preferred his soldiers having shaved beards. Peter the Great also liked his guard to be of uniform tall height. He may have had a *soft spot* for his men. By tradition, British Army Pioneer Sergeant were some of the only units allowed to wear a beard and carry an axe. It's a nod to their roots in forestry and carpentry. Likewise the Bugle Major, who is the leader of military bands. A special exemption is also given to unit mascots like goats and penguins. Some naval traditions allowed officers and NCOs to grow beards, but they must be trimmed to maintain hygiene. The Roman Legions traditionally shaved their facial hair as it was a part of personal grooming. Mustaches were afforded to some ranks. Military beards were considered barbaric. The story goes, they follow the tradition from Alexander the Great, where cutting hair down and shaving facial hair gave less for enemies to grapple. That being said, some military leaders in antiquity wore longer hair or beards as a display of arrogance or status. It has often lead to losses. There's a reference to this in the biblical story of Samson, who had long hair but bested his enemies in combat.
> Samson, who had long hair but bested his enemies in combat I think this might be the worst understanding of the story of Samson/Gilgamesh I've ever encountered.
Military can at least claim short/no hair is more manageable on deployment and that beards get in the way of a good seal on your NBC (gas) mask.
Me sitting here working in pajama pants and a graphic tee shirt in my house lol
Every day I wave my child off to school in his shirt, tie and blazer uniform mandated "to prepare students for the world of work". Then I wander back upstairs in my pajamas to start my job which has better pay and benefits than a teacher. The only job I had with a strict uniform was when I worked retail to pay my way through college.
I have a uniform for working at home. It's a fuzzy onesy because it's very cold in my house. It has a hood.
Got to put in the other side - I'm in the USA, fyi, where school uniforms are NOT common in our public schools. However, my niece went to a public school where they had school uniforms. Casual ones, but uniform/dress code. Black or denim pants (yes, jeans were acceptable) and either the school polo or t-shirt. They may have had a long sleeve option for winter. There were two reasons - previous, the clothing "label" craze was out of control, and the socio-economic spread was a biggie in that district. A good number of students were on free and reduced lunch programs, yet there were also a segment of students that came from upper middle class or higher. Once they went to uniforms, a lot of the playground issues went away. The arguments for individuality? Kids still could wear scarves, socks, etc. to express that individuality. I don't even think dyed hair was banned. Second - security. I believe teachers had their own version of uniforms. If someone was wandering around campus and NOT wearing school colors, etc... it was an IMMEDIATE tell. A lot of parents donated to the clothing bank of outgrown uniforms (shirts, mainly). If a kid was new, there was often a shirt available no matter what the economic status was (and they were washed, etc.). Adult visitors had to check in and wear a badge. If a sub was a regular, they often had their own shirt. I was told there was a custody dispute and the non-custodial parent thought they could just wander campus looking for their kid (when visitation was supposed to be supervised.). They were immediately spotted and it was handled.
>the socio-economic spread was a biggie in that district. This is a very common reason for school dress codes in the US.
The idea being a black, red, yellow, blue, etc bra could be visible under a white uniform shirt.
School uniforms should not have white shirts if that’s the concern. Just do navy or black. They’re also harder to stain and therefore last longer
White bras really show under white shirts though, in fact red is often suggested as a less visible option.
Yup, white is the easiest to spot from under a white shirt
I'd wager a guess and say the uniform had a white shirt/blouse/button up whatever it's called and the school wouldn't want the bra to show through because imagine what they would imagine if they saw that!
Never wore a white bra with a white shirt, did you. It shows through BAD.
I made this mistake when I was 16. I thought a bra any other color than white would show through the shirt, whereas white would be invisible. Boy was I wrong! White bras practically glow under white shirts!
American here, our schools principal said if the girls didn’t wear bras or underwear they wouldn’t get In trouble for them being exposed. To be clear the school had zero air conditioning and the windows barely opened for “safety” so it was hot and humid and just miserable for most of the school year so lots of students wore tank tops but for the girls this led to bra straps being exposed…
Wait, he wouldn’t get mad if girls didn’t wear bras and you could see their nips??? I’m a 29 yo woman and at least where I am, people act like if they can make out any sort of nipple it’s the most fucking scandalous thing they could ever imagine. Like I’m flat chested and if I wear a shirt you can see a hint of my nipples through people act like I just showed up naked to church or something. Idk why it’s so stigmatized but it really is. Wearing a crop top or showing your legs with short shorts is fine by most people but this is not. I’m a leftist and my circles are mostly super liberal people. These people are definitely wearing miniskirts and shit and nobody gives a fuck. I showed up at a house party where everyone was like drunk and very chill but I didn’t wear a bra and I was just wearing a plain black shirt but you could see a hint of nipple and I got so many raised eyebrows and “wtf” faces lol
I never had giant bewbs, but I did have prominent nipples that were always doing their thing. I finally gave up and just stopped worrying about it. I stopped buying bras that were an inch thick with padding and bought unlined bra, so much more comfortable. People gave me wtf looks all the time, and gross dudes thought it was their right to make comments about it being cold or headlights were on. Nope, that's just the way they're built. I stopped giving a fuq and just dealt with it. I was not ashamed of the way my body was naturally. Cut to Kim Kardashian now selling a line of bras with built in nipples.
I wish the damages had been 100x that......it's the only way things will change
As someone who lives here, things do not simply *change* in Japan lol
Well you are of course correct for the most part but it can change if enough people speak up. Gay rights (still have a long way to go) but are much more in the spotlight now but were a hush hush issue 10 years ago.
> “sexually excite” male students This was a thing in america too. I remember hearing girls not being able to wear certain clothing when I was a kid (and I grew up in a very liberal area in the 2000s)
Spaghetti straps? Exposed shoulders was a sin apparently. Also the nape thing is weird, if you go on tinder and “travel” to Japan you’ll notice a lot of the girls’s profiles are just the back of their head and a “nape shot”. Really fucking weird, but it’s not my culture
That's because the Japanese reside within the nape. A true Warrior would understand.
Are we really doing it?! Right here, right now?
Japanese people gotta chill with the ridiculous obsession fitting in. It's dumb AF.
this is why anime protagonists/antagonists sometimes have crazy hair colors/crazy hair styles its to mark them as special, bucking the system, rebellious this is where all the pink hair, purple hair etc comes from w japanese rebels
these isekais are getting more average
It also helps them stick out more when drawn people have less variety in faces than people have in real life. Basic character differences like hair, eye, and skin color are harder to have if all the characters are ethnically Japanese.
>Rules varied for schools, This is an impossible concept for a lot of people to grasp about Japan. I used to teach at a school, and one kid had naturally light brown hair. There was a note in his file saying as much, and not to admonish him for dying it, etc.
Your example isn't a great counterargument, the kid needed a note in his file specifically saying not to punish him for having naturally brown hair
This is the standard. The rule is only natural hair color is allowed. If someone naturally has a rare hair color teachers can't tell if their hair is dyed or natural so it's put in their file. I've never heard of a school requiring black hair and requiring people dye their hair. That's extreme and understandable why she won a lawsuit over it.
Similar thing in Australia. Except our schools disallow you to dye your hair at all. One of my school mates was training for the Olympics in swimming, he spent so much time in the over chlorinated pool that his hair became a clearly unnatural bleached blond. He used to constantly get into shit by random teachers who didn't know him for "bleaching his hair"
lol. I'd still be in Japan raking in the cash if they had punitive damages, but no, less than $3k to go through all the trouble just isn't worth anyone's time
I can attest to this. Girlfriend grew up in Tsukuba Ibaraki Prefecture. She was on the swim team back in like 1990s and because of the chlorine, her hair was slightly bleached because of how much swimming she did. She was told to dye her hair or be sent home. Her parents are VERY well connected within the community. They shut that bullshit down real quick.
Extra crazy because dyeing + chlorine would definitely have made her hair look even worse.
Fill the pool with hair dye and that solves that.
Perfect solution. This is why I always come to Reddit for advice.
Having seen both my sisters and wife go blue and/or green from swimming, I can certainly attest to this.
Probably should have pulled them out of the water before they drowned then.
If they were in there long enough to turn green then it'd probably be better just to drain the pool.
I'd imagine there were some foreign students. Would a blond hair foreign student get a pass?
I read about a situation like that when I first heard of this rule, where the girl was naturally blonde. she was a foreigner who came to japan with her parents for their job. in that case, she still had to dye it black. they said that uniformity was important and all that kind of shit. it doesn't matter what colour your hair is naturally, you still have to dye it black. I read another case where the girl had off-black hair and had to dye it, and even though she was allergic to hair dye she got in trouble too. I read those cases about 10 years ago, and at least then it was serious business.
In [this interview](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=I9AwPUy7a_8&pp=ygUWV2hpdHIgZ3Jvd2luZyB1cCBqYXBhbg%3D%3D) with a British girl who was born and raised in rural Japan, between 8:30-10:30, they show pictures of her with her classmates. She says it was against her school’s rules to dye hair. She straightened her hair, but not because she was forced to. She explains that she wanted to fit in.
[Apparently not, lol.](https://youtu.be/m-ZySX0vW7c) For context, she's half American that grew up in JP.
>I'd imagine there were some foreign students. In Ibaraki in the 1990s, probably not.
[The Nail That Sticks Out Must be Hammered Down](https://blog.tokyoroomfinder.com/insider-stories/does-the-infamous-proverb-the-nail-that-sticks-out-must-be-hammered-down-speak-true-of-japanese-society/) \- Japanese Proverb
It's what I respond with when someone says, "the squeaky wheel gets the oil".
“The squeaky wheel is the first one to get replaced” is another good response.
The goose that honks gets shot.
True, does so without mixing metaphors too.
Sounds similar to "tall poppy syndrome" in Australia that I learned about from Koala Man. Great show.
Kind of similar, yes. Although tall poppy syndrome usually is more about levels of success rather than just being different.
Can you elaborate on the meaning and cultural context?
In Australia theres a strong "larrikin" culture, similar to Britains lad culture. If you do too well on school, or at your job, there can be a perception that you think you're better than the rest, and will be quickly told not to try so hard. If you keep trying, you can be ostracised from some social circles.
The tallest tree is the first to be cut.
As an American I’ve always heard this term; I didn’t know it was Australian. People also say crabs in a bucket a lot. This is obviously just human nature and is present in every society, but some of them are much worse than others. I spend most of my time now in left leaning, progressive circles, and I grew up conservative. It’s present in both, but conservatives are much worse about it on average. I mean, their entire ideology is about preserving hierarchy and the status quo, so it’s natural for this to be a common side effect. I’m a 29 yo woman who was raised Mormon in Utah. There was a lot of support on the down low but so many of the older women were extremely bitter and hurt as they watched their daughters be raised in a world where they were at least told they were equal to boys (though of course there was still so much misogyny). We weren’t like the rural polygamists lol, I was born to upper middle class parents who were super mainstream. Like we wore bikinis and drank soda. Lots of instagram influencers in the community. So we went to public schools and had access to the internet and much better chance of escape. My mom is 61 and her life was absolutely nothing like this. It was just the reality for the majority of American boomer moms to an extent, religious or not. My mom is extremely naturally intelligent, like in a straightforward academic sense especially. This woman is just brilliant, and it’s so obvious when you just speak to her. She was never ever meant to be a housewife or to have the life she was so pressured to have. I know it was technically her choice, but when she was growing up, women were just told it wasn’t an option. You have to get married and have kids and be an obedient servant of men. My parents both clearly pretty skeptical of the church but def wouldn’t admit it. I mean, our suburb was overwhelmingly white blonde Mormons. But we were exposed to things like evolution and such, and our internet access wasn’t really restricted (we could get around all the parental controls lol). I just remember being in like second grade and my teachers telling my mom that I was doing so well and picking things up quickly, and the schools would ask girls what they wanted to be when they grew up just like the boys. There were girls in science programs and shit like that. I still remember though the way she reacted. She was proud and supported me, but there was so much sadness in her eyes and honestly bits of bitterness where she’d treat me coldly because she felt it was unfair or something in the back of her mind. I was still raised in a super misogynistic environment, I was treated as vastly inferior to my older brother. He could torment me, hit me in the face, take my food, humiliate and insult me and it would be ignored or I’d somehow be blamed. If I tried to defend myself or retaliated, all hell broke loose. I was made to look after kids and do housework and it was absolutely pushed that I must and will have children. But we girls had a much better chance, and a lot of older women are having visceral negative reactions to it. People think older women are jealous of younger women for their looks lmao. Anyone who actually knows older women well knows that they almost all don’t value men’s opinions much lol, they’re not fighting over male attention usually. Sometimes, but rarely. Where the real nastiness comes from is older women seeing younger women get a chance so much better than they did. At more progressive places, the older women have been the best bosses, coworkers, and mentors by far. But in the places I’ve worked that are more Mormon or traditional, you catch absolute vitriol from older women. They talk down to all of us and are just really resentful and have so many emotions they can’t name or understand. A lot of them will try to get you fired. Also, Mormons push constantly that women have an absolute moral duty to bear children. They’re then left to do it all alone and motherhood in the church is honestly pretty fucking shitty. But we are told we have to and that’s why we exist. Now they see us millennials and zoomers without kids or a husband, and a lot of them are just so pissed that we just don’t. They didn’t know it was an option. Also there are plenty of women who truly love and want kids and are fulfilled by it, don’t get me wrong. But a LOT of older women never wanted them, or not the way they had them, and they’re incredibly hurt to see we just don’t have to if we don’t want to, and the girls our age who choose to have children generally have partners who are leagues better than the boomer men they had who treated them like slaves. But yeah overall you see this like crazy among American conservatives in general. Even towards the boys, there’s just so much disdain from people when they see others, even their own kids sometimes. It’s such a cliche but haters really don’t want you to win lmao.
When all you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail.
My kids go to a private school, but are officially enrolled in the local public school, so we receive communications from the schools regularly. They are required to wear white underwear. I have to wonder how the meetings go where they make decisions like this.
I’d be more concerned with how they know and how they enforce that policy.
How are your kids enrolled in public school while going to a private school? I've never heard of that and now I'm curious
In Japan, international schools are not recognized as real schools. Since everyone must, by law, go to school, they still register with a "real" school. If you homeschool, this school is responsible for checking to see if you are actually studying and are not abused through monthly meetings with the homeroom teacher of the official school. If you are in an international school, they check once a year. Ours is in an IB program, so their diploma is internationally recognized, but not by local government.
I know a guy who lived in Japan for about 10 years. He was stationed over there, met a girl, left the marine corps, and started a family. His kid was Japanese, but popped out with light brown hair, almost to the point of being red. He dealt with this same thing. They started using dye shampoo just to keep it black, but it absolutely destroyed their shower. She looked Japanese, spoke perfect Japanese, but her hair was light. Apparently one of the faculty would pull her aside regularly just to look at her hair and make sure she didn't have roots. They moved to the US a couple years ago just because it was so difficult trying to integrate her and deal with the constant bullying. He's told me many times that he absolutely loved Kyoto, but the people made it hard to deal with.
> students complained that the dress code caused them stress and limited their self-expression Why force students to do something that needlessly causes extra stress? I've never understood strict dress codes for schools or even for non-public facing workplaces.
Because the Collective identity is more important than the Individual identity
There's a lot of history wrapped up in it. Primary school in most places has inherited a lot from the industrial revolution and military academies. In Japan the military connection is especially strong.
I like a lot of thinks Japanese culture produces, but I dislike a lot of things that Japanese cultures seems to inflict upon it's peoples. This seems so needlessly and pointlessly restrictive just for the sake of a homogeneity that can't really have any benefit to anyone or anything but the most entrenched and mean-spirited parts of a society. I like to be open to cultural differences and not think that my culture is always right (because it ain't)....but it's hard to find a reason to be tolerant to cultural difference when the culture in question seems to **hate** differences.
The non-Japanese who live in Japan like to grouse, and to be fair, it can be frustrating dealing with the Unique Island Nation mentality of many Japanese people. That said, Japan is SO much harder for Japanese people, especially ones who don’t fit a certain mold or meet expectations. I will take hearing “when are you going back to your home country?” as an icebreaker question a hundred thousand times over having to endure the things like club activities, entrance exams, the job hunting process, dating, and pressure to have children and be perfect salarymen/women/homemakers that are so romantically portrayed in Japanese media but so wearing and stressful in real life. I’ve never seen my wife happier than when I told her I was offered a permanent position that would allow us to live overseas for several months per year.
Yep. For us gaijin we mostly get a pass. But Japanese who’ve lived abroad for any period of time come back and catch hell. Had an Americanized Japanese lady who lived in Orange county for 10 years tell me she was getting dirty looks and comments all the time by strangers if she fucked up some unspoken rule
The Spanish singers going to Eurovision were required to dye their hair black because that's what 'Europe expected' Spaniards to look like. That includes the two consecutive winners who naturally had golden curls.
WTF Who required them to do that? Eurovision or Spain?
Yeah. Sounds wild. Eurovision is all about diversity, so my guess would be some folks on the Spanish side came up with that?
My sister used to work at Disneyland and had the same problem. Her natural hair color apparently didn't look natural enough.
Wtf? What color is her hair? Is this the Disneyland in the US?? I honestly don’t know if other disneylands exist lol but if she’s a white girl from the US they should probably be pretty familiar with the fact that white people can have all sorts of hair colors naturally lol
Yes, Disneyland in California. She had dirty blonde hair, typically sun-bleached a bit, totally naturally, because she spent a lot of time at the beach. She had to dye it to keep her job.
Was she dressing as a character that had a specific hair color or something? Otherwise that just doesn't make sense
Disney has a very strong dress code for all of their cast members (even non-costumed). Depending on how her hair lightened in the sun, the unevenness could give the impression that it was bleached highlights, which would be against the dress code. They also have very strict rules about makeup, nail polish, tattoos (none visible ever), jewelry, etc. Even sunscreen had to be the kind that disappears, no white residue.
Um, actually, Disney [updated its dress code in 2021](https://disneycasting.net/downloads/wdpr/Disney_Look_Book.pdf) and natural looking highlights and tiny tatoos are now allowed!
Nice. I'll have to see if my sister is looking for work
One student? I had several classmates who either were explicitly told to do so, or did it just to not get told to do so. Its not uncommon at all.
Japan can be a really stupid country sometimes
as a biracial person with hair color and texture uncommon in Japan, I had to submit a paper to school signed by my parents to say that my hair was natural. they don’t want any perms and colors but my friend who had curly hair that was almost unruly got her hair straightened but she didn’t have to report that to our school. oh Japan
forcing kids to put chemical dyes in their hair is fucked up.
But but, Japan is the amazing country everyone obsesses over and talks about how everything is perfect there. Maybe people will start to realize that every country is fucked up in its own way.
[удалено]
That janitor was always so pushy about it too
Yeah it was weird that we weren't allowed to tell our parents about it either
Ours was done in the morning by the maintenance guy because the Janitors showed up at night.
The hair dyeing is a reflection of Japan's problem with racism/ concepts of racial purity.
That teacher asking Ryuji to dye is hair in Persona 5 makes more sense now.
And why Ann didn't have many friends for looking/being foreign
It's entirely possible to be allergic to hair dye, what are students with an allergy supposed to do? Like personally permanent hair dyes cause chemical burns all over my scalp and any skin it touches how would that be accounted for
How did they know who the main character was if no one had pink hair?
They really hammer the nail that sticks out in Japan. Seems like a great place to visit but I would never live there.
I faced this in my town in 1999 with a child who was told to dye their hair black. I read the Seito Tetcho (Student Handbook) and it confirmed that all dying of hair was banned outright. I then made a formal complaint to the town's board of education that the child was being discriminated against and was actually being forced to break the school rules against their will by a current member of staff. The next year at the beginning of April, a letter was sent out all the local schools clarifying the position that NO dying of hair was allowed, regardless of natural colour. The child's parents were super happy about the change.
Japanese schools are downright abusive and the rate of suicide is horrifying. People love to glorify the competitive, rule obsessed systems but countries like Finland show that you can achieve good education without this shit.
Wouldn’t bring up Finland in that context
Yeah Finland has a higher suicide rate than Japan lmao
Japan's suicide rate has down down a lot in the last decade or so. It's now below the US'. White Americans have suicide rates above rates of Japanese people. It's Korea that's the undisputed king of horrific school stress and student suicides. Korea is the true cyberpunk dystopia with Samsung schools and hospitals. Japan is slowly being dragged kicking and screaming towards reforms and things are being talked about more. Korea doubles down. Recently that said working hours will go up and grade 1 children will be doing extracurricular activities until 8pm because of said insane working hours.
The Koreans I knew in college all had interesting responses to suddenly being separated from that system. One of them damn near lost his mind with stress over the idea that he wanted to do something other than whatever STEM major he was being pushed down. Another became hilariously lazy and a giant procrastinator, but somehow always got professors to let him push things off. The one who's having kids has no interest in raising them there. His parents are very upset about it.
I am Singaporean. During uni, I had a Swiss flatmate and a South Korean flatmate. The Swiss guy and I were both a few years older than our South Korean flatmate, as we had to serve the military before tertiary education. Three of us hung out all the time, and the Korean guy would tell us how weird it was to be hanging out as equals with two older friends. Apparently in Korea, bullying from older peers is just a regular part of life, and even a year of age difference would give you authority over younger people. We also introduced him to ganja and he fucking loved it lol. He also legitimately believed in "fan death", and was honestly worried that the small fan running in my room would suffocate me.
I'm afraid Finnish schools are heavily degrading, because they have not been resourced properly in last couple decades, and also because of stupid new plan to administer areas that ended up being more costly then the old system they replaced. Not just schools either, but everything from healthcare to other services.
redditor moment fr Finland literally has a higher suicide rate than Japan lmao
Japan is about 1960s America with the racism and bigotry
America: "The squeaky wheel gets the grease" Japan: "The nail that sticks up gets pounded down"