I had absolutely no idea this was part of the dress code.
"The ostensible reason for the rule is that almost all Japanese people have naturally black hair, and so they’ll only have non-black hair if they’ve chosen to dye it a different color."
Are there any children currently enrolled in Tokyo public schools that are of say european ancestry with blonde hair that needed to follow this rule?
A German friend of mine, who did high school I think in Osaka encountered this. If I remember it right one teacher wanted to enforce this and dye his hair so that he wouldn't stand out, but the principal overruled him and he didn't end up with black hair.
Don't know which article were talking about since there is a couple of articles saying that.
Ethnically Japan isn't homogeneous (almost no country is), culturally it depends.
I think their stance on LGBT says it all, no one cares if you're gay/trans, until you announce that you intend to have a long standing relationship, then people especially family will care a lot (negatively).
Because you go against societies own mandate, of family before yourself.
I went to an american school that had its own strict requirements regarding hair. male students were required to keep their hair cut short enough so it would not touch their collar and to be clean shaven. repeat offenders would get a (sloppy) haircut from the dean or be required to shave on the spot, respectively. I don't find the hair color requirement to be any more unreasonable, though perhaps it has a racial subtext?
I agree, it’s a weird cultural quirk that you think wouldn’t exist with the longstanding trend towards acceptance of difference.
It’s a bit like Zwarte Piet in The Netherlands, where from an outsiders perspective it looks clearly problematic, but if you have grown up in The Netherlands you likely don’t see anything wrong.
This makes me feel very privileged for my mostly liberal and progressive society, for which it seems I take a lot for granted, like the right to dye my hair.
Also, I was surprised to hear this, because, in anime, characters very often have colorful hair.
This is actually one of the reasons that anime characters have colourful hair. It helps serve as a creative outlet and an escape from the conformity, rather than to depict it.
(Conformity at work and school, that is. Walk through somewhere like Harajuku, and even anime hair might start to seem tame).
I went to a school with a strict uniform code. The hall monitor would check for well polished shoes(white canvas shoes on mondays, black leather/faux leather rest of the days. The faux leather was a religious exemption, but they didn’t care as long as the girls wore Mary Jane type shoes. Boys had a different design), nails(no long untrimmed nails or polish).
Having said that..we had free rein over hair. As long as it was not loose and plaited neatly, any style is fine. We could wear flowers in our hair and earrings as this was in India and there were social/cultural/religious reasons for girls wearing jewelery, flowers and even henna on our hands.
Also: Fridays were non uniform days for grades 5 and lower. And you can wear anything you want on your birthday..all grades.
We still had to march to class and up the stairs from daily outdoor morning assembly(20-30 minutes or so) everyday to the music of a band! Prayer, reading of daily news, thought of the day, school announcements, school sports team announcements and national anthem before dispersing in ‘an orderly fashion’. And by that, I mean..we had to march to class in a line(class lines were in height order)
When I tell this to kids these days, they think I am pulling their legs. And I thought my school was being strict!!
I wonder: how unpleasant was all of that, as a kid at the time?
From an outsider's perspective it sounds tyrannical, but there's also something appealing about a codified environment that looks very different than my own life; it would be an alien adventure to get used to it. Well, for a while, until it starts to feel oppressive.
I would certainly have a much greater emotional association with band music if I had been made to march to it as a child.
Some of the comments seem to be suggesting that this is because of some Japanese quirk of requiring extreme uniformity far above what is required in other countries but it really isn't; it's essentially just laziness on the part of schools. The real reason for these rules is that (as with schools in many other countries for better or worse) Japanese schools don't want their students, who mostly have black hair, to dye their hair brown or other colors.
However, since the vast majority of the students naturally have black hair it's just MUCH easier to write the rules to say that in the rare cases where a student has another hair color they have to dye it black rather than trying to argue with students who have dyed "chapatsu" brown hair but then claim that that's really their natural hair color when it isn't.
Some schools like high schools in Osaka have a system where students with natural colors other than black are supposed to register so the school can record their natural hair color to know that they aren't dying it.
It's pretty dumb and it sucks for the students who naturally have brown hair but it's easy for the school to be lazy and take the approach of just requiring all the students to have black hair.
Wikipedia mostly talks about Brazilian nikkei (fascinating).
However, and I can’t find it now, last decade Japan was in the process of pushing out Brazilian “migrant” workers, leaving the workers’ children (born and raised in Japan) in a cultural & language limbo.
Background on the business organizing this. Sounds like a daycare facility:
>In Japan, NPO Florence has profited from competent business models and reinvested that profit into solving children’s social issues, all while still providing decent remuneration to its staff.
That's a pretty good idea. Has anyone explored the option of disallowing friendships and romance? I think kids waste far too much time socializing and pursuing young love. That's a tremendous amount of wasted study time.
To think that many of them then end up in big tech makes me wonder if their oppressed needs causes them to make decisions that impose the same oppression of ideas/joy on their customers (basically, the rest of the world).
Edit: Not saying that it would, I'm just questioning the possibility of it.
[+] [-] Meerax|5 years ago|reply
"The ostensible reason for the rule is that almost all Japanese people have naturally black hair, and so they’ll only have non-black hair if they’ve chosen to dye it a different color."
Are there any children currently enrolled in Tokyo public schools that are of say european ancestry with blonde hair that needed to follow this rule?
[+] [-] yolobey|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Hamuko|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|5 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] umvi|5 years ago|reply
Reminds me of other quirks in Japan like when customer-facing women were banned from wearing glasses[0]
[0] https://www.bbc.com/news/business-50342714
[+] [-] 0dayz|5 years ago|reply
Ethnically Japan isn't homogeneous (almost no country is), culturally it depends.
I think their stance on LGBT says it all, no one cares if you're gay/trans, until you announce that you intend to have a long standing relationship, then people especially family will care a lot (negatively).
Because you go against societies own mandate, of family before yourself.
China has a more extreme version of that.
[+] [-] tyingq|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] leetcrew|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Hamuko|5 years ago|reply
https://soranews24.com/2016/10/27/tokyo-junior-high-school-d...
[+] [-] Closi|5 years ago|reply
It’s a bit like Zwarte Piet in The Netherlands, where from an outsiders perspective it looks clearly problematic, but if you have grown up in The Netherlands you likely don’t see anything wrong.
[+] [-] quercusa|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] didibus|5 years ago|reply
Also, I was surprised to hear this, because, in anime, characters very often have colorful hair.
[+] [-] jbay808|5 years ago|reply
(Conformity at work and school, that is. Walk through somewhere like Harajuku, and even anime hair might start to seem tame).
[+] [-] heavyset_go|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] vmilner|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] arpa|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] snemvalts|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cgrealy|5 years ago|reply
There are plenty of societies and organisations that embrace diversity or deviation.
Am I reading your post wrong?
[+] [-] jelliclesfarm|5 years ago|reply
Having said that..we had free rein over hair. As long as it was not loose and plaited neatly, any style is fine. We could wear flowers in our hair and earrings as this was in India and there were social/cultural/religious reasons for girls wearing jewelery, flowers and even henna on our hands.
Also: Fridays were non uniform days for grades 5 and lower. And you can wear anything you want on your birthday..all grades.
We still had to march to class and up the stairs from daily outdoor morning assembly(20-30 minutes or so) everyday to the music of a band! Prayer, reading of daily news, thought of the day, school announcements, school sports team announcements and national anthem before dispersing in ‘an orderly fashion’. And by that, I mean..we had to march to class in a line(class lines were in height order)
When I tell this to kids these days, they think I am pulling their legs. And I thought my school was being strict!!
[+] [-] ajkjk|5 years ago|reply
From an outsider's perspective it sounds tyrannical, but there's also something appealing about a codified environment that looks very different than my own life; it would be an alien adventure to get used to it. Well, for a while, until it starts to feel oppressive.
I would certainly have a much greater emotional association with band music if I had been made to march to it as a child.
[+] [-] resoluteteeth|5 years ago|reply
However, since the vast majority of the students naturally have black hair it's just MUCH easier to write the rules to say that in the rare cases where a student has another hair color they have to dye it black rather than trying to argue with students who have dyed "chapatsu" brown hair but then claim that that's really their natural hair color when it isn't.
Some schools like high schools in Osaka have a system where students with natural colors other than black are supposed to register so the school can record their natural hair color to know that they aren't dying it.
It's pretty dumb and it sucks for the students who naturally have brown hair but it's easy for the school to be lazy and take the approach of just requiring all the students to have black hair.
[+] [-] nobodyandproud|5 years ago|reply
e.g., https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brazilians_in_Japan
Wikipedia mostly talks about Brazilian nikkei (fascinating).
However, and I can’t find it now, last decade Japan was in the process of pushing out Brazilian “migrant” workers, leaving the workers’ children (born and raised in Japan) in a cultural & language limbo.
[+] [-] sthnblllII|5 years ago|reply
>In Japan, NPO Florence has profited from competent business models and reinvested that profit into solving children’s social issues, all while still providing decent remuneration to its staff.
https://globisinsights.com/mba-essentials/critical-questioni...
>Our Vision - Society fulfilled with smiles of diverse families
>Zero waiting children for nursery school. All the mothers can continue their work.
>Assist parents (mothers in particular) to remain in the workforce
https://florence.or.jp/english/
[+] [-] alphazino|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|5 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] diveanon|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ku-man|5 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] clcuc|5 years ago|reply
[0]: https://mainichi.jp/articles/20190905/k00/00m/040/210000c
[1]: https://www.nikkei.com/article/DGXMZO47985000Q9A730C1000000
Edit: structure.
[+] [-] unknown|5 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] HeavenFox|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] elefanten|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] behnamoh|5 years ago|reply
Edit: Not saying that it would, I'm just questioning the possibility of it.
[+] [-] unknown|5 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] bdz|5 years ago|reply