The Arlington, TX, school board says students may no longer wear mouth jewelry known as “grillz” — shiny teeth caps — or the earlobe-stretching practice known as “gauging.”
I have to figure that Arlington, TX, (isn’t that the home of Hank Hill?) has to have the greatest school system on earth. Every other educational problem has to have been solved otherwise they wouldn’t have the free time to devote to this. I admit I am a tad prejudiced on these matters. Collateral Damage is a graduate of Hope High School in Providence, RI (the only school ever to live up to truth in advertising laws), which was such a bucolic learning place that even today I can look back and say with pride, “hey, there was only one shooting on campus the entire time I was there.” And we knew from ridiculous attire. This was back in 70s when there was an even greater need for fashion police among the teen age set then there is today. But not once did it ever occur to me that a crackdown on tube tops and tight polyester would improve our educations. If only I’d known.
“We want to instill in them a sense of modesty and a sense of community,” said school board trustee Gloria Pena. “We’re preparing them for the work force, and in the work force there are rules.”
Ah ha. This is about preparing people to be good little worker drones who won’t rock the boat and will help create community that values conformity over all else. Well, those are definitely time-honored educational principles.
And on behalf of every company that makes and/or sells Grillz I would like to thank the Arlington School Board for giving the kind of product endorsement that you can only hope for.
Collateral Damage 
Frankly, I like these rules. It sure is about conformity but so are the grills. I’d much rather have my kid forced to conform to a “No Grills” rule enforced by “the Man” then have them feel they have to conform to insane peer pressure. If they still want to do stupid things when they hit 18 or get out of H.S., whichever comes second, go for it.
+1. I like the idea of uniforms, personally. if everyone looks the same, maybe they can distinguish themselves by their performance in the classroom.
Ewwww. that sounded like my the school board wrote that.
Sheesh… could we get a little tamer in our comments? I think that the school boards justification is beyond the pale. Unless there is a safety issue; electric shock or starting gang type violence the school should not be saying what kids should be decorating themselves with…. This will show my age. I clearly remember girls being sent home because they were wearing pants. The justification at the time was on the line of: “Young ladies should not wear pants in public” or some other drivel.The style maybe more extreme but the sentiment is the same.
In other words: agree with me or my big brother will beat you up…
Ohhh give out my shameful secret!!!