@steveTu... re your bill 'confusion' re the grey box and the charges -- that grey box ( ie the 35.28 per kwh for electricity) is including vat at 5% , the numbers below showing usage are shown ex-vat (basically because I think VAT needs to be separately explicitly disclosed on invoices). I would imagine you have a VAT £x line at the bottom of the bill to get to total cost.
To change the subject: Washing bought vegetables. Is it enough to run them under the tap?
I just run them under the tap, but not always. I don't know if the advice is because of mud, bacteria or chemicals. I wash off mud. Something high off the ground like runner beans I don't bother to wash as they are going to boil in water. OH said if it's chemicals it probably isn't possible to wash it all off, may have been absorbed by the vegetable. I wash tomatoes that are to eat raw, don't know who has touched them.
Dordogne and Norfolk. Clay in Dordogne, sandy in Norfolk.
Is there such a thing as an ethnic hairstyle that isn't simply just a fashion of a group?
I was at senior school in the late 60's and we had 'appearance' rules - uniform (including wearing of a cap), shoe colour, hair style and length. We could not have 'fashionable' hairstyles that broke the hair length rules (short back and sides with the back being off the collar) - even shorter lengths (ie skinhead) were banned. No beards or moustaches either (for those who could grow them).
When does a fashion become ethnic? Could you say beards are accepted in some groups? No hair in others. So aren't you really saying ANY rule is invalid?
Is there such a thing as an ethnic hairstyle that isn't simply just a fashion of a group?
Yes. Just from my experience of friends from various ethnic backgrounds there is only a certain amount of styles you can do with some types of hair unless you want to use a lot of nasty chemicals. It seems strange to let a white girl have long hair just because it hangs straight but ban a black girl from having long hair because it sticks out more. That's basically a definition of racism isn't it?
If you can keep your head, while those around you are losing theirs, you may not have grasped the seriousness of the situation.
Not all white girls have hair that hangs straight and tidily - mine's always been sticky-outy-frizzy without a lot of effort and product applied (although nowhere near as so much as black/afro hair). Never been a problem though, so skin colour must come into it if frizzy hair is being seen as a problem.
Mu opinion - no hairstyles should be banned as long as they are appropriate for the situation (eg health & safety reasons - if you're working in a food factory or similar, or with machinery that hair might get caught in, hair needs to be tied back/covered)
Doncaster, South Yorkshire. Soil type: sandy, well-drained
I suspect appearance rules in schools were set long before dreadlocks, hair extensions etc were even known. Likewise hair cut short and with patterns in it. There are far too many reported cases of kids missing schooling because of styles like those mentioned here. Schools do need to have rules, but they also need to consider that lifestyles, as well as hairstyles, change.
I would say in the case of my school - it was about appearance and uniformity. Little boxes made of ticky-tacky. In the past, short hair was a norm (in some way because of head lice/nits?) - it was across society - from prisons to CEOs.
But I'm for uniforms - I'm for them because it levels down. It stops the fashion parade that schools become and stops less wealthy kids from feeling left out.
@wild edges comment - but what is a style other than fashion? And for the same reason that I prefer 'affordable' uniforms, I'm also for trying to stop fashion in hair (or anywhere else for that matter - do you allow piercings, tattoos...) becoming a way of exclusion rather than inclusion.
And I still don't quite understand an ethnic hairstyle from a fashion anyway. Is an afro ethnic...dreadlocks, a mohican, skinhead... aren't they all fashions within a group? Length of hair is different.
I don't know whether it's still the case, but when I was at school the rules were applied subjectively, which is plain wrong.
Examples:
When I was at secondary school (late 70s to mid eighties) dyed hair was supposedly banned. My punk friend bleached her fringe and dyed it green, and got suspended for it. Another girl whose family bred and showed red setters used to have her hair dyed to match the dogs whenever there was a show coming up and she never got into trouble for it. Might not be a coincidence that her mum was on the PTA.
Girls were allowed to have long hair but boys who had long hair would be "sternly advised" to cut it. They didn't get suspended if they kept it long as far as I know, but it was still discrimination. My punk friend also got ticked off when she had a skinhead cut (the girly version with long bits around the edges - it actually really suited her) whereas it was fine for boys.
I wasn't aware of any rules about afro hair, cornrows, dreadlocks etc but we had very few black pupils.
Doncaster, South Yorkshire. Soil type: sandy, well-drained
There's been plenty of cases now where school rules say no shorts allowed as part of the uniform but skirts are fine so boys have turned up wearing skirts in hot weather. I think you're on a hiding to nothing trying to remove fashion from hair though. It sounds more like prison rules than school. I used to get told off in school if I didn't shave often enough but Sikhs were allowed a full beard under religious exemption. That used to nark me a bit but looking back at old photos my 'designer stubble' wasn't fooling anyone. I've always hated shaving though.
If you can keep your head, while those around you are losing theirs, you may not have grasped the seriousness of the situation.
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