Wearing duct-tape rooting outfits to a high school hockey game? Dogs and cats, living together! Mass hysteria! That’s the position of a Catholic school board in Windsor, Ontario, which suspended eight female students from St. Joseph’s High School for wearing duct tape over their clothes at a hockey game.
Catholics sure pick the strangest times to overreact. Like, how about re-directing some of that righteous overkill toward priests who abuse children, or the Pope comparing atheists to Nazis?
No? OK, the duct tape, then. Carry on.
For several years, St. Joseph’s students have donned duct tape over their shirts emblazoned with letters spelling out messages such as “Go Lasers,” in support of the school hockey team.
The board recently banned the practice saying the outfits were getting too racy.
A group of eight friends started a petition to get the practice reinstated, promising to keep it all PG. School administrators, including principal Tish Hedderson, still said no.
The girls did it anyway. They wrapped shirts in blue and yellow tape, making sure to cover even their shoulders.
“We made sure our cleavage was hidden as well,” said Sindi Mucollari, 17.
The girls said they got kicked out in the dying minutes of the game and were told they’d be dealt with in the new year. They arrived at school Tuesday only to be suspended for a day. The girls said they were also threatened with being banned from Spring Fling and prom.
“All we were trying to do was show school spirit,” said Mucollari.
Fun school administration quotes below.
Seguin stressed that the girls were not suspended because their outfits were too skimpy. They were suspended for disobeying the rules, he said.
“That’s opposing the authority of the school, the administration of the school,” he said. “That’s suspendable under the Safe Schools Act.”
Seguin said the suspension teaches the students an important lesson because they’ll be dealing with rules for the rest of their lives.
“Lessons need to be learned at this age,” he said. “As adults it’s our responsibility to help them understand that. They’re going to work some day and they may disagree with a policy, and if they choose not to follow that there could be extreme consequences including losing their livelihood.”
Yes, it’s never too early to begin learning to compromise your beliefs and extinguish individual thought and self expression. Because what the world needs is more a**-kissers who toe the company line and won’t make waves. This school board is not only wrong; its members should be arrested for child abuse.
Just wait until WikiLeaks gets around to you, Catholic Church.
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Windsor students in sticky spot over duct tape outfits [The Windsor Star]
