Tokyo public schools will stop forcing students to dye their hair black (2019)

I had absolutely no idea this was part of the dress code.<p>&quot;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.&quot;<p>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?

Is it just me, or is this a counter to the HN article earlier that &quot;Japan isn&#x27;t homogeneous&quot;?<p>Reminds me of other quirks in Japan like when customer-facing women were banned from wearing glasses[0]<p>[0] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.bbc.com&#x2F;news&#x2F;business-50342714" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.bbc.com&#x2F;news&#x2F;business-50342714</a>

I checked to make sure it wasn&#x27;t somehow an Onion article. That&#x27;s an interesting cultural quirk I&#x27;m surprised still exists.

A consideration of the Japanese saying &quot;The nail that sticks up gets hammered down&quot;: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.tofugu.com&#x2F;japan&#x2F;conformity-in-japan&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.tofugu.com&#x2F;japan&#x2F;conformity-in-japan&#x2F;</a>

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.<p>Also, I was surprised to hear this, because, in anime, characters very often have colorful hair.

This is just sad and a good reminder that intolerance to any deviation is inherent to any society or organization.

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&#x2F;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).<p>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&#x2F;cultural&#x2F;religious reasons for girls wearing jewelery, flowers and even henna on our hands.<p>Also: Fridays were non uniform days for grades 5 and lower. And you can wear anything you want on your birthday..all grades.<p>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)<p>When I tell this to kids these days, they think I am pulling their legs. And I thought my school was being strict!!

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&#x27;t; it&#x27;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&#x27;t want their students, who mostly have black hair, to dye their hair brown or other colors.<p>However, since the vast majority of the students naturally have black hair it&#x27;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 &quot;chapatsu&quot; brown hair but then claim that that&#x27;s really their natural hair color when it isn&#x27;t.<p>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&#x27;t dying it.<p>It&#x27;s pretty dumb and it sucks for the students who naturally have brown hair but it&#x27;s easy for the school to be lazy and take the approach of just requiring all the students to have black hair.

Background on the business organizing this. Sounds like a daycare facility:<p>&gt;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.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;globisinsights.com&#x2F;mba-essentials&#x2F;critical-questioning-qa3&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;globisinsights.com&#x2F;mba-essentials&#x2F;critical-questioni...</a><p>&gt;Our Vision - Society fulfilled with smiles of diverse families<p>&gt;Zero waiting children for nursery school. All the mothers can continue their work.<p>&gt;Assist parents (mothers in particular) to remain in the workforce<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;florence.or.jp&#x2F;english&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;florence.or.jp&#x2F;english&#x2F;</a>

(2019)

I wonder what impact this has on Japanese students willingness to take risks and express themselves once they leave the educational system.

Links to Japanese articles:<p>[0]: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;mainichi.jp&#x2F;articles&#x2F;20190905&#x2F;k00&#x2F;00m&#x2F;040&#x2F;210000c" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;mainichi.jp&#x2F;articles&#x2F;20190905&#x2F;k00&#x2F;00m&#x2F;040&#x2F;210000c</a><p>[1]: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.nikkei.com&#x2F;article&#x2F;DGXMZO47985000Q9A730C1000000" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.nikkei.com&#x2F;article&#x2F;DGXMZO47985000Q9A730C1000000</a><p>Edit: structure.

Many schools in China require girls to cut their hairs short, so they don’t spend all their time on it and can study instead.

Yet I&#x27;d still rather live in Japan then in the US