Where Do You Stand?

• Position: Pro and con viewpoints on whether school districts should restrict the wearing of gang colors - Brief Article

Should schools ban gang colors?

YES

In many school districts around the country, gangs disturb learning, damage property, and threaten innocent kids, Some officials try to curb gang violence by banning the wearing of colors or insignias that mark kids as gang members.

In Winfield, Missouri, for example, students have been told not to wear orange-and-blue attire because those are said to be gang colors.

In Round Rock, Texas, administrators banned red clothing because they said red was a favorite of the Bloods, a local gang. "We simply have enforced the policy that says any clothing that has gang slogans, symbols, or colors may not be worn," Round Rock High School principal Sherry Blackett told the Austin American-Statesman.

Blackett said the goal of the ban is to prevent violence. Before moving to Round Rock, she was an administrator in Corpus Christi, Texas, where, she says, "kids were being shot because they were wearing someone else's color. I'm asking the community to understand the safety issue here."

Ronald Stephens, executive director of the National School Safety Center in Westlake Village, California, agrees that gang members can target people wearing the colors of a rival gang.

The purpose of dress codes, he says, "is to protect the safety and welfare of all students and staff."

--REGIONAL NEWS REPORTS

NO

Banning certain colors or kinds of clothing at school may seem harmless to some concerned parents, but there are two big problems with it. First, it violates students' right to free expression. Second, developing profiles of how people behave based on what they look like is a form of discrimination.

The Winfield policy, for example, assumes that kids who look a certain way are more likely to be troublemakers. Profiles --which can be based on race or ethnic origin, as well as manner of dress --are stereotypes, and we should fear their increased use in schools, in airports, and by police.

Students should be disciplined based on their conduct, not their appearance.

--Deborah Jacobs, AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION OF EASTERN MISSOURI

Should drunk drivers lose their cars?

YES

"Drunk drivers kill," says New York City Police Commissioner Howard Safir. "I can't tell you how many times I've been to the scene where somebody was killed, and the drunk driver had been arrested three or four times before. I do think there are lots of people who will think twice about drinking and driving if they think they are going to lose their car." Says...