In news that I’m sure is going to make a lot of the conservative culture warriors penning columns for News Corp burst a blood vessel, the Queensland government is planning to change its state uniform policy to allow schoolgirls to wear shorts and pants as part of the uniform.
According to AAP, education minister Grace Grace (as always, not a typo) told ABC Radio today that it should well already be the case:
In today’s day and age, there should be no reason why shorts and pants aren’t made part of the school formal uniform. . . . Everyone should be entitled to be able to choose shorts and pants.
You’re goddamn right.
Other than it just being super weird to decide that pants are solely for boys, research has found that making girls wear dresses makes them less likely to do physical activity than boys, which – even outside of the health ramifications – can have some crazily significant knock-on effects later in life.
