ring discussion ..........?!

Talked to some of my childrens friends about this tonight and was somewhat disturbed by the laughter and glances exchanged between the female members of the company. Why I asked ? It was explained that some adherents to the "silver ring thing" wear it to show that they are not going to lose their virginity before marriage...but....(as one Bill Clinton claimed) oral sex is OK.
Bloody hell i thought. Puts a different slant on the story I guess.

 

I really wanted to know that.

 

that is funny.

 

So girl's dad heads up the British branch of loony evangelical cult selling these rings at £10 a time plus assorted other goodies like sweatshirts etc. Case funded by other loony bunch of Christian lawyers. Girl has already left the school she is taking to court having completed her GCSEs. Finally US research where this lunancy started in 2004 shows an 88% fall out rate of original pledgers.
Why on earth does the case need a decision later. Tell her to clear off now!

 

Good publicity for their business though isn't it.

My sympathies are with the school, but having thought about it some more maybe they should have just turned a blind eye.

 

Trouble is when you turn a blind eye to one, 20 more will try it on tomorrow!

 

I doubt there are 20 kids in the school willing to take the piss taking I'm sure this young lady must have got.

 

A rings a ring though. If I turned a blind eye to one ring wearer, regardless of what it was, I'd have 20 other young ladies arriving with similar ones the next day, without the message. Children en masse can be incredibly sheeplike, and it's in their nature to try and kick over the fences, and push the boundaries of what is considered to be acceptable. Uniform is only in schools really as a control mechanism, it encourages conformity, and helps teachers to maintain order. The jewellry is just an extension of that.

 

It also has a strong presentation purpose, doesn't it?

Both for the kids and the school?

 

I think there are several problems with this case, and overall strongly support the School.

First thing is the obvious one - it seems obvious to me that the only reason such a big fuss has been raised is because the parents of the girl are the UK proponents of the whole ring scheme. I wonder what the girl, if asked in private, really thinks about this. There are deep questions of identity and family /peer-pressure here.

Second is that studies in the US have indicated the ring makes no positive difference anyway - there was a piece on the Guardian site the other day quoting that over 80% of 'purity' ring wearers do have sex before marriage.. as opposed to comparatively-few more that do anyway. However the ring-bearers tend to have higher incidences of STDs and/or unwanted pregnancies because the discussions on these (serious) matters do not or cannot happen in the context of this variety of upbringing. Blame the parents..? Yes.

And that's my concern here. I want my child to be educated enough, and loved enough, and know they're loved enough by their family (in case it goes ..wrong in any way, to be supported) to make informed choices about when and with whom sexual exploration first happens. In Britain we seem to have such a f*cked-up attitude to this milestone in our children's lives that on balance... we'd rather not know. By way of contrast, in Sweden (for instance) that first time..usually happens with the full knowledge of the parents, and at home. In a some car somewhere sometime, because yer parents'll kill ya, or ...safer. Think about that one for a while.

Just my 2p's worth.

 

spot on Felix.
The school spokesperson summd it up for me when they said that if they allow this shallow meaningless symbol because it is important to the girl they'd have to allow rings swearing allegience to a football team, etc.

 

Yup, I think Felix has nailed it.

 

A bit of a blow, eh?

 

I doubt that. It's just that back then a marriage would have been hastily arranged, or the baby would have been handed to an orphanage. In any case, in your parents' day, most girls would have left school at 14.

 

Yes and no... It's a control mechanism, you will conform, the presentational purpose comes after that

 

but I thought she was a virgin..?

 

You owe me a new keyboard.

 

I'll look into this.....have an ask

 

And thankfully the high court has seen sense.

 

Sad if true.