LIVESTRONG = track meet DQ's?

Call me late to the band wagon, but just had to blog about this: High School runners disqualified because they wore the Lance Armstrong Cancer survivor wristband "LIVESTRONG" during a track meet. The Virginia Beach school district strictly prohibits the wearing of jewelry other than religious jewelry, health advisories and perhaps, wristwatches.

HUH?

Can you guess Delegatrix and I had a rousing talk on the way into work today. Seems we were not the only ones. The aspect of this situation was perhaps the most outrageous was the fact that the wearing of religious jewelry was sanctioned.

Great minds think alike, as Delegatrix commented that the runners should have simply taken a pen and drawn a cross or the star of david on the yellow rubber band and said it was personalized religious jewelry. Then, she found an article on HamptonRoads.com talking about this very situation, and the author's similar idea to reconstitute the LIVESTRONG bands into religious jewelry.

So while the controversy over this had ended with the county official backing down and reversing her decision, a larger issue is at hand. Have school districts gone too far in their regulating the appearance of their student body? And if so, why has it come to this? Is it because many parents no longer see it as their job to teach, discipline and care for their own children, and have foisted their responsibilities onto the "system"?