Not yet. Once a month, maybe? Just deep enough to draw blood. I got cut worse building an ice fort last week.

Daganev, I know you can argue better than this, give it a shot. That was just silly.

Is it ok to discriminate against ugly people? Or a certain race you don't like? If you don't like freckles or beards, should you have to work with people who have them?

What is the difference between body modifications (tattooing, piercing, branding, scarification, etc) and other physical traits? Does it matter if it's immutable (having a tattoo) or not (having a beard)?

At what point is it ok to make someone change their appearance? Is it ok to make people not have beards, for example?

Just to note, I never sad having a piercing meant you were immature or couldn't raise a family. I said the tantrum you're throwing, and that you're willing to quit your job because of it, meant that you were immature and that that would be a luxury you couldn't afford if you were supporting a family.

And the conformity argument is such utter bull :censored: First, its a job. Second, they aren't asking you to all look identical. You can easily dress similar to someone and be completely individual. I'm sorry if you have a problem with who you are--but that's the idea you're presenting. If one aspect of your appearance is so important that the world comes crashing down without it, then that says to me that you're shallow and don't exist very far beyond your little 'statements of bravery'. Why do you have to show the world you're strong? Are you afraid of what they'll think otherwise? That's what it sounds like. If you weren't who gives a care about how they want you to dress. You're your own person, and only a weak-willed individual is going to stop being an individual by being forced to dressed within vague guidelines.

Is it ok to discriminate against ugly people? Yes. If said ugly person is applying to be a representative or secretary for a modelling angency, what that person looks like is going to reflect on the company. In some cases, attractiveness is part of the job description. If you don't have looks, you don't fit the role, just like if you can't type, you shouldn't be applying either.

Race is the same way. In certain situations, someone of a certain race just isn't going to be right for a position because of their race. For instance, a white guy teaching black history.. that is going to look funny, and people taking the class are less likely to take said class seriously.

And i've worked at places where beards weren't allowed, except during hunting season. It wasn't a big deal. And I know a lot of places where tattoos aren't supposed to be visible. Sometimes exceptions are made if the person's skill makes up for it, but in a lot of cases, if you have a huge tattoo on your face, its highly unlikely you're going to be hired.

Whether you like it or not, when you work for someone who deals with the public, how you look matters. In the grand sense of things, how you want to look doesn't matter, but when you GO TO A JOB FOR WHICH YOU GET PAID, you are required to follow certain rules. To not wear a certain type of thing is no different than not openly picking your nose if you're a waiter. Its about image. And whether you like to admit it or not, the last election showed that a majority of Americans would prefer someone who looks professional over someone with a ton of piercings. Whether they have an outward reaction or not, a lot of people are going to have less respect for you because of it. And whether you care or not doesn't matter so long as you are working for someone else.

It's not about how I look. I'm fine as long as I can wear something to keep it from closing. If everyone else has the exact same piercing as me, and the same clothing, I don't really care. To look at it from an aesthetic viewpoint is to miss 90% of the reasons this actually matters to me.

And if I'm not happy with my job, and I have another lined up to pay my bills, I'm sure as hell going to quit, whether I have a family or not. I'm not going to default on all my loans because of this, but I will start to job hunt again. Why is that immature? I'm not going to stay at a job that makes me unhappy, simple as that.

There is a difference between telling kids (who are young and therefore unexperienced) what should they do, and telling grown adults what should they do. Besides, taking a piss/dump in the corner has negative effects on the surrounding area, because it needs cleaning and there's a possibility of vermin/filth/whatever. The only downside of body piercing in a job like Sylphas's is that someone might not like the aesthetic effect - in which case they can shove it.

I do not have any piercings, and do not plan to have any. But in my book, if someone wants to, they can walk around with 20+ piercings, including an eyeball one - and as long as the piercings are not a danger, do not interfere physically with a job you're doing, and as long as the job does not have strict uniform rules (for example, a soldier or a policeman, but NOT a librarian), they should be let to.

If a job makes you unhappy because you have to take a piercing out for 7 and a half hours of your day.. that is what makes you immature.

You think it is silly because you conformed at a young age. However, after seeing my nieces and nephews currently who like to wear the adult underwear, but also enjoy the feeling of their diapers I am not quite sure how silly it is.

Conformity in certain areas, and to a certain degree is a strong sign of maturity. It is the basic process of saying the desires and needs of others are more important than my own at this time.

When I was younger, I remember enjoying the pain I felt when I streched and being able to block or overcome the pain, so I understand what you are saying, but its something I do in private, not something I define myself by. Another part of conformity and maturity is knowing how to separate the rule given down from the actual affect it will have on you. I assume you work 8 hours of the day. That means for 16 hours, you can be whomever you want to be, and for 8 hours you be who they want you to be, just think of it as a giant roleplaying game.


Also, lets not pretend that there is no difference between choices you make and things you are born with. Lots of places don't allow facial hair, and lots of pepole either shave, or work elsewhere. (Disneyland actually had a policy that you can't even grow facial hair when you are off hours, such as at a company party or get together.)

Yes, because I sat down one day and decided exactly what will make me happy and unhappy, who I'll fall in love with and who I'll hate, and what sorts of food I'll like and dislike. Seriously, how does that make any sense? It is important to me and they're making me change it. Maybe some people love that, but I'm not one of them.

it's sort of unfair that you need to take a piercing out when you work but life's not fair. A buisness or other places, in this case a library, do have a status and look to uphold. Your piercing does not fit in to that look. I hate to say it but when you work for someone you are not you, your just an employee. As an employee you need to hold up an image for a company.

I don't know. I understand your frustration, especially since you've been allowed your piercings up to this point.

At the same time, an employer has the right to establish their rules for the workplace. My right to expression applies in that I don't have to work there if I choose not to do so. Employers all the time set policies on what employees can and cannot say or what they can and cannot do within the confines of the workplace, and if those restrictions aren't what you're willing to live with, then you have the freedom to find somewhere else to work that has restrictions that you prefer.

At my work, I interact with no customers. I only see co-workers the overwhelming majority of the time. Yet, I am required to wear a dress shirt, slacks, and nice shoes. My company is trying to create a certain kind of atmosphere, and I have the power to agree and comply, or disagree and take my skills elsewhere. The thought that I should be allowed the inherent right to wear my Iron Maiden t-shirt to board meetings as an expression of my individualism and unwillingness to conform to corporate culture would never occur to me, even though it would have no effect on my actual work at all. I am willing to trade away my right to wear whatever I want in that particular location during that particular time for the other things the job gives me.

I guess what I'm trying to get at is that I don't think it's wrong at all for the place where you work to say that you can't have (visible) piercings. They are not required to allow you to do so. However, it is your right to decide if your piercings mean so much to you that the current situation is intolerable, and if so, you can try to ask for a change of policy, and if they won't change, then you can decide if the job is worth the tradeoff.

It's really not a moral issue; it's just a matter of you deciding what sort of tradeoffs you want to make in life, and that kind of decision says more about your maturity and personal growth than an eyebrow ring, anyway.

Actually, you would be surprised how much a person can choose what they like and dislike.

3 weeks ago, I hated rye bread and would not eat anything that came in contact with it. I was also reviled by the idea of dates and dried apricots.

Now, because of various health issues, I am forcing myself to eat them, and they are becoming quite tasty.

I used to wear a trench coat and steel-toed boots to school. Then columbine happened, and my attire took on a whole new meaning to people, and airport security got more restrictive. Now I love sandals/slip ons and have no desire to wear heavy boots and enjoy thin jackets. Different situations call for different desires.


Also, I wouldn't even dream of arguing for or against the particular habit of piercings, it could go either way. It is the general attitude you are presenting that I am commenting on mostly.

Sometimes I just wait to hear on the news that Julia Roberts is suing some movie Studio because they won't accept her for the role of Rocky, because she is female.

He's willing to be reasonable and not wear his piercing, he just wants to keep the hole there so that he can wear it on his free time. And that involves wearing a plastic thingy so the hole doesn't close up.

Now the library should be reasonable back and allow it.

In any event I doubt this would be a problem if he were a pretty girl with a tiny nose piercing. Double standards and all.

Yes, we all know that pretty girls are allowed to do whatever they want.

You know, I think every country should require a few years of mandatory military service... if after a few years where you learn the important of uniformity in a 'team' which -gasp- starts at the appearance level, people would understand that dress codes are not only for 'public' relations.

Ew. No. There are better ways to teach teamwork than giving people guns and sending them to die for a moronic president's ego. Thankyouverymuch.

Er, focus on their work? Ill feelings? What the hell? What, you think that someone having a piercing on his eyebrow would draw so much attention nobody would be able to look away? It's a two-centimetre stainless steel needle, not a brass knob shoved through his septum. If people are disturbed and have "ill feelings" towards people who look different, that's their problem.
I would be willing to bet that frightens and disturbs you, conservative-boy.

Er.... no? There's a difference between conformity and empathy. Acting like everyone else is not a sign of maturity, regardless of how you try to spin it; having regard for other people's wishes and feelings is a sign of maturity. Teenagers tend to dress just like each other, act just like each other, think just like each other, and talk just like each other inside their immediate social group - But that doesn't make them mature, now does it?

Not allowing facial hair is bloody retarded, unless there is a significant hygiene concern involved. A (private) employer can be as discriminatory and idiotic as it wants with its policies, but that doesn't make them defensible.

Typical military thinking... "I was brainwashed to be one of the hive, so everyone should, too."

Worst. Idea. Ever. Thank you, try again.

Also, it's almost (because there are ways of dodging mandatory service, for example studying - which I do) implemented in my country. So don't mention it again unless you want me to e-strangle people.

EDIT: Especially the uniformity part. Because you simply CAN'T have teamwork with people who think or even LOOK different than you. Ayup, that's the case, as Tomtom in Estelbar often says.

I take my ideas of teamwork from the Avengers rather than from the military, thank-you. If you read the comics, you'll notice that the military is hugely incompetent and constantly failing at things that a bunch of guys in silly costumes succeed at.