The Rosie and Roula Show

228: Who Decides How Kids Should Look? School Rules, Hair & Self-Expression

• Roula Abou Haidar and Rosie Burrows

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Should schools be allowed to dictate how students wear their hair?

In this episode of The Rosie & Roula Show, Rosie and Roula unpack a controversial school policy that restricts students’ haircuts — banning styles like mullets, undercuts, and shaved designs. What starts as a viral Facebook post quickly becomes a much deeper conversation about self-expression, control, discipline, and freedom, especially for teenagers navigating identity.

Rosie questions how a student’s haircut has anything to do with creating a safe and engaging learning environment, while Roula reflects on parenting, cultural conditioning, and how appearance is often wrongly linked to behavior. Together, they explore why rules around hair disproportionately target young people — and what message this sends about conformity, authority, and autonomy.

They also discuss:

  • Why “this is how it’s always been done” is not a valid argument
  • How controlling appearance can lead to secrecy, shame, and rebellion
  • The difference between hygiene, safety, and control
  • Why self-expression matters most during adolescence
  • How schools could model open dialogue instead of censorship

This episode asks an important question:
Where does it stop — if we start by controlling hair?

🎧 Listen now and join the conversation.

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Rosie (00:01)
Roula I've got to be in my bonnet and I don't know what your opinion on this is going to be. You do surprise me a lot, but often I have an idea of where you're going to take things. This one I'm not sure and I might get really pissed off at you or you might get pissed off at me. So let's see where this goes. There was a social media post that popped up on Facebook. You know how it just

recommends things to you, even if you don't follow the page. This post was from a high school, an independent high school. So kids pay fees to go to this school or the parents pay fees. Anyway, it's the beginning of the school year in Australia that starts in January and school went back a couple of days ago. And this school put on Facebook a post about haircuts.

I'm reading this post and I thought it was satire. And then I got to the end of the post and went, fuck, they're being serious. So this post was outlining acceptable haircuts for students to have and unacceptable haircuts. So students are not allowed to have an undercut. They can't have a mullet. They can't have a haircut with like a design shaved into their head.

All these different things. They're only allowed certain haircuts. And I just, it pissed me off so much. I posted on TikTok and I think I even put on my Facebook. I said, this is bullshit. Like why, what has a haircut got to do with providing a safe and engaging learning environment? Absolutely nothing. That was my stance. And the comments on this post were interesting. There were people who were taking my view.

But then there were other people going, well, kids need to learn that there's rules in society and you need to look neat and presentable and if you don't like the rules, go to another school.

And my argument, I'm kind of answering my own question, but I'm going to keep going and then you can attack me. My argument...

No, hang on, I'm getting lost. People are saying this is just the way it is. Lots of schools have these rules. It's the way it is. That's what society is like. Jobs expect you to have certain haircuts. And I go, well, just because something's always been done that way doesn't mean it's appropriate or it's correct. Imagine if throughout history we never changed anything. my goodness. This is just the way it's always been done. We're not going to change it.

Roula (02:48)
you

Rosie (02:51)
So I went on a rant and I was just furious, but there was a large group of people defending the school. So I want to know, Roula, is it appropriate for a school to dictate the sort of haircuts students can have?

Roula (03:08)
I don't even feel safe to go to such a school.

Rosie (03:11)
Yeah, right? Yeah. Right. Surely school should be a place where it is safe to experiment with your self-expression. You should feel safe at school.

Roula (03:13)
I can't be myself.

Okay.

thinking, I'm thinking because this is, this is so, yeah, it's so annoying. We talked about this not long time ago that my son wants to let his hair grow.

Rosie (03:30)
I put you on the spot haven't I? Yeah.

That's right, yeah.

Roula (03:44)
And we always wanted him to go and cut his hair. But now I'm like, but why? He feels in his element. He performs better because his hair is what's making him feel good about himself. So why do I push him to go and cut it? I agreed with him. We won't cut your hair. We will trim it so it looks neat and nice shape. So you also look well taken care of.

Rosie (04:00)
Right. Yes.

Roula (04:12)
And this brings me to the point of the parents who say, yeah, they have to be neat and I don't know. You can be having a punk hairstyle, a punk rock, whatever, and still look neat and well behaved and dressed. We have this impression that the hairstyle determines the behavior. In a way, we...

Rosie (04:23)
Mmm.

Yeah.

Yeah!

Roula (04:38)
We can deny this. cannot deny it because there are categories in the society that follow a certain style. And yes, we are scared of them, for example, or they have a big mouth. And I'll give you an example. When I was at this parking lot in front of school, we also talked about this. I don't remember which episode. And then all these guys, very scary and intimidating, came out of their cars and they all had the same haircut. And this haircut represented for me

Rosie (04:54)
Yes, I remember this story.

Roula (05:08)
danger. Okay? And this is a different thing.

Rosie (05:09)
Yeah. The other thing to remember

though is correlation is not causation. So the haircut does not cause that behavior and the behavior does not cause the haircut. But there is often a grain of truth from these stereotypes, isn't there? They come about because of observations that seem to keep appearing. Yeah.

Roula (05:29)
Yes.

But then, then what happened? I was watching the soccer. Do you say soccer or football in Australia? Soccer game where my daughter is playing and the coach of the other team, a young person had the same haircut as these guys that I was scared of. But this coach was respectful, very well dressed actually to be on the soccer.

Rosie (05:36)
Yeah, we say soccer here.

⁓ yeah.

Roula (05:56)
field, he was super fashionable. And I realized, no, he's carrying it in such a fashionable way and coaching the team such a good way that I was able to discern or to make the difference between that. ⁓ Yeah. Bring me back to the school.

Rosie (06:13)
Yeah, it's not about the haircut, it's about the person. Yeah. Yeah.

Roula (06:20)
if they are controlling their haircut, are they also controlling their sexuality? Are they also controlling their gender, feeling, determination? Are they also controlling the way they play outside their independence, their privacy? It starts with the haircut. Why is a teacher annoyed by child haircut? Okay. Let's say the hair is on their face.

Rosie (06:26)
Where does it stop?

Yeah.

Roula (06:42)
Okay,

you can say you can leave your hair long, but at school put like a bandana or something just to keep it away from your face. This

Rosie (06:50)
You see, even

that to me, though, why? They can have their hair on their face.

Roula (06:53)
Well,

they can, yes, I'm saying if this is too much and they want them to, okay, your hair is you own it. If a school want to have a regulation, it has to be something that fits, but then when he's out of school, he's himself again. And the headband, he can use it at school. So his hair is away from or her, his or her or them, whatever, away from their faces.

Rosie (07:03)
Mm.

you

Roula (07:20)
but then when they leave school, they're themselves.

Rosie (07:25)
Mmm, I understand where you're coming from, but I've got this feeling of why can't they be themselves at school? Who gives a shit if their hair's on their face?

What's it to the teacher? And I had a teacher message me privately who's sort of an acquaintance. She was too scared to comment on the video I posted, because you know what I'm like, I'm very passionate. And she said, yeah, I agree, it's ridiculous. And she's like, the rules are the same at mine. And often when the kids go on summer holidays, the boys will let their beards grow out and they'll grow their hair. And then back to school, they got to shave it all. And a point I made in the video I posted, well,

does that mean I can't teach there because I've got a so-called boys haircut? And she said, no, teachers can have whatever hairstyle they want.

So, that's interesting. Yes. So what, where's the, you know, like, I cannot think of a reason that this is an appropriate rule or boundary to have at school. And all these parents saying, well, there's expectations if they go in the army, they have to have a certain haircut.

Roula (08:14)
So we did shortcut.

to bring this up in the Netherlands in the army everyone has their own hair whatever style they want

Rosie (08:35)
Yeah.

I

love that because what's the fucking problem? this shit pisses me off so much. I'm probably blowing out the microphone with my loud noises, but

Roula (08:45)
Have them.

You know, discipline and abiding to the rules and the regulation and be responsible. These are not things that that we have to. They don't come from the physical appearance into the inner self. On the contrary, when people feel when I was at school, we had to wear a school uniform. And yes, we had to have our hair in a certain way, shoes in a certain way. And our school uniform was a skirt.

Rosie (08:55)
Mm.

Yep.

Mm-hmm.

Roula (09:19)
And we would roll the skirt up to the edge of our bum when we're outside of school and put it down when we go into school. So these regulations make young people lie, hide, do things in secret. not because I thought I'm doing something wrong when I did that. And then I realized I could have been myself, but they didn't let me.

Rosie (09:24)
Yeah. Yeah. ⁓

Yeah. ⁓

S.

Right, because what are we teaching them? We're teaching them that a dictatorship is okay and that having people dictate to you how your hair has to be is okay. I don't think that is okay. And when parents start saying, well, certain jobs have expectations, okay, yes, but it doesn't mean that's right.

Roula (09:48)
You know?

But then when they're older

and they're going to do this job, then they deal with those expectations. Then they're grown.

Rosie (10:11)
Right, but also,

also it doesn't mean that because those expectations exist that they are right and that they shouldn't be changed. at one point, another point I want to make, there's probably more. I saw this post, I commented on it and I was engaging in the comments and I went to share the link with a friend and the school had taken down the post. They'd made it private because they weren't expecting the backlash in the comments.

And I was furious. hadn't screen-shotted it, so I didn't have evidence of it. Anyway, about an hour later, they made the post public again. And so I screen-shotted it, and they've gone through the school and deleted comments that didn't support the post, and they've now turned commenting off. But my argument in my vid- Right! It's censoring! So in my video, because they'd taken the post, they'd made it private, I said, well, why?

Roula (10:54)
This is pure dictatorship.

Rosie (11:03)
could they not have taken this as an opportunity to role model how to have a constructive conversation when there are differing points of view? They could have used that as a learning moment. Yeah, exactly. And my video starts reason 999,999 that I hate the education system. So yeah, I really don't like the system. The fact that this is considered okay. And yes, it's just a haircut, but

Roula (11:12)
But this is why you don't like the school system.

Rosie (11:33)
I really don't think it's okay and I have big issue with it.

Roula (11:34)
Yeah.

Here in the Netherlands, look, the country is getting polarized. We are going in weird directions. And I'm grateful not our schools, maybe the kids, maybe the parents, maybe these beliefs. Yes. But the schools here, they at least the public school, not the religious one. These schools.

Rosie (11:41)
Okay.

Mmm.

Roula (11:59)
They are so focused on personal freedom, freedom of choice, freedom of accepting. They're working really hard on having kids believe in who they are and how they are. Because outside in the world, and regretfully it's happening in the Netherlands more and more lately, is that people are being attacked for how they look. I'm not saying they're race, their color, their religion, no.

Rosie (12:19)
Mmm.

Roula (12:26)
They're just attacked for how they look. They close the wear, the hair, et cetera. And I hear my son, who's 10, sometimes he's worried about, he likes to have black earrings. And he has the anime style of hair. He's adorable. But he's worried that, and he likes to have black nail polish.

Rosie (12:29)
the clothes they're wearing and the hair and yeah. Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Roula (12:51)
And in my heart, I so want him to do all these things because it is allowed at school. Only the kids are so harsh. Some kids, not all of them, some kids. And my responsibility is to teach my child to be strong and do the things that make him happy and comfortable regardless. And this school is actually doing the opposite. It's telling the kids, you have to look in a certain way so you are accepted.

Rosie (12:59)
Mmm.

I don't like that.

Roula (13:24)
I'm sad for these children, the ones who don't want to cut their hair, for example.

Rosie (13:26)
Yeah.

And I was taken aback. I was floored, Roula, that there were about 50-50 responses supporting the school and the other half in my sort of boat saying that's ridiculous. So the fact there were so many parents not seeing issue with it, I was floored. I thought, really? The argument is, yeah.

Roula (13:53)
They want control.

They're glad that the school is controlling their kids because it's too much work to control your child.

Rosie (14:04)
I want the kids to like protest, go to school with beard and you know, crazy hair, just because how ridiculous.

Roula (14:14)
they will want it how old are these is it like ⁓ high school even

Rosie (14:18)
So it's high school, so that's from roughly ages,

what's that here? 12, 13 up to 18. So it's a critical period where you are experimenting and trying different looks and discovering who you are and school saying no.

Roula (14:28)
Mm. That's critical.

Especially now

in Australia with the social media ban for this age and now restriction on how they're gonna do their hair It's like what else do they want from them? Okay, social media. It's we made an episode on this topic, which I think we lost it We have to record it again. No, I found I think I found it I found it I found it about the social media ban in Australia Yes, it's really sad ⁓

Rosie (14:44)
Mmm!

Yeah

Really? ⁓ did we?

okay, right.

Roula (15:06)
I'm not at all with this school. If my child was there, I would pull them out, take them to another school. But also I want to mention something, Rosie. It's normal that there is supporters and against.

Rosie (15:13)
Yeah. Yeah. Mm.

True, yes. Absolutely. I just was not expecting it to be so even.

kind of scares me that there's so many people out there who think dictating a haircut is okay.

Roula (15:36)
There are, yeah.

Rosie (15:36)
What next?

The colour of your eyes?

Roula (15:40)
That's the book that is very sensible.

Rosie (15:40)
You know, where does it, where does it stop?

So yeah, I not if, if you're curious, I'm not going to mention the school in the podcast episode, because Rilla will turn me off definitely. But if you're curious, you can go to my TikTok and there is a video on there that does name the school and you can go look at that.

Roula (15:56)
Every episode that is about restricting freedom, especially for children, upsets me and this is why I have absolutely no desire to say to people to go to our website and buy us a coffee. I don't feel like it's the appropriate episode to share this information.

Rosie (16:08)
Yeah.

Yeah,

yet you brought it up. No, yeah. And I am relieved that we're on the same page as this. was just, had to bring it up. I don't have kids, but wow.

Roula (16:15)
you

Freedom to all our kids. Freedom to every person. And this is I want to end the episode.

Rosie (16:31)
Yes. And if you're a parent

and insisting on your kid having short hair, long hair, whatever, maybe start questioning why. Roula was confronted with this, weren't you? When your son said, I want longer hair. And then you realized, okay, it's more about me wanting him to look neat and tidy. And so you said, okay, yeah, you have long hair, but let's agree. You just have little trims. You don't have dead ends and make sure you're washing it and brushing it. That seems fair. Yeah. Yeah.

Roula (16:57)
Yeah, self hygiene, that's important.

Rosie (17:00)
It's a life skill.

Roula (17:00)
Thank you for listening. Bye.

Rosie (17:02)
MUM-