Burnley Grammar School

Hello,

In response to a couple of comments below on my earlier comments, I do understand the point being made. I'd add it wasn't just a matter of listen to the girls, ignore the boys. At first we changed no one's kit - it had always been full length leotards for or girls in gymnastics, just shorts for boys in gymnastics and fitness drills (girls wore t-shirts and shorts for fitness drills), t-shirt and shorts for everything else. But we had to review the kit anyway (the supplier went under I recall correctly), and the leotard was an extra expense, and also slowed things down, so there were lots of arguments on top of girls' complaints leading to us to change the girls' gymnastics uniform to shorts and t-shirts (which had to be tucket in at all times).

More generally, while I do sympathise there might have been some discomfort, and it was different treatment, of course there are physiological differences too, and the idea of double standards goes both ways - it is society that has decided women are forbidden to show as much of their bodies as men, and in sports such as swimming or gymnastics that might reduce the comfort or practicality of what they must wear.

Ultimately, some discomfort is inevitable growing up. Not just on this matter - many students feel uncomfortable wearing shorts, or when I was a student I didn't like the blouses and gym skirts we had to wear in gym. But growing up is about overcoming fears as well. I recognise it wouldn't be normal nowadays, but if I were setting the gym uniform from scratch ignoring outside opinions, I'd probably stick with what it was back in the day in the 70s and 80s. Practicality, safety, simplicity, at the expense of some initial awkwardness I'm sure would be overcome.

Comment by: Nick T on 31st March 2025 at 22:40
Comment by: Terry on 31st March 2025 at 18:06
Terry, no it was not. But it could’ve been. Poor guy.


Exactly my point I think you understood. I didn't actually think there was any chance it really was you, that would have been truly coincidental! But many of us were Nick there for sure.

Well, my last post seems to have taken flight, snaffled perhaps by the moderation fairies or the broadband gremlins. So here goes my second attempt.


Hi Terry,

Wow. I found that offensive just to watch. Words fail me to be honest. I suppose that after everything I have read on this forum I shouldn't be surprised but I am surprised. I'm still surprised that any school would practice such blatant gender discrimination regarding PE kit but I am more surprised that they would be blase enough to publicise the fact by throwing the girls and boys in together. Didn't any of these people have sons of their own? Didn't any of these muppets realise that boys have feelings too?

PE lessons were always separated at my mixed secondary school. I can only recall one single mixed session in the gym due to staffing shortages and the odd girls-vs-boys rounders game out on the playing fields in summer. I don't remember any of us having any problem with them. This will have been because we were not forced to strip almost naked beforehand, unlike those poor boys in that clip.

I suppose it's just yet another demonstration of that universal double standard that boys don't/ shouldn't have sensitive feelings and that where they do they are to be made to disregard them.

I am guessing that some of the girls complained about the embarrassment of leotards in front of the boys and so they were allowed to add leggings to their kit. There's no way of knowing if any of the boys complained about their kit but plainly if they did they were ignored, which was exactly what Susan F stated a few weeks back in the school she taught in. She too seemed utterly oblivious to the sexism present there.

Not only are the girls covered up from their collarbones to their ankles but they are also allowed to fade into the background, with the focus of the clip on two stripped boys. In the viewers' comments one or two posts claimed the minimal kit was to teach the boys body confidence. Those two boys look anything but confident, they seem very shy and subdued. So would I have been. I was painfully shy at that age. And that was with my clothes on.

There was also a comment from a woman stridently asserting that the clothing disparity was absolutely, positively NOT sex discrimination. (Of course it wasn't! Only women and girls can ever be victims of that, this is an indisputable law of physics, as we all know.) So there you go, guys, that's us lot all told.

And it is always, always, always boys on the receiving end of these inequalities. Boys are just shown less consideration overall. Maybe there will be women reading this and inwardly triumphantly sniggering and thinking, 'suck it up, boys, suck it up'. But this sort of thing is a problem when boys are expected to develop into men who respect women. These things fester.

Comment by: Yours Truly on 31st March 2025 at 22:55


Hi YT. No I didn't take the band remark as offensive - the most offensive thing that ever happened to me in my big band days was having to play the Bobby Hackett solo (note for note) in the horrible Glenn Miller tune "String Of Pearls" - for that dubious pleasure I had to borrow a cornet (I was depping for somebody else who usually played that abomination). I preferred the flugelhorn or trumpet, and being able to improvise solos, on more contemporary material,

I have to say that I think our Christine has made it manifest that she rather favours the old fashioned approach of shirtless gym and compulsory showers, and has no regards for shy boys or boys who had their own particular set of problems. She clearly knows every rule in the book, but, like most civil servants gives no thought to the people who are affected (in the same way a person dying of cancer is simply "a case" to the doctor)..She is more concerned about the measurements of the room than the feelings of mere boys. I do still get concerned to think there might be PE teachers like mine running around, especially now they have older lads forced to stay on at school, many of them, no doubt, forced into P.E lessons. Our Mr. Roberts loved watching the 15/16 year olds - God knows what he would have been like with 17/18 year olds.

Comment by: Michael on 31st March 2025 at 21:25


"....Will you pull up the comment where she said she did not speak to any actual children in schools please Alan because I don't remember reading that. My problem with the way you factor your arguments is that you often seem to go out of your way to misinterpret what others say to fit nicely in with your own agenda driven narratives......."


My pleasure old chap.

The message is very long, so I am sure that Ms. Sanderson and yourself will forgive me if I only print the relevant passages (it is akin to somebody requesting A Love Supreme by John Coltrane on a forty five minute request programme - the piece lasts for 40 minutes so you can only reasonably play an extract) . If you wish to read the whole piece, then it is currently on page 15 on the site. On page 16, by the by, she makes an extraordinary assertion that endorses a study by Essex University who claim to have discovered (no doubt at public expense) that boys who shower after PE are fitter than those who don't. No wonder I am a dab hand at manoeuvring large metal boxes filled with electronic equipment around!

The gravamen appears in the final three lines of paragraph 2 in this message:

"
Comment by: Christine Sanderson on 23rd November 2024 at 19:17




...........In the days of HMI's before Ofsted was established just over 30 years ago, the government education inspectors had wide powers and could access any part of a school at any time of day and speak to any member of staff or a pupil. Go through the sek of the head teacher, eat the school dinners and look around the kitchen, and even stand in a PE changing room and observe the working school environment. There could very well be men here who might have seen a PE teacher of theirs standing with a complete unknown figure as they slipped in or out of the PE kit or even having a shower. This practice was before my time but was common before 1992. An inspector may appear in a class situation, or a PE situation and just quietly observe, along or in a group, saying nothing at all to anybody including the teacher, or they may engage with questions...............

.....As this is a forum largely based on PE in schools, I'm well aware of some of the previous comments here and how many pupils viewed their PE in school. But one thing an inspector would not go around asking to individuals are things like, do you like doing gymnastics, do you like football, do you like swimming, etc, or do you like you PE kit, do you like a shower or wearing no top for boys.......


It seems clear that Ms. S and her ilk are more interested in the buildings than the pupils - a wall 6 inches too short is more important than the ritual humiliation of students - another case of preferring the box to the chocolates.

I say this - offend or please - schools seem to take far too many liberties in inflicting their screwball ideas these days, on young impressionable minds, as they seem stacked to the rafters with left wing loonies. This was published yesterday - had it been published today you might assume it was a sick April Fools joke:

https://www.standard.co.uk/news/education/toddler-suspended-transphobia-nursery-b1219768.html

I wonder how many of you will defend THAT?.

I have said it before, and I say it again, any person entering the teaching game ought to be analysed by a psychiatrist, as a pre-condition of employment, because it seems to me far too many dictatorial and unbalanced idiots are let into schools.

Hi Alan,

Thank you for your support. Snarky internet comments don't worry me, I'm perfectly capable of them myself.

I hope you didn't think my 'Arse Against' reference in my last post to you was a homophobic dig. I only realised after I had posted it that it could have come across that way. It was not meant as one. It was actually a pun on a real-life brass orchestra called Brass Against who do brass covers of metal, alternative and punk anthems. I got to see them two years ago in London supporting the almighty Tool.

It was not and is not my intention to have a go at Christine Sanderson. Or anybody else on here. I don't want to hurt anybody's feelings. Her contributions on here are valuable and as a former OFSTED inspector she has a particular and niche insight into what we discuss.

It is just that her detachment often feels more than just professional and the rationalisations she gives for certain unpleasant practices often feel like the type of bland, diplomatic platitudes trotted out in public life by politicians and PR bods and sometimes she seems not to be addressing the point under discussion. Plainly it was just a job to her. Then again I think I can remember her explaining before that the inspectors' remit was to make sure that the compulsory stipulations were being upheld and not to question those stipulations themselves. Although I did point out to her that the pupils would have been the best people to ask to ascertain whether proper procedures were in place because they would be the most likely to give an honest answer.

I saw that headline. As the old song goes, 'Meet the new boss/ Same as the old boss'.

Looking back I must have gone to a pretty unusual catholic school. Not only was there no corporal punishment, not only were we taught about other religions than catholicism/ christianity but I honestly never heard of any pervy teachers there or even a rumour of one. As I have said before even our PE teachers made a point of turning the water on and immediately vanishing into their broom cupboard of an office, none of this standing and watching us that so many other people, both men and women, cite bitter memories of. Looking back now it makes me wonder if this was observation of new guidelines that might have been laid down following some sort of incident. But this is nothing but idle speculation.

The only dubious anecdote I ever heard of was Towel Lady snatching that girl's towel from her as she exited the showers. Twenty-odd years after leaving that school I saw this incident confirmed as real on the now long-defunct Friends Reunited website by a woman some ten years older than me who witnessed it at the time. I feel inclined give this teacher the benefit of the doubt and presume that she was trying to encourage this girl not to be so sensitive and shy. But that was not the way to go about it, even in the long-ago culture of the 1970s. Today I imagine it would almost certainly land her in a disciplinary hearing.

The lenient sentence handed out to the teacher you describe is the fault of the court. Christine and her colleagues were not social workers or mental health professionals.

As regards PE teachers with an overweening sense of their own power, well, funnily enough just yesterday this clip cropped upon my PC, from Jack Black in School Of Rock:

"Those who can, do. Those who can't teach. Those who can't teach? They teach gym class."


We have now seen this from several women posters. The lack of any concern when it is boys on the receiving end.

Comment by: Terry on 31st March 2025 at 18:06

Terry, no it was not. But it could’ve been. Poor guy.

Will you pull up the comment where she said she did not speak to any actual children in schools please Alan because I don't remember reading that. My problem with the way you factor your arguments is that you often seem to go out of your way to misinterpret what others say to fit nicely in with your own agenda driven narratives.

You mention the lady as being an apologist for the teaching profession. Why would you expect someone to come on here and rubbish their profession and not defend it?

You don't like people judging you but my goodness you are incredibly judgemental of others, and in this lady's case I fail to understand it much like James has already said.

I think you could have a disagreement by yourself in a lift with your own reflection or shadow.

If I may also say, how many comments on here have you now mentioned the name of that school? Give it a rest eh.

Comment by: James on 31st March 2025 at 17:27


I suggest you re-read what she said about her not communicating with the pupils when doing her job. You don't get a rounded picture by only talking to one side. She comes over as an apologist for the teaching profession, despite the odd mild stricture. Did she ever convey any of her unease to the teaching staff?. Frankly I doubt it.

Comment by: Nick T on 31st March 2025 at 16:38

This wasn't you by any chance was it Nick? Shirtless boys, no footwear, in a mixed gym. (It's been posted before I know)

https://youtu.be/l_gb0CUzwX0?si=XZn5A3OeWB-u1qsO

My takeaway from this excerpt is that the school gym we see here looks very low energy, lethargic and tediously dull. The boy "Nick" here looks like he'd prefer to be anywhere but in this gym, and probably would like to have his t-shirt on and not be dragooned into presenting his key stage three shirtless gym techniques among the girls and most certainly not be in front of the camera in this way. He looks so unconfident and shy, so that's why he was obviously picked, or for not being up to expectations. I remember boys like him very well at school in PE.

I wonder how many times he's needed to roll head over heels in his adult life since he left!

On this forum time and again you have spoken of how badly you were treated in your schooldays by teachers and pupils alike Alan.

So why then are you attacking without any good reason a lady, Christine Sanderson, who has posted here and are now trying to inflame others to do the same, saying things like you expect a lot of negativity from Christine if she responds. That's a bit rich coming from you, everyone has to put up with never ending negativity out of you and it just never ceases.

Someone previously mentioned how you attack women quite often when they appear on this forum, but it's also noticeable how you seem to attack anyone who has any kind of education background as well. But why?

For the life of me I cannot understand what Christine has said that would rile anyone, she actually ended her last comment by saying the following;

"I think many PE teachers in the past could have done far more to ease any discomfort their pupils may have felt around the communal showering requirements they implemented and also with the shirtless PE for boys for those who it caused anxiety. The question is the style of approach you take."

Just what more do you expect out of someone? Explain yourself.

It might seem like no big deal for some boys, but having to wear just shorts can be very uncomfortable at that age when many are worried about how their bodies are perceived.

Boys had to do gymnastics in just shorts when I was at school in the 80s (for most sports we wore t shirts as well). Being very skinny I found it very awkward, and it was uncomfortable that there were girls in the class as well.

By far the worst aspect of it was that I was gay, closeted, frustrated and confused in myself at the time. So being surrounded by boys in just shorts, while I was also forced to wear as little as that, was a very tricky situation to deal with.

I’m glad this has mostly been consigned to history.

Comment by: Yours Truly on 30th March 2025 at 20:16



I am going to put in a word of support for you, YT, as I suspect you will be getting a lot of negativity to your post, not least from Ms Sanderson herself.

I entirely agree with your views. It has always seemed to me dear old Christine was very much the teacher's friend - she reminds you of one of those loyal backbenchers who turn up on the BBC to defend benefit cuts to the disabled at the same time as defending MPs like this one:

https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/34138863/taiwo-owatemi-expenses-dog/

All animals are equal, as George Orwell said, but some are more equal than others. I remember Ms S on one occasion on here saying that when she was doing her "inspections", which are, I imagine tick box operations - have they got the uniform shade of Magnolia on the walls in the staff room?, are the chairs nice and comfy?, she said that they did not, or were not obliged, to speak to the students, and frequently didn't. So it encourages a very one sided view.

If these inspections were thorough and totally unbiased, the sort of behaviour that went on at the Royal Liberty School, for example. could not have happened. It was totally egregious that a P.E. master was allowed back in the profession after serving a 22 month prison sentence for indecent behaviour with boys, only to go on and commit other similar offences a few years later. Proper inspections, including conducting confidential interviews with pupils, don't happen and we continue to this day to see pests int he profession.

You do have to wonder why boys are made to "shower" without soap and in cold or lukewarm water, especially when the school day is finished, I assume in MOST cases it is the overweening sense of power some teachers feel they have, but I know, from personal experience, that there are worse, and much more sinister reasons, that SOME teachers enjoy watching boys shower, especially the older ones.

Hi Christine Sanderson,

So school showers were actually about fairness? So, not sanitation like they told us? You argued in a previous post that the realisation of unfairness is an essential lesson for schoolchildren to learn. Now you change your tune.

You need to read Simon's post more closely. You talk of 'fairness'. There has been much talk of unfairness on this forum, specifically with regards to boys but you have never been moved to respond to any of those posts. By keeping those boys in and making them do something they were unwilling to do after the specified remit of their authority over those boys had ended for that day those teachers were overstepping the limits of their authority. Explain to me please where the fairness is in letting adults 'professionals' throw their weight around and rule by their whim rather than by the stipulated rules.

Where was the fairness in keeping certain pupils in while the rest of the school was allowed to saunter out the gates at the regular time? Where was the 'fairness' at all the schools where they forced boys to shower together but allowed the girls not to bother at all? Or at the schools, like mine, where girls did have to shower but were allowed to do so in private while we boys were made to get our bollocks out and go in all together at a young and vulnerable age?

'Many schools actually consider that their pupils are still under their guidance before they reach the school gates into school and leaving their school gates after school, especially while in uniform until the point you reach home and take it off. So if you walked half a mile home and got into mischief in your own road the school could technically sanction you in many cases if they saw fit, or if pupils made a nuisance in a shop on the way home.'

You are not really addressing the question. Which is where the threshold lies in a school's authority over their pupils. It might well be elastic as you state but that limit is there. It has to be. Teachers cannot hold children at school indefinitely. A bell or buzzer might only be an advisory guide in law but it is also the law that teachers are not and never were empowered to hold pupils in school indefinitely after the end of the day. That would be abduction, which is an offence that potentially carries a substantial custodial tariff.

'I think many PE teachers in the past could have done far more to ease any discomfort their pupils may have felt around the communal showering requirements they implemented and also with the shirtless PE for boys for those who it caused anxiety. The question is the style of approach you take.'

Well, you and me both. It's just, you never come across as if you actually care.

Hi Samantha,

Thank you for your input. It's good to be reminded that girls sometimes got a raw deal too.

We men don't 'get' most of anything. Everybody is free to post here. I think the reason it's mostly men posting on here is simply because boys were more likely to be treated badly. Not just in PE lessons either. As boys we were to be inculcated with a stoical, manly disregard for our own feelings. There have been several previous female posters who stated that they were never made to use the showers while showering was absolutely enforced for the boys.

You mention seeing boys covered head to toe in mud. Well, there you go. Presumably those boys had been playing rugby while you girls were doing netball or something else civilised and sanitary. Our own games lessons were never that rough and ready but I can remember our old bastard PE teacher having a go at me at the end of a session out on the playing fields for the precise reason that I wasn't muddy, which was something he equated with a lack of effort.

I always thought it must have been worse for the girls because of periods. One or two women posters have stated that their PE teachers actually kept a diary recording every girl's cycle so that they couldn't use it as an excuse. Girls were forced to announce their situation in front of a class full of their peers. There was even one poster who said girls were excused swimming lessons but only to be made to run laps of the playing fields. Which sounds like a punishment, doesn't it? Not only that but the boys doing football or rugby would see them and know exactly who was having their time.

As regards things sticking out, well, you raise the vital point that boys are naturally just more cruel and unfeeling to each other than girls. Which you might just naturally assume means that boys deserve more consideration that girls, especially in such vulnerable situations.
Nope. I got teased in the showers. To be honest by that time I was so used to being teased for something or other I just took it in my stride. Well. Until the other boys, seeing I wasn't bothered, upped their game by telling the girls in my year . . .

I never had to do PE without a top on. I think I would have hated it. But numerous other men posting here have stated how they had to undergo topless PE and sometimes in mixed sessions with the girls. Often they mention feelings of unease at having to do this but beings boys these were not taken into account by the teaching staff. There was a recent poster, Susan F I think, who told of how when PE lessons at the school she was working in introduced mixed PE lessons for gymnastics the girls complained about how they found their leotards embarrassing. in front of the boys As a result their kit was changed to t-shirt and shorts. At the same time several boys spoke up about feeling embarrassed having to be topless around girls. Their feelings were ignored and they were made to get on with it. The usual kit for boys at her school was t-shirt and shorts. The boys were only made to go topless in the gymnastics classes, presumably for health and safety reasons, which is understandable. Your t-shirt falling down over your face could lead to an accident. Yet the school allowed the girls to wear t-shirts in the same class! Was it a health and safety issue or not? Susan F made no comment on the differing dress codes imposed in the boys and girls. She may have been oblivious to them. After all they were only boys.

There was a woman poster quite a while back now who told of how during her first year at a mixed grammar school then girls were made to take PE in nothing but their knickers - this despite the fact that there was an elaborate list of PE kit items specified in the school's prospectus. She didn't go into any detail about how the girls felt about this imposition but she didn't seem scarred by it.

There was also a recent post by a woman who had been a young teacher in the early 1980s during the golden age of teacher strikes. She found herself roped into taking a boys' PE class. The male teacher who usually took them advised her to make them take off their tops - something they weren't usually made to do. The point was to make them more biddable by making them feel embarrassed and vulnerable and it worked.

An almost identical situation in my case to Simon here.

In my secondary school years, early to mid nineties period 1991 - 1996 virtually the lot of my own PE was taken as the last lesson of the school day on two days a week.

Exactly the same as in Simon's school, we could only go home once we had taken the expected shower and the PE teachers all made sure we did this, there was no slipping quietly out the door hoping to be the one that got away without doing it, their backs never seemed to be turned, they saw everyone and everything.

Our changing room must have been designed with all this in mind actually. The shower area and the exit door were quite close to each other so all the PE teachers in my case had to do was stand guard beside the door and nobody could pass unless agreed to go, whilst at the same time getting the perfect view a handful of feet away straight at the whole lot of us showering, and changing of course.

We also had teachers that took us in some cases way beyond the final school day finish. I remember one occasion we were playing football or rugby out on the school field away from the building and the game was quite exciting and our teacher totally forgot what time it was. None of us were allowed to wear a time piece so had no idea what the time was, we were dependent on him for that. School ended at 3.30pm and it was 3.45pm when he looked at his watch, and he only did that because another teacher was bounding across the grass to us wondering why we were still out there which made our teacher check his watch. I don't think he said sorry though! Even though we'd had an extra quarter hour tuition due to his bad time keeping he still made us all go into the showers back in the changing room rather than just hurry ourselves and leave school as quick as possible. There were lots of other times when they all knew the time and we were showering and dressing after the school day had actually ended, like you Simon.

We did not have any of our teachers share showers though. When I started secondary school in 1991 I had a conversation with my parents about showers in school and I'm sure he told me he had PE teachers who took showers with him at the end of class in the sixties.

Hi Simon P,

That's absolutely outrageous that you were held back to shower after mandatory school hours. Didn't any of you complain to your parents? Didn't any of your parents complain to the school?

At my first parents' evening in secondary school the teachers drew my parents' attention to the fact that I wasn't mixing or easing into school life. To remedy this they suggested I should get involved in an extracurricular activity so I could socialise more.

Unfortunately the two activities they mentioned as examples were the two facets of school life I loathed the most. Drama club? I was shy to the point where it was an informal disability and I have written on here before about my thriving aversion to school plays. Football? Oh yes, really. Turn up to school on a day when I didn't have to (football practice was on Saturday mornings)? Run up and down a muddy field chasing after a ball with a bunch of other boys who mostly already hate me? With our seething old bastard PE teacher glowering and barking at us?

Yeah, really. The school knew which hole that one was going up.

Your account only reminds me yet again how lucky I was to have gone to secondary school in the 1980s, when a lot of these rules and customs and practices had been relaxed. And I still hated the whole experience.

Were the girls at your school held to the same showering tyranny? Or was it an all-boys school?

Hi Ian D,

In my last post the first was meant to be addressed to you but I put Alan's name by mistake.

You ex school boys get most of the say on the dreaded PE showers here. Me and my sister absolutely detested showers at school in the eighties. I don't think I knew a girl who didn't always find it something of an ordeal. Some girls used to cry in our changing room in front of the PE teacher at times and plead for avoidance. It was not seen as a nice experience for any of us to be thrown into against our will, and I've no doubt none of us would have chosen to shower by free choice unless we had been rolled in liquid mud and were brown from head to toe. We used to see boys almost like that at our school. They could quite often look like they had no choice but to shower, but us girls were not like that.

I always thought it was even worse for boys having to shower because of the obvious bit of anatomy that sticks out easy to judge and impossible to hide. I wouldn't have wanted to be a boy in that situation, I can't imagine what it must have been like for you boys forced to judge each other so openly. Girls didn't really do that, even with our developing breasts. Our period was also a big deal with showering too.

I never had to worry about doing any topless PE thankfully, but I am interested to know that boys did so much of it. They did quite a lot at my school. I saw a topless boys class through a window once and wanted to stop and stare but couldn't. It did seem quite normal for the boys to be seen doing PE without tops on though in their bare chests.

Perhaps some of you boys from back then can explain what it actually feels like to do a school lesson without your top on for PE especially if you don't like it. I can certainly understand why boys would be nervous about it. What is the sensation you felt in PE, I would hate anyone to tell me to take my top off against my will.

I think this is the kind of result at the top that gives my former profession a bad name and I see no justification for it. A peerage for the boss of Ofsted. I was very unhappy when I read this.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/crknkkx21gvo


Simon, while I fully understand your schooldays frustration with your last lesson of the day and desire to go home there will have been a very good reason for insisting on a shower before you leave and that is quite simply to maintain fairness, what one has to do, all have to do, to avoid any sense that some people are receiving special treatment. That's why they insisted you completed your lesson properly like the others earlier in the day before you and showered after PE, even after the close of school. On that, whilst you are still on school premises under the supervision of your teacher they continue to have responsibility for you, whether the formal end of school time has passed or not, so they were well within their rights to insist. The bell, buzzer or any other way the school announces the beginning of the day, the end of the day or breaks and lunchtime is only an advisory guide and not a legal definition to hold by.

Many schools actually consider that their pupils are still under their guidance before they reach the school gates into school and leaving their school gates after school, especially while in uniform until the point you reach home and take it off. So if you walked half a mile home and got into mischief in your own road the school could technically sanction you in many cases if they saw fit, or if pupils made a nuisance in a shop on the way home.


I really like the sound of your group Craig, good luck later tonight with that. I don't think I will be allowed to join anytime soon will I. I like your positive attitude. People with such an attitude in classes I observed were easy to identify with moments of first meeting them. I think many PE teachers in the past could have done far more to ease any discomfort their pupils may have felt around the communal showering requirements they implemented and also with the shirtless PE for boys for those who it caused anxiety. The question is the style of approach you take.

I'm looking forward to the next week when our bareskin whatsapp group has got four bareskin runs planned with various people, including a midnight run tomorrow night, Saturday, for about an hours duration with four takers so far.

One of the newer guys on our bareskin runners group showed me this YT video last week and I thought I would share it on here with you guys. He's one of these people we've got who heard about us from his friend and chose to join and see if it did anything for his confidence, and it has. He's a nice, slim guy in his early thirties and he told me he relates to the thin guy in this video which he showed me on his iPad before we ran one night. I actually think he's got a really great body, but he refuses to see it like I can. In this video there is a thin lad but when you see his body I think he looks lovely and has nothing to be hung up over. Obviously the chubby young man here could do with losing some weight for his own health, never mind the looks aspect. We've got one or two slightly overweight men who run with us.

Take a look at this, and just remember that we now have men volunteering to run shirtless 'bareskin' out and about who relate to these young men here and many of you on this forum.

For teens who keep their shirt on at the pool - https://youtu.be/phRQmEWw9Fk?si=Msdyh0fUklspJ2zA

Hi Yours Truly.

Many of my senior school PE lessons were final period of the day running from half two until nearly four o'clock back in the late 70s, early 80s. When I got my timetables and saw this I was quite pleased to have PE at the end of the day because there would be no rush for the next lesson and pressure to get sorted. I also thought it was great because we'd just be able to come back, get changed and clear off home and if we wanted to clean up back home we could do so there.

None of that happened though.

It became clear to me that there was no advantage to having PE last period, and there were a few disadvantages. Firstly, being last lesson before home time didn't give us the right to clear off without taking showers. We were always made to do so and nobody was allowed to leave the changing room unless they had done this, and properly. A couple of us lived within a 2 minute walk of the school gates and could easily have slipped home and done that. Infact we all could have done.

Another thing with final period of the day PE was how most of my teachers ran the lesson clock right up to the final bell school ending time, so we'd be going back to our changing room and seeing the rest of school walking out going home. Someone actually brought this up with one of our PE teachers who was making us shower rather than just going home, and mentioned that by the time we were back in the changing rooms getting told we must get in the showers the actual school day had formally ended and it was now our own time again, so technically he couldn't tell us to shower. They made quite clear they could insist whatever the time was on the clock while on school premises.

So this had no effect whatsoever on any of our teachers and so last period PE meant we were forced into showering in our own time past the knock off time and that really p*ssed a lot of us off, and I don't just mean because of anyone being shy about it.

I always thought there were three different typoes of boys in my school PE class when it came to the mandatory showers we took. There were the obviously shy and less confident boys among us, then there were those like me who just quietly got our heads down and got on with it as we were told and created no issues, and there were another group who were obviously more confident and showy offy and seemed to like the attention it gave them.

We were also expected to shower beside any of up to six different male PE teachers as well if they decided to come in with us, which happened from time to time at the end of the day and on some occasions there were two or even three PE teachers, grown men, in the communal showers, completely naked, alongside us young teenage boys, also all completely naked too. These teachers only had to wait five, maybe ten minutes more at most and they could have had it all to themselves because we would have been and gone.

That's last lesson PE in the 1970's for you!

Hi Alan,

'Thanks for saying what you did there. I've always thought there was "something else" about the reasoning for the mass school showering of us all at school years ago and the determination of the teachers to fully enforce it on everyone. They were crazy firm on it, like a forced ritual, which came at huge cost to a lot of people's mindfulness.

In one of my schools I went to we had to all shower in chilly feeling water and were not allowed to use soap or any other wash product on ourselves, so it was effectively like getting caught out in the rain without your clothing on. That's not cleanliness, that's just getting wet! But at least we all got naked and that seemed to be the most important bit for some reason.'

If you were forbidden to use soap, well, I rest my case.

I'm not suggesting any kind of conspiracy-theory level bullshit, just that it was a universal belief that boys needed to be toughened up and that an essential part of this was forcing them to become indifferent to their own emotions, especially feelings of embarrassment, humiliation, vulnerability and discomfort. This was what they did not have enough respect for us to tell us to our faces.

Eleven years of age is too young to be made to shower naked with other children your own age. I was already starting to attract the attention of bullies, some of them in the same shower room, by the occasion of my very first secondary school shower. If learning to be naked with your peers is so essential then it should be implemented later, not before the age of sixteen.

Only - it isn't essential at all, is it? Public, communal nudity is simply not a feature of adult life. So why was it necessary at all? Yes, we got used to it. But I never grew to accept it and on Mondays the knowledge of what was to come would fill me with a sense of dread that stayed with me all day.

'at huge cost to a lot of people's mindfulness.' is such an eloquent phrase.

I have stated before how in first year my Games lesson was the last lesson of the day which meant they could just have let us go home and bathe/ shower in private. The school could have shaved essential pennies off their expenditure by making us use our parents' hot water instead of theirs. But this was not done.

The most basic, most essential agency you have is over your own body. it takes children years of growing to learn to trust their world, which is why this particular violation should never have been allowed.


Hi Alan,

'If forced nudity created such "close bonds", why not go the whole hog and live in a naturist camp. When I was in a big band, perhaps we should have all played stark naked!. After all you can get quite hot and sweaty reaching for the high notes. Not this brassman - red in the face is one thing, red anywhere else is a no-no.'

Maybe you could found a naked brass orchestra that played covers of alternative rock anthems. I suppose you could call it Arse Against.

I am relieved, but not surprised, to read that you have no inclination to get your own slide trombone out.

James your comment - 'In one of my schools I went to we had to all shower in chilly feeling water and were not allowed to use soap or any other wash product on ourselves, so it was effectively like getting caught out in the rain without your clothing on. That's not cleanliness, that's just getting wet!'

That's so true isn't it. That made me smile when I read it. Many of our PE teachers just wanted us to get wet, not wash. Why have I never thought of that! I did things just like you too.

I was browsing the shirtless blog that was mentioned on here a few weeks ago and there are a couple of interesting comments on there that I thought were worth a note here.

There's a PE teacher called Phil who has written this last week;

'I'm a middle school PE teacher and we play a lot of skins against shirts games with the boys. Everyone is expected to do this equally so nobody feels they are one more than the other, and all are expected to be skins just as regular as a shirt.
Telling boys to remove their shirts on PE and be skins is not done to embarrass or shame them.'


There is also this yesterday afternoon from Ryan bringing things right up to date;

'Bare chests are compulsory at my secondary school in Bolton, England. I'm 21 now but my brother still goes there. The school guide says 'tops are not required for boys gym activities', and my brother has followed in my footsteps there on that. He hates it, I was meh about it. Communal showers are compulsory too and were taken in a large open square room lined on three sides with shower jets well above head height. You were not allowed to refuse, even on religious grounds.'

Comment by: Mike Checkley on 26th March 2025 at 23:36


"....... When I was at school many moons ago I found that the communal nature of our physical education lessons where going bare chests was nearly always compulsory and showering was not allowed to be avoided meant our nudity and shirtless lessons created a lot of close bonds with many of us."

Mike - you have said it yourself there "many moons ago". JUst because boys were treated appallingly decades ago is no excuse for disrespecting them in 2025.

If forced nudity created such "close bonds", why not go the whole hog and live in a naturist camp. When I was in a big band, perhaps we should have all played stark naked!. After all you can get quite hot and sweaty reaching for the high notes. Not this brassman - red in the face is one thing, red anywhere else is a no-no.

Comment by: Yours Truly on 27th March 2025 at 23:38

Thanks for saying what you did there. I've always thought there was "something else" about the reasoning for the mass school showering of us all at school years ago and the determination of the teachers to fully enforce it on everyone. They were crazy firm on it, like a forced ritual, which came at huge cost to a lot of people's mindfulness.

In one of my schools I went to we had to all shower in chilly feeling water and were not allowed to use soap or any other wash product on ourselves, so it was effectively like getting caught out in the rain without your clothing on. That's not cleanliness, that's just getting wet! But at least we all got naked and that seemed to be the most important bit for some reason.

Hi Ian D,

You cannot clean yourself properly in cold water. . . Which means that cleanliness was not the real reason for the cold showers your teachers inflicted on you. One more instance of evidence of a hidden agenda to this whole school showers ritual.

Comment by: Mike Checkley on 26th March 2025 at 23:36
Call me old fashioned if you like but I think young males should be expected to do their gym work in a bare chest and take a shower afterwards in school and not complain about being told to do any of that kind of thing. There;s far too much sefl indulgence going on nowadays. These kind of things are designed to make boys grow up and mature and show a sense of self discipline. Expecting privacy in a school is just silly. When I was at school many moons ago I found that the communal nature of our physical education lessons where going bare chests was nearly always compulsory and showering was not allowed to be avoided meant our nudity and shirtless lessons created a lot of close bonds with many of us.




Mike, when I was at school in the 1960's and 1970's I had to do all my gym from primary right through to the end of secondary school in just my PE shorts, and there were showers in both schools that everyone was made to use as well. So I was a quite young age when I got to grips with how school treated boys when it came to PE lessons and privacy and modesty about oneself took a back seat. I was very modest and shy about myself and showing my exposed upper body or being naked. Even just changing sometimes. I just wish I hadn't been that way and really regret it because I have to rather agree with your own analysis and think I would have benefitted from being far less concenred about myself to that extent.

The worst at school for me was cross country shirtless running through soft mud and narrow bramble lined trails. It was mad that we had to run shirtless through such areas near to prickly sharp twigs, at one point there was a place were we couldn't run and had to walk slowly and navigate by pushing branches and twigs out of the way ahead of us which would often scratch our bare skin. A running top would have prevented this for the most part.

Reading through this topic has reminded me of many PE sessions at my own school. It was an all boys grammar, where privacy was often low on the list of priorities. Actually, it didn't exist at all.

From starting senior school we would have a weekly PE class at the sports field, this would happen if it was hot, cold, flooded, windy, under a snow drift etc. The changing room was in a small building in the middle of the fields, I can't even put into words how cold that building was in the winter... I absolutely hated it. What made it worse was that it was also the rugby season, on a boggy field, so we would often return to the changing room covered head to toe in mud and grass, what a sight we were.

Our PE teachers were like the Spanish Inquisition in the changing rooms, they were always where you least expected them, ready to scream at you for slightest transgressions. As you can imagine they were very particular that boys would shower properly and thoroughly and put on fresh clothes before going back to the main school. I guess this seems reasonable thinking about it now, but it was fairly bizarre at the time. For example, some boys would wrap a towel around their waist (shorts and underwear still on), run into the shower, wet their hair and continue getting dressed hoping they wouldn't catch on...

Well, they did catch on, from that point onwards there was a teacher at the changing room door. If you walked past with a towel wrapped around your waist he would pull it open to make sure you had nothing on underneath. Then, down the hallway in the shower doorway, another teacher would standing watching to make sure nobody was messing around and the boys were cleaning properly, making sure we all soaped properly up and did then full all over body wash, including between our legs and under arms. One was so picky with all this it was a surprise he didn't tell us all to wash under our foreskins for him, he was always looking at our willy's it seemed. Perk of the job for him quite possibly.

This went on for quite a while, until we were in the higher years and could be trusted. It was definitely uncomfortable and the last thing I wanted to do from 11 onwards... talk about embarrassing.

I am convinced the water in the shower was somehow below freezing... it would take hours for my testicles to come out of hiding after a shower in there, I think the water was made deliberately cold on purpose to make us scream and holler about it. Coming off that freezing cold windswept school sports field already shivering and then having to strip naked and be herded off into quite cold showers was endurance in itself and at times fairly demeaning how we were expected to do it.

In the teachers gym office next to our changing rooms they had three separate showers for themselves with a curtain to pull across. Even grammar schoolboys didn't get afforded such luxuries.

Call me old fashioned if you like but I think young males should be expected to do their gym work in a bare chest and take a shower afterwards in school and not complain about being told to do any of that kind of thing. There;s far too much sefl indulgence going on nowadays. These kind of things are designed to make boys grow up and mature and show a sense of self discipline. Expecting privacy in a school is just silly. When I was at school many moons ago I found that the communal nature of our physical education lessons where going bare chests was nearly always compulsory and showering was not allowed to be avoided meant our nudity and shirtless lessons created a lot of close bonds with many of us.

Comment by: Chris G on 26th March 2025 at 08:22
Comment by Alan 25th March

"The reason that many PE teachers in the 50s and 60s behaved like Army Drill Sergeants is that's precisely what they had been in their previous life. Of the three PE teachers that I had in my Secondary school years, two were ex-Army sergeants, the third being a Catholic friar!"

Fair enough, Mark - but we are talking about teachers "at work" (though they did little exercise themselves) in the 1980's - twenty years after N.S ended and they should have had the gumption to realise that the boys of the 1980s were different to those of twenty years earlier - just as the school students in 2025 are different to us. I assume that if they treated todays boy and girls as they treated us they would find themselves in hot water.

This is something Phillipson might address, were she not too busy with her "teeth brushing lessons"