As a young and rebellious Flying Officer, I used to see how long I could grow them before my OC started to twitch at the sight of them!
I’ve just briefed my troops on the change in regs, and they all seem very positive about it!
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The CCF solution would be to have school hair rules which wouldn’t permit that (ours wouldn’t for example).
Enjoying the irony therefore that I can still prevent my CCF cadets from having long hair, but the ATC can’t…
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Bet the long haired ATC males still do it smarter than the short haired CCF equivalents 
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Question out of curiosity.
Before I ask question. Just want to put in black and white. I have NO issue with the policy.
Question.
Wonder what it was that has led to this change.
Legal action?
Conscious?
“Wokeism”? note the quotations.
RAF led and RAF wil be following us?
Like I say.
Curiosity. Want to understand the policy change thought process.
I would expect a combination of the Comdt’s approach being very keen on this sort of thing, and someone in Legal finally pointing out that gendered uniform policies are illegal outside of the actual armed forces.
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I think the commandant’s obvious sympathies for LGBT+ and general equalities is likely to have been a big factor, but they may also have been covering themselves for any potential legal challenges.
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@Baldrick and I writing pretty much the same thing at the same time. Shouldn’t you be working?
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Ssshhhh…
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I have no issue with the policy, however I believe this is the first time we have differed from the RAF on appearance. I wonder if regular personnel, especially SWOs, have been briefed on the acceptability of long hair for our male cadets and CFAVs?
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I imagine the RAF will follow or have adopted without the comms yet
I wonder if regular forces, especially SWOs, care?
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A better question would be “what’s it got to do with them anyway?”
They don’t have any say over any of the other civilian personnel on a station, why are we any different?
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I agree - but we keep being told we are the ‘blue footprint’…
…so if we are going to be representative they might care about how we are representing them
That sounds like a “them” problem
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I’m not sure I am generally a fan of things which drive a wedge between us and the regulars, BUT legally we didn’t have a leg to stand on.
In the same way, we allow cadets to fly who might not in the regular RAF but who can safely do so; the Av Med 1 is carefully constructed only to exclude cadets for whom it might be actually unsafe to fly. That way we keep the right side of the disabilities legislation without putting cadets at risk.
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You can see problems arising with some when males decide to grow their hair, it will take the best part of a year to get any proper length depending on their hair type. Even through the lockdown my hair length didn’t get much more than on the collar and just over ears, yet on top it was really thick. It’s not going to be like beards a couple of weeks.
I wonder how many current cadets will be bothered? We might find out if haircuts drop off by Easter. At school I don’t think one boy has hair long enough for a pony tail, which is pretty much the same out and about among teenage boys. Even then will the no need to get it cut attract them to the organisation. I know that’s not the rationale. You can see more staff giving it a go.
I would guess that in the majority it will be more taken up by those eligible to join who previously wouldn’t have done so due to already having long hair.
It’s noticeable on social media how many regulars, reserves and CFAVs are now sporting beards. I think it’s a novelty thing currently because we can. In some photos the majority are doing so:
I wonder if long hair will go the same way initially and we’ll see social media festooned with mullets?!
Bring on the 80s!!
Beards are just in fashion in general at the moment. Before the rule change I was the only clean shaven person on my team at work.
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