I’ve been moderated on here previously for posting piccies of poor dress standards, so won’t post a link to any of the gash examples that I’ve seen over the last few weeks, but I have to ask who is vetting what ends up on social media.
A few examples I’ve seen include belts undone, wedgewoods long sleeved with one arm rolled up the other long and no tie, a officer in blues wearing a beret, a cadet wearing a stable belt over a pair of grey coveralls. These all being on ‘offical’ accounts - not personal.
My thought is we must do better than this, it looks terrible and doesn’t set the right standards; so please if you are your unit’s IC Social Media please vet what you are putting out or better still get your staffs and cadets to be in compliance with the uniform standards in the first place.
No one specifically. But when there are real mess ups, it’s up to anyone who sees it to report it. I can think of a couple of good examples where people have uploaded stuff (not necessarily uniform related) that has been taken down pretty quickly after a polite email.
Some of those are pretty bad.
I’m not even in uniform, but I agree we should try to do better. That may occasionally mean sticking your neck out to let someone know they’ve done something silly. But that is better than them ending up on FYBUK.
I’m the main poster (ok basicaly the only poster) to my wing’s SM and have been the cause of a few headaches for my WWO (and my sqn OC for that matter on the Sqn SM).
I try to always get someone else to have a quick look over, whether that is the WWO or another SNCO (especially for uniform and drill matters) or just any other CFAV.
I would never post content showing uniform as you’ve described but if they look smart and i haven’t immediately spotted something then I’m not worried since my focus is on celebrating the cadet and the cadet experience.
Sounds like the standard HQAC media reply on Facebook
But yeah, people do generally try their best, which is why if I see something I’ll let them know! If it’s posted by someone I actually know I’ll happily ping then a message on Facebook or whatever.
I did the right thing and raise it to Wing and from there up the CoC reached HQAC…they questioned why I had a problem with the photo, to which I quoted the relevant lines.
a bit of to and fro about how the situation came about (which wasn’t my beef) and the end reply was “we tried our best”
A quick trawl of social media posts in relation to Remembrance Day have provided a veritable feast of uniform issues which again seem to lack any moderation. We can’t now it seems show specific examples, but just a flavour -
Warrant Officers (who should be the exemplars of standards), wearing the WO2 style badge which was withdrawn a couple of months back.
An Officer wearing number ones without a belt
An adult sergeant wearing brown leather gloves.
A whole unit parading wearing civilian coats over uniform.
It’s bad enough this happening but to put it out on social media demonstrates a real lack of understanding.
The coat thing… As much as its irritating and can look scruffy but if it stops them getting cold and wet… So be it… However I think jeltexs could of be mustered up from somewhere to solve that…
WO badges… No 1 badges are a challenge to find at the moment, personal preference would of been just wear no 2… But get why people are precious about wearing no1s
The rest yeah… Not acceptable.
My biggest annoyance is really small but incorrect buckles on white belts…
Does every Sqn not have a giant box full of the bloody things that no-one knows what to do with, they multiply over-night, I’ve issued every new Cadet with one and we still seem to be drowning in them In every uniform order this year from stores, you order one and get at least three!
That said, I’m in agreement that Cadet welfare takes priority.
Assumption being that said WO has received their new badge? There was certainly a long lag between some people on here receiving theres - and I’ve no doubt that some have been lost in the post along the way!
I’m going to make the assumption that it was a male officer? Can’t really defend that one otherwise! Sack off No 1’s for the day and wear a jumper.
Maybe they only had brown gloves available and they had cold fingers. It happens. It’s not right. But welfare trumps standards.
Was it cold? Wet? Do they not have enough Jeltex? Do they have any Jeltex? As frustrating and scruffy as it looks, i’d rather the unit paraded with cadets welfare in mind, than entering a parade in early November with no consideration to the weather conditions! If the RAF supply chain could guarantee us enough serviceable uniforms to fulfil the needs of every CFAV and Cadet, then i’d happily get the hump about this stuff. But they can’t. So I don’t.
I wasn’t even talking about No 1s! I’m talking about sliders for 2s!
Lets not forget that the whole “pandemic” thing has made accessing tailors quite challenging!
I appreciate that this is a relatively fixed date in the calendar so people know when it’s happening and should have got their admin together before now… but…
Yeah exactly…if the same thing is being discussed this time next year then i think a conversation needs to have because the opportunity is out there to resolve this i think…as far as im aware all WHQs got the initial set of 1 per WO on sms, its the ones appointed since that s the challenge, nothing is trickling through from HQAC.
Also with a lot of this stuff, people end up criticising how a cadet (or cadets) looks when it’s not even their fault.
Coats - I’m with Alex. Better that than nothing if it’s coming down. With that as well, while I’d generally go with “do what you have to, but don’t advertise the rules you break”… What other choice did they have for yesterday? Not post anything at all of an important (and probably one of their first) major event?
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In every uniform order this year from stores, you order one and get at least three!