by Bethan Jones

Created on: June 04, 2009   Last Updated: June 05, 2009

Recently I had an interview for a job as a teaching assistant in a local Church of England primary school. During the interview I was asked, if offered the job, if I would remove my facial piercings because the children, seeing them, would want to copy me. I agreed, began work a few weeks ago and took out my facial piercings, with the exception of my nose (it is an acceptable modification) and my bridge piercing (which I replaced with a transparent PTFE bar; it is still new and healing). The piercings I removed were both eyebrow piercings and my labret stud. I also put plugs in my ears rather than wearing flesh tunnels. Over the first few days however the children noticed that I had holes in my face from where my piercings were and asked me about them. They also asked me about my tattoos. When I told my family this their immediate reaction was 'you didn't tell them anything did you?' and when I answered yes they were surprised and disapproving.

The point I am trying to make here is that my family and employer believed that if I kept my piercings in or talked to the children about them and my other modifications I was being a bad role model. They believed that if I were to keep my piercings in and my tattoos on show I would not be able to do my job as effectively as I could with my piercings out and and my tattoos covered up. This is what I want to discuss in this article, and I want to look at the following things; what is a role model, the difference between a positive and negative role model, whether we should be acting as role models to children and whether, as modified people, we need to act twice as well in order to be considered a positive role model.

Firstly, what is a role model? The common consensus is that a role model is someone who serves as an example of positive, or good, behaviour: "n. a person looked to by others as an example to be imitated." One example would be the young man who helps an elderly lady carry her shopping to her house; another, a teacher speaking politely to a child instead of shouting. Both of these illustrate positive examples of behaviour which society would like us to emulate. In contrast a negative role model is someone whose behaviour is deemed unacceptable and shouldn't be emulated; the group of teenagers who spray graffiti onto walls; the girl who lies to her mother in order to go drinking underage. These kinds of role models are not wanted.

What you can see from the above examples is that the key concept in being

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