Were students suspended for wearing John Deere shirts?

John Deere launched a massive clothing campaign at Hot Topic. They make overpriced shirts, hats, wristbands, and hooded sweatshirts. I'm still trying to figure it out, is John Deere subtly Punk Rock? I myself own a John Deere wristband.

I thought John Deere made lawnmowers?? <looks confused>

They also make tractors. And John Deere gear is the rage among young men and women (like 15-20) right now in this area. My friend's 18-year-old daughter was excited to get a John Deere cap, one of the farmer's caps, like a baseball cap but bigger on top and on the bill. I think it's funny, because my dad wore those caps back when John Deere gave them to potential customers of their farming equipment.

It must have something to do with the whole trucker-hat craze. Now it's cool to 'dress up' like the blue-collar worker, or the workin'-on-the-farm farmhand, or even the trailer park couch potato. Wife-beater shirts (tank undershirts), trucker hats, work boots, rodeo belt buckles, gingham print button-ups, & polyester seem to be huge. Frankly, had this been the craze when I met my husband I can guarantee I wouldn't have looked twice. Whatever happened to jeans that fit (too loose & too tight seem to be the in thing) & don't look like they've been dragged behind a truck for 10 miles? Or skirts that can't double as a headband, and shirts that say "Izod" instead of "Porn Star"? ahh...the days when jeans and T-shirt said, "This is the weekend", instead of, "There's only a few hours to get me drunk & naked before the weekend".

Schools have been known to ban fairly ordinary clothing because a street gang had adopted, or was suspected of having adopted, that particular clothing as its "colors." So my first thought was that maybe some racist gang had taken to wearing John Deere caps and so forth. But now the school system says they never had any such prohibition, so I guess it was all a wild rumor.
I don't think there's anything racist about the tractors themselves: I've seen people of every race driving them.

Hey Meagan I resent that. I'm a teenager and my jeans fit just fine.

I never mentioned teenagers in my post. 😊

BUT...this article from SunHerald.com, dated Dec 20, 2003 has this to say:
"Teens spend the biggest single chunk of their money on clothes, shoes and accessories, Wood said. In 2002, teens ages 12 through 19 spent $70 billion on clothing, shoes and accessories. Teens are attracted to whatever is new, both because of fashion and the fact that their bodies are changing, said Wood."

The article also goes on to say that teens (12 thru 19) spent $170 billion last year (2002), of which $125 billion was their own money...

Things teens were spending money on: clothing, music, electronics, snack foods and soft drinks, & furniture.

ummm i think that people who are not farmers or rednecks should not wear them. if they do and theyre not farmers or rednecks than i consider them wannabes. john deere is meant for the country where the real people live. im sorry to say city folks but a lawnmower isnt a tractor its a lawnmower. a tractor is big. they pull heavy equipment across the fields. but yeah i dont think its racist it just makes me mad that people who are like "punk" or "girly girls" wear that kinda stuff. people that have never taken a step onto a "real tractor" not a lawnmower. let me tell ya this city folks need to stay away from this stuff because theyre makin jd. look bad. its a country thing not a city thing.

i tottaly agree with u carmen i live on a farm and i hate it when the preps at my school where that stuff and they dont even kno what j.d. is. they thik its a cloths brand.lol but u have a really good point

just kuz u dont live on a farm doesnt mean u cant where the cloths. jeese they would never sell it

thank you aly its about time someone agrees with me round here. oh yeah and as for what u say brittany i never said u COULDN'T wear the clothes, i said i didnt like it when they wear it. yes they would sell it to people that are farmers. not some city folks that give the name a discrace.

i fully agree with carmen and aly! i dont live on a farm but i am pretty redneck and i got a john deere t-shirt when i went to stay with my grampa and now everyone in school is fighting over who is better, international or john deere! and half of them have never even seen a tractor let alone know which one is better! and it bugs the hell out of me when i see a pretty little 7th or 8th grader walkin down the halls all decked out in john deere and talkin crap about international tractors! its like hell! how the f would you know! anyways i digress! and i dont think that just cuz your a redneck means your a racist! thats bull crap! well i have rambled enough!

Suppose you grew up in the city (yes, city) of Moline, IL, where John Deere is based? I'd hope Moline kids could wear JD apparel without causing grief to you self-professed rednecks.

ok, im from kentucky. i love where i live, and i love the farms. i love workin on the john deere tractors, but i sure as hell hate seein all the guys and girls at my school who wouldnt know a farm if it hit them in the face wearin it, tryin to talk with an accent, and wearin rebel flags even though they have no idea what it stands for. i dont even think its a matter of wearin john deere, i think its just people, as always, followin a trend. its kinda sad, and they just need to stop! oh well, hopefully it'll get better soon. bein country is an upbringing, not a phase of fashion!

Hi... I own A John Deer. there second to best tractor in the world. internationals are the best but any ways to get back on subject i think that it was totaly wrong to suspend those students. i thik that there lying about not suspending them but i dont thik it is rasit. i wear john deer clothing all the time.

some on pleas wright me back

http://www.tshirthell.com sells, or rather used to sell, a shirt that is a parody of the John Deere logo. It is basically a gay joke that takes the slogan for John Deere and replaces it with "queere" (sic).

Maybe someone wore one of these shirts to school and that is where this rumor originated. Anti-gay sentiments aren't racism, per se, but they are bigoted nonetheless.

okay okay okay, first off... yall sittin there complainin bout the fact of "preps" wherein jd. and them followin the crowd, and i agree, but whats with the whole labeling thing? preps goths freaks rednecks?were just people...i own a couple jd things, hats shirts and s***, does that mean the im following the crowd? i didnt grow up on a farm, i dont live in the country, but i have been on a jd. and i have farmed, many times, my uncle lives on one, i go 4wheeling everyday like its a ritual, drink bud, watch nascar football, go muddin, and so on... so am i "classified" as a "redneck"? or am i a "wannabe"? do u get what i mean? im a person, i where jd cause it last good when i mud and rasel, ya know?

and bye the way jd makes mowers!

The whole John Deere thing is so gay. But then again so is Mossy Oak. I swear, what kind of world do we live in when all of a sudden people crave and lose sleep over at night by getting a John Deere hat, shirt, and tag for their car. I mean damn. I don't give a shit if i had 5 john deere tractors, i wouldn't wear the shit. Since everyone is wearing that fag wear, i would never buy a john deere. Tractors are in no way cool, nothing cool about a 70hp tractor. Oh yeah, let's get even gayer by having shirts with Cotton or car tags with it.

SHANE WROTE:
'fag wear'

Shane, did you know that an obsessions with someone's sexual orientation is almost always based on feelings of non-participation?
You resort to a sexual orientation as a degradation, this means you probably dream of sucking cock, and get mad at people that actually do. You feel, "if they get to suck cock and I don't, I am at least going to get some mileage out of it, because it frustrates me"

I dont't fualt you a great deal, it is based in basic human nature, but you should have the intelligence to prevent yourself from using sexual orientation as a degradation. (or just admit you wish you could suck cock, without it effecting the ramifications of your sexual orientation.

I an a 'fag enabler' because I recognize what a vile practice it is to degrade someone based on their sexual orientation. If you can pass judgment based on sexual orientation, it is a short step to passing judgment on someone for their last name, or hair-color, or race, etc...

You can call me a fag to, but it won't upset me, and won't change the fact that I have slept with over 200 women.

I would love to hook all you 'fag-haters' up to a device that measures sexual arousal, and then see if you are truly hetero sexual. I don't think there is ONE of you that would have the balls to do it. I know if i was hooked up to a device like this it would go haywire when I saw female imagery. Would it for you?

You may get aroused by some version of non-heterosexual images, as well, it doesn't mean you are gay, and it doesn't mean you need to kill fags.

Just lighten up, dude. The true enemy of manhood is not gayness, it is anal-retentiveness.

I would rather hang out with a cool gay guy than an anal retentive straight guy. I would rather have a gay teammate, or police-partner, or co-worker, that was GAY, than anal-retentive.

Maybe you can say "I ain't wearin' those clothes that those anal-retentive swines wear'
-Toodles!

Right, I'm from Italy and I think have been the first in my country wearing a John Deere hat (Thanks the Web)and I guess the only one.The first time I ever seen one of those (twenty years ago)was on a Lp cover , on the top of the head of Arlo Guthrie and since that time I ever thought there was a link between american folk (and Country and Western and Bluegrass music, at least the progressive kind) and those kind of farmer hats. People like P.Fonda; The Ozark Mountain Daredevils and even a lot of bluegrass musician surely more progressive than racist often show up wearing hats like these.
Thanks.

Weird:
I just got off the phone with the brother of the guy that replaced the original bassist for Ozark Mountain DareDevils, Ed Hines.
His brother was my best man at my wedding, at which I wed a psychotic whore who abused my dog.
Anyway, god, I hate that music. Yea, I am in Springfield, Mo "daredevil' homeland.

I think that ya'll are racist againest John Deere And Mossy Oak isn't gay.

I'm a straight up farm boy,and like any smart farmer knows that john deeres are pieces of s***. Its true all the city people are like i'm cool i have a john deere lawn mower . they think there hicks. i tell them that they dont belong in a small town and that any of my 7 international's would walk over there piece of s*** so called John Deere tractor. So city folk stop disgracin John deere any more than it all ready is

i'd have to agree that John Deere makes the most poorly constructed equipment on the market. we recently bought a new combine, took one look at the tin can john deere and turned the other cheek. we have friends that have bought them. one in particular had his catch fire the first day, totalling the engine. the dealership sent them a replacement which caught fire IN THE SAME DAY. i wish i were making this up. anyways, we test drove a Case Intersmashable as well, but it wasn't built heavy enough, the front end kept bouncing. pretty dangerous in a combine. anyways, we are a Caterpillar household and i'll be damned if i'm gonna sit my ass down in any of that other shit. Caterpillar being by far the best farm equipment on the market. (although i'll give kudos to the new Case sprayer we bought. auto-steer, auto spray rate, auto boom height, automatically senses overlap on the GPS and turns off nozzles that are overlapping places already sprayed. pretty much awesome.)

Hey Shane!! You are an IDIOT! There are lots of tractors that are more powerful than 70hp. The biggest tractor John Deere makes right now, the 9620, has 500hp. Don't you feel like a retard?

Thats just sad, why would john deere advertise farm equipment in a "punk" store. If john deere would take more time making there equipment better and less time advertisting their inadiquit garbage of tractors I would maybe consider purchasing one.
Worst American made farming equipment, Worlds greastest advertisers

A little advice, buy a fendt.

I find this outrageous, where is the freedom of expression? Does that mean that I have to take big care when choosing what clothes I need to wear? I don't even think about it, I would actually very much appreciate an apparel overstock in my town.

:down: John deere really brings me down the oh yea they dont just make tractors u dummy hahah :ohh: also they make tractors that stink and they r really rusty!screw who ever made john deere tractors I bet they regret it :lol:

John deere is sooo gay

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OMG! we are a country high school with 400 kids. the middle school (across the parking lot) actually DID Have students get in trouble for wearing john deere the principle said they were a "GANG" she is now the high school principle and john deere is BANNED!! so we went out and bought every john deer thing we could find just to get in trouble!!!!

shelby- the redneck in love with john deere!!! WHOOP!

i did grow up on a farm and i do have some john deere tractors. its very hard work and becuase i know that first hand i am proud to wear it or anything else i want, for the people you think its overrated or just want to bitch about, no one says you have to wear, buy or even look at it. you just don't get it and why should you, you never did the work or understood what it means.

Yes!! I agree with Carmen and i don't think that just cuz your a redneck means your a racist.

Well were here in Az in the land of farming is very big and every one here likes John Deere T shirts, Hats etc. and for the most part john deere things are not gay if you choose not to wear it thats ok but don't knock every body else if they choose too.every one is not trying to be the so call hip cause hip is not always in; some of you need an education. and if the children did get suspended for wearing John deer t shirts shame on all of you at the school, they are there to get a education maybe you'll need to go back to school to see what John deere means!!!!! Tractor DUH