School uniforms – good or bad? Either way, the system makes us suffer | Zoe Williams

School uniforms become a hot topic this time of year, for obvious reasons: half the country is bankrupt about it, and the other half wonders why they have to. dress their kids like pretending to be executives on polyester salaries, and there's a fierce debate on Mumsnet about whether that's bad for equality (so expensive) or good (at least you don't have not to buy other clothes). Then they will be distracted and never solve the problem. I don't think it can be resolved - it's an empty signifier. Whether they are in uniform or not, inequality between children will persist as long as inequality between adults, and of course sending them to school naked in an exercise in awareness, but; make no mistake that this is the solution or even the beginning of one.

Even if you can't vent on the uniform, you still need to buy it. The system for buying it is abstruse, and it's stacked against you, and there's no game, and sometimes I think people who don't know there is are happier in the long run . At my local uniform store, there are three lines: a short, tidy one for people who have a date; a longer one full of anguish, for latecomers to their rendezvous; and a wild and tumultuous, like the last airlift out of a war zone, for people who didn't know you needed it. There is no solidarity between the queues, it's a shame, because once inside, you're really going to need it.

The big ones items (blazers) are too high to reach, so you have to be helped by a guy with a ladder, except you are 50, three of him and a ladder. The walls are adorned with "polite notices" telling you not to abuse the staff, and while I'm largely on board with not abusing people, if it happens enough that you need signs, you don't maybe you don't have enough staff. Or ladders.

Kids about to start big school arrive full of excitement - damn it, maybe they'll get a new calculator as well of all the other new stuff - and you see the innocence fade from their faces as they realize people are bad. If adults are so mean, what will 10s be like?

Do it online, that's all I'm saying. If only I thought that.

Zoe Williams is a Guardian columnist