Asklemmy

I've been to both school with and without uniforms. As I said, I only witnessed bullying based on clothing in the schools with uniforms.

For the schools that did, I often bought mine discounted or second hand, and still I've yet to be bullied about my clothing compared to when I only had my dilapidated wardrobe

I still don't understand why money put towards uniform could not have been put towards better leisure clothing.

I've been consistently bullied less often in schools that have a uniform, regardless of the topic.

I neither believe that school uniforms create more bullies, nor do I believe that all schools with uniforms are bad. I think that uniforms are a huge waste of time and money that makes many children miserable - of course some will also like it, as you have made quite clear.

You could argue that this is correlation and not causation

Whether uniforms are normal or not really depends on the local culture so there could be any number of things at play of why there was less bullying or why you may have felt more comfortable in general. Attributing everything to uniforms sounds reductive.

For the vast majority of the world, uniforms are the norm and even mandatory in many countries.

The vast majority of countries also still use corporal punishment. I don't value their opinions on education.

There is a reason why schools, hospitals, soldiers, and prisons have uniforms

to legitimize an institution and instill discipline.

Do doctors and nurses need to be taught discipline? Prisons use the lack of individuality as part of a punishment. Wearing something stupid is supposed to make you unhappy. For military this is true though but these are adults who know what they are getting themselves into. These aren't angsty teenagers trying to find out who they are and instead being forced to wear things they hate.

When schools are already understaffed and underfunded, the lack of a uniform makes it even harder to keep students in line. When students wear uniforms, their individuality stops being just about how they look and starts being about how they want to be perceived by others through their actions.

In the school where I had to wear a uniform there were quite a lot of children from socioeconomically disadvantaged homes. There were quite a lot of kids who acted out and made life difficult for teachers and other students. There was far less of this in the schools without uniforms. It's a socioeconomic thing. Uniforms don't change that.