The same week his state outlawed racial discrimination based on hairstyles, a Black high school student in Texas was suspended because school officials said his locs violated the district’s dress code.
Darryl George, a junior at Barbers Hill High School in Mont Belvieu, received an in-school suspension after he was told his hair fell below his eyebrows and ear lobes. George, 17, wears his hair in thick twisted dreadlocks, tied on top of his head, said his mother, Darresha George.
George served the suspension last week. His mother said he plans to return to the Houston-area school Monday, wearing his dreadlocks in a ponytail, even if he is required to attend an alternative school as a result.
I used to work at a company that practically refused to hire black people because their dress code precluded basically every common black hairstyle.
It pisses me off that dreads and braids are some sort of white-collar taboo.
This isn’t an accident.
It’s to give plausible deniability to racists who don’t want to deal with EEOC violations as often.
It’s a way of making anyone except for a specific culture of people feel uncomfortable. “You can come work here but you won’t like it so don’t try” is the message they are using instead of “we are racist and understand it’s distasteful to say it openly” but it produces the same effect.
Wow that shouldn’t be legal!
Aaand that’s why affirmative action was implemented - people can effectively exclude any group, without mentioning them by name. The effect is what matters. So the effect is what’s targeted.