“Quit being so distracting, Triana…”

Deborah Brown Community School in Tulsa, Oklahoma forbids its students from wearing their hair in dreadlocks, afros “and other faddish styles.” Terrence Parker, a barber, challenged the rule by sending his 7-year-old daughter Tiana to class there wearing her hair in dreadlocks. She was told that she could not attend school with her hair in a (stupid and ignorant) rule-violating style. Tiana is now attending another school, while the story, reported on the web in various sources, is holding the school up to well-earned ridicule for a dress code that if not racist in intent, is racist in impact. Eventually, I would think, the school will be shamed into seeing the error of its ways, which is enforcing an inappropriately narrowly-viewed, culturally-biased interpretation of what constitutes a “presentable” hairstyle as opposed to one that might “distract from the respectful and serious atmosphere [the school] strives for.”

This is the way unethical rules get changed. Parker confronted the rule by violating it, and accepted the penalty while publicizing the unjust rule to the greater community, which is making its disapproval known. Continue reading →