High school students threatened with suspension for wearing natural hair

[KamaAina]

http://thegrio.com/2016/02/22/high-school-students-threatened-with-suspension-for-wearing-natural-hair/

When students at the C.R. Walker Senior High School in the Bahamas tried to wear their natural hair to school, they were allegedly told that their hair was “untidy” and “unprofessional” and ordered to change their hairstyle before returning to school.

Parent Misty Raine took to social media to vent her frustrations writing: “So my child comes home to tell me that her school states that tomorrow is the last day that she can have natural hair; her hair must be processed/perm for school on Monday…please don’t do it.”

Another parent, Kessa Deleveaux, described the situation: “I have a question.. Why would a high school principal tell my daughter that she cannot wear her hair like this anymore because it does not look like a schoolgirl hairstyle and it looks as if it’s not combed…What could possibly be so wrong with this hairstyle?! SHE IS A BLACK CHILD WITH THICK NATURAL HAIR!”

The controversy has inspired the hashtag #SupportthePuff, as other naturalistas embrace their beauty and show off their hair in solidarity. An online petition to #supportthepuff addresses the historical roots of bias in beauty standards:

[HubertHeaver]

1. A school admin wanted to send my son home for having "unnatural color hair".

His hair, along with his 3 brothers' and sister's hair, is natural red.

[Rex]

2. SMH.

[KamaAina]

3. And this is going on in a largely black country!

[haikugal]

4. I have naturally curly hair and when I was young it was very thick. People always bitched at me

here in PA that it was untidy.

FUCK THEM! I can't believe what control freaks there are in this world. Natural hair is beautiful but I had to grow into accepting it as it was and working with it...and I'm white!

I hope they get to keep their natural hair however they like.

Damn!

[Kalidurga]

5. This is beautiful to me

And I think women who go to all the trouble of working on their hair for hours are also beautiful. But, I think natural for a while even for those who do their hair would be nice.

[jillan]

6. Me too!!

[Cracklin Charlie]

8. I freely admit...

That I am totally clueless on the fashion/beauty subject, but this issue has always bothered me.

I am a white person, who grew up in the Mississippi River delta. In my high school, there was one black girl in my class. She lived right down the street from me, and her mother loved my mother. I don't know why she loved my mother, but the lady must have told me she loved my mother a hundred times. She was sweet as candy.

That poor little girl wore a wig every day from the time she was in third grade, straight through high school, and she still wears one today. I have always wondered what her real hair looked like.

I think black women look beautiful in natural hair. It just looks "right" somehow.

[malaise]

7. This has been going on for decades

They hate us - we must not be natural - we must imitate white people - even dogs get to keep their natural hair.

A boss once told me that he didn't like my natural hair - I told him that given that he was bald I didn't have a say re his.

[phylny]

9. Our office manager is an African-American woman who had permed

her hair straight forever. We (all of her white co-workers) encouraged her desire to wear her natural hair when she wondered aloud about "the big chop" and after two years, it's absolutely stunning.

[whistler162]

10. Anyone want to ship a few hundred

of these http://www.amazon.com/1-X-Orange-Mohawk-Wigs/dp/B00767ML84/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1456361842&sr=8-1&keywords=mohawk+wigs to the Bahamas so the students don't have to wear their natural hair?

[eppur_se_muova]

11. Don't know why I hoped this was the Onion --

Onion has more class than that (although with new ownership we'll see if that lasts).

As a white male, I've not had to deal so much with the attempts by ARCFs (anal retentive control freaks) to 'Barbiefy' the population. But I was always more comfortable with my hair long and absolutely hated getting my hair cut short. By the time I was in Jr. High, schools had started relaxing their dress codes a bit but I still remember boys weren't supposed to let their hair grow past the top of the collar. I couldn't help wondering "what difference does it make to you"? It's my hair, it grows the way it does quite naturally and I see no point in tampering with Nature unnecessarily. I've always felt the same way about AA hair -- it just grows that way, no skin off anybody's nose. And hearing stories of what black kids put themselves through to straighten their hair to meet others' expectations just made me feel sympathy for them.

My beard came in late, and most colleges gave up on the whole idea of dress codes, so I never had to deal with the regs which prohibited any kind of facial hair. But that's another case where it seems to me that if it grows that way naturally, it hurts nothing to just leave it alone. Oh, except the poor ARCFs are offended somehow.