A kindergartner and a high school student were both dismissed from their schools at the beginning of the school year. The students, both male, had hair that fell past the collars of their shirts.
Five-year-old Malachi Wilson is a member of the Navajo Nation who believes hair is sacred and should not be cut. The Plaquemines Parish high school student, only referred to as “John Doe,” is a follower of the Rastafarian movement and also does not believe in cutting his hair.
Ultimately, both boys were allowed back to school but only after nonsensical paperwork and several missed days.
This draws me to the point: why do schools make such a big deal of boys with long hair, especially if it’s a religious practice? Both boys went to school with their hair neatly tied back or pinned up, yet the school still made it a problem.
If I’m sitting in a classroom with a male who has long hair, I won’t learn less or be distracted any more than if the male had short hair.
It makes no sense for schools to waste time nitpicking about things that have nothing to do with how a child learns. Instead of worrying about the length of a little boy’s hair, schools should be more worried about teachers who molest students or about the pig slop children are served at lunchtime.
Another story from earlier this month involved a teenager who was denied a license picture while wearing makeup. The mother of 16-year-old Chase Culpepper is filing a federal lawsuit against the South Carolina Department of Motor Vehicles.
Culpepper is gender-nonconforming and usually wears makeup and women’s clothing.
If women who wear makeup on a daily basis are allowed to take their license picture with no trouble, then so should Culpepper and any other male choosing to wear it. It is not up to the DMV to determine specific guidelines of what a man or woman is supposed to look like.
Who cares if he wears makeup and women’s clothing? What happens if he looks like two totally different people with and without makeup? If he ever gets pulled over, the cop will look at this guy like he stole someone’s license, which will just be more mess Culpepper will have to go through.
In other hair-grooming news, the U.S. military is finally beginning to relax on natural hairstyles usually worn by African-American women. It is now acceptable to wear two-strand twists in the Army, Air Force and Navy. The Army has increased the acceptable size of braids, and both the Army and Air Force will remove the racially-insensitive terms “matted and unkempt” from their grooming guidelines.
African-Americans have been wearing Afros, dreads, braids and twists since the beginning of time. Just because black hair grows differently from other types of hair, doesn’t mean black women or men should have to conform to more European hairstyles.
Why should people have to assimilate to what is socially acceptable if what they’ve been doing their whole life doesn’t bother anyone?
Women have long hair andshort hair. It shouldn’t be different for men. Women wear makeup — who said men shouldn’t?
I think the world would be a much better place if those in authoritative positions stopped finding miniscule problems about how people wear their hair, clothes or makeup. Lots of grooming rules stifle creativity and self-expression.
I do understand that different environments warrant more or less creativity when it comes to style. But if a person’s style truly doesn’t distract anyone in his or her environment or cause much of a ruckus, then there shouldn’t be a problem.
Taylor Simien is a 20-year-old mass communication junior from Lafayette. You can reach Taylor on Twitter @TSimien_TDR.