In recent years, schools throughout the country and beyond have experienced an increase in pushback against their dress codes.
Not only is this because they tend to be enforced differently by gender, but it’s clear that students simply aren’t buying the rationale that banned outfits for girls “distract” boys anymore.
But while common dress codes like this have been the subject of protests and frustrated letters from parents, it’s even harder to tell what someone is supposed to do when the dress code targets their natural attributes.
This is a problem that many people of color face when these codes set a “professional” standard for hair that excludes their natural hairstyles, but the rare circumstances behind one student’s story in particular shows how rigid and overzealous enforcement of dress codes can be.
In a post to Reddit’s r/MaliciousCompliance community, one person described what their cousin went through at a school with a strict dress code.
As this person explained , the cousin has natural white streaks in her hair due to a genetic condition called poliosis.
Although she used to get bullied for this when she was younger, this stopped when it became trendier to put multi-colored streaks in your hair.
However, it seems that this trouble from her peers has since been replaced by trouble from her school’s faculty.
When in-person classes resumed at her school, her teacher immediately sent her to the principal’s office.
As she soon learned, this was because her streak was considered “unnatural and extreme” hair that was also a distraction.
Although she tried to explain to the principal that this was her hair’s natural color and that she’s never dyed it in her life, she refused to listen.
Instead, she said, “When you come back tomorrow, I expect you to have dyed your hair back to its natural color, and don’t dye it again!”
Noticing a technicality in how the principal worded this ultimatum, the cousin slyly agreed and dyed all of her hair darker.
Ironically, she was praised for going back to her natural hair color as a result, but she knew that her point would be made when her roots started revealing themselves again.
Sure enough, the cousin was sent back to the principal’s office once this became noticeable and scolded about her hair again.
In response, she said, “I dyed my hair the color of the hair on most of my head to get rid of the white streak, which, by the way, is how my hair naturally grows, and didn’t dye it again, so now the roots are showing! I did exactly what you told me to do!”
Still apparently not getting it, the principal called her parents and told them to come pick her up because she would be suspended.
Since they knew what this was about, her parents then arrived with a family photo album showing that those white streaks existed throughout her life.
And as a kicker, the dad revealed that he had a white patch in his own hair from the same genetic origins.
This finally convinced the prinicpal not to suspend the cousin, but it seems she couldn’t let it go even then.
In the principal’s words, “Your extreme hair is still a distraction to the other students, and they are going to wonder why you’re getting special treatment. Consider yourself lucky!”
This turned out not to happen because the cousin’s classmates actually understood that her hair was perfectly natural, which they thought was kind of cool.
Still, her experiences with the school’s faculty convinced her family not to enrol her there for another semester.
After all, it seems unlikely that this is the only thing they would be overbearing about.
h/t: Reddit | Cut-Unique
