Just a couple of weeks after a Georgia school was publicly slammed for shaming its Black students and their hairstyle, a Texas junior high is being sued by two parents after their son was subject to an offensive move of the latter. Dante Trice and Angela Washington filed a complaint against Berry Miller Junior High School Principal Tony Barcelona, discipline clerk Helen Day and teacher Jeanette Peterson after they filled their son's fade in with a Sharpie after claiming it was out of school code.
"The haircut did not depict anything violent, gang-related, obscene or otherwise offensive or inappropriate in any manner. J.T. did not believe the haircut violated any school policy," the parents of 13-year-old J.T. stated, according to NBC News.
J.T. was approached at school and told to go to the discipline office. Once he arrived, he was given the option to be suspended or fill in his fade with a Sharpie. Since he was scared of being dropped from the track team, he opted for the coloring in of his hair. "The jet-black markings did not cover the haircut design line but made the design more prominent and such was obvious to those present at the very beginning of the scalp blackening process," the suit added. "It is commonly understood among scholars and the general public that depicting African Americans with jet black skin is a negative racial stereotype."
J.T. parents are seeking an unknown amount of monetary damages for their son's pain and suffering.