Young Boy Banned From Kindergarten For Being Native?

Arg. A frustrating story to start the week with, but at least there is action that one can take after reading this.

As reported by Jessica Yee on Racialiscious (and originally on Shameless), the superintendent at the Houston based Needville District School made a ruling that forbade 5 year old Apache Adriel Arocha from attending kindergarten. Why? Because he has long hair. In one foul sweep, superintendent Curtis Rhodes has enacted the double-whammy injustice of reproducing racist neo-colonialism AND gender conformist crap. Oh but there is more, as Jessica writes:

The kicker though is that the school board is willing to make exceptions on religious or other “proven” moral grounds, but doesn’t think that being Native American cuts it.

Even after Adriel’s father Kenny submitted a DNA sample of his blood and explained the long history of why many of us do not cut our hair until a family member dies, he received this response from superintendent Curtis Rhodes:

“To make exceptions, you have to be provided evidence of something, and to this point, I don’t feel I’ve been provided evidence to make an exception.”

Whatever. This is an absolutely ridiculous, gross misuse of power. Its a good thing that we can simply contact Curtis Rhodes to tell him what a shameful racist and gender-conformist power-tripping bully he is being, eh? Dial 0 for the district operator once you call.

Jessica Yee continues to write from a Native perspective here.