By Erin Beck, The Register-Herald
CHARLESTON, W.VA. – After a Beckley mother told lawmakers that her son was barred from playing high school basketball games because of his dreadlocks, the West Virginia Senate’s Committee on the Judiciary passed a bill on Monday clarifying that state law prohibiting racial discrimination includes mistreatment based on hairstyles typically associated with a race.
Sen. Mike Azinger, R-Wood, a white man, vehemently spoke against the bill, telling Tarsha Bolt, the Beckley mother and a black woman, that she was trying to “undercut authority” and trying to pick “the rules” for herself.
Bolt told lawmakers that a basketball coach at Woodrow Wilson High School told her son, Matthew Moore, a freshman player, that he had to cut his dreadlocks because they weren’t “neat,” even though other players on the team had afros and man-buns.
“I think it’s neat,” she said. “It’s a part of our culture.”
She explained to lawmakers that dreadlocks are “one of the most manageable ways” for black people to wear their hair. …
