Del. Walker: Voting 'No' on CROWN Act supports racist discrimination

Several community members at Saturday's rally spoke about their experiences with hair-based discrimination, particularly in local schools and workplaces.

By DOUGLAS J HARDING

Del. Danielle Walker, the leading sponsor of the CROWN Act, said during a rally Saturday that lawmakers who vote against the bill will be voting in support of racist discrimination.

“A [‘no’ vote] is saying that you are a racist,” Walker said. “A [‘no’ vote] is the brink of racism, and I don’t care what adjective you put in front of it: Where there is racism, there is a racist.”

At the Capitol Saturday, where community members rallied in support of HB 2698, the bill to ban discrimination based on hairstyle, Walker discussed a common type of demonstration called “the pencil test,” which is used by racists to intimidate and discriminate against Black men and women.

“I wonder who came up with the pencil test—to [place] a pencil through some strands of hair and if it falls out, you’re white; if it stays in, you’re Black,” Walker said. “Today we say, ‘No more.’ The only pencil test we need to see in the people’s house is that we place [the CROWN Act] on the [legislative] agenda.”

CROWN stands for Create a Respectful and Open World for Natural hair.

Activists also pushed for the CROWN Act’s passage last legislative session but were unable to force a vote on it.

Del. Walker encouraged her colleagues at the Capitol to vote ‘yea’ on the bill when a vote occurs during this session.

“Let’s see those pencils start moving, and you pressing those green buttons,” she said.

Del. Walker also said some of her colleagues at the Capitol regularly make inappropriate comments about her when she is at work.

“I hope my colleagues don’t say nothing about my hair,” she said. “To my colleagues: It is not a compliment when I walk in and you say you don’t know how I’m going to wear my hair today. It is a part of me. It’s a part of that diversity, equity and inclusion. Whether I choose to wear my ‘fro, my extensions, or a wig, or braids, twists, locks—It is my business. Don’t ask me if it’s my hair because I’ve never stolen nothing in my life. I got a receipt. What we need is to see those receipts of you placing this bill on the agenda. Because we’re going to keep those receipts […] for 2022 when election time comes.”

Several community members at Saturday’s rally spoke about their experiences with hair-based discrimination, particularly in local schools and workplaces.

One such speaker was Beckley Human Rights Commissioner Tarsha Bolt, whose son’s experience at Woodrow Wilson High School in 2019 helped to inspire the movement to pass the CROWN Act.

Bolt said she and her son both were very excited that he made the basketball team as a freshman at Woodrow Wilson, but on the first night she attended one of his games, she realized a stunning issue with how her son was being treated. About ten minutes into the game, she did not see her son on the court, so she called his cellphone to figure out what was going on.

“He answered […] and said, ‘I’m in the locker room, mom. Coach said I cannot play unless I get these dreads out of my hair,’” Bolt said.

She said she and her son then went to their car in the parking to try to adjust his hair so his coach would allow him to play in the game.

“I’m in the front seat, he’s in the back seat, and he’s got this pick trying to, like, rip out his dreads,” Bolt said. “I don’t know if anyone knows, but it’s not simple to just take out dreads. Dreads is a permanent hairstyle; it’s a lifetime commitment.”

Bolt said the sight of her son trying to rip out his own hair so he could play in the game angered her so much that she decided to dedicate herself to inspiring change.

“This anger just came inside of me,” she said. “This frustration of just, ‘Why are we even here right now? And why are you ripping out your hair? And why can’t you play basketball because you have dreads?’ Half-way through us ripping out his hair, I said, ‘That’s it. We’re not going to do this.’”

Bolt said she stopped her son and they left the game. When she got home, she made a Facebook post about her son’s experiences, and the post was shared widely throughout local communities.

“So many people within the community realized that these things were happening to all of us, not just in West Virginia but in every state,” she said. “Our ethnic hairstyles are being attacked.”

Bolt said when she asked the coach why he discriminated against her son because of his hairstyle, the coach replied that her son’s hair needed to look “neat.”

“Whose definition of neat?” she said. “People have preconceived ideas of the way your hair looks. [They think] you’re not acceptable; you’re not decent; you must be a thug.”

Local high school student Aliyah Crozier said she is tired of people judging her based on the style of her hair.

“My hair does not define who I am as a person,” Crozier said. “My hair does not tell you if I’m dependable or a hard worker—it is simply: hair. My hair can be styled in a hundred different ways, but I am not my hair.”

Crozier said such racist forms of discrimination are regular experiences for young Black men and women.

“We have no control over how our hair grows,” she said. “It is so sad people are being told, ‘You can’t play this sport; You can’t attend this college,’ over something we cannot control.”

Crozier said young Black men and women regularly are forced to change how they look to avoid race- and hair-based discrimination in society.

“We can control the way we wear our hair—and even hide it sometimes to try to fit in with society’s ‘normal,’” she said. “But who are you to tell me my hair isn’t normal? God created everyone individually and special and unique, so why try to fit in a box? We weren’t created to fit in a box. We weren’t created to please other people.”

Crozier ended her speech citing a quotation she said she had read recently for the first time: “My hair does not need to be ‘fixed.’ Society’s view of beauty is what is broken.”

The West Virginia Holler is an affiliate of The Tennessee Holler and is powered, in part, by West Virginia Can’t Wait.

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