Louisiana sure has become problematic. South Plaquemines High School in Louisiana suspended a student because his dreadlocks extended beyond the collar of his shirt, breaking the school’s dress code. Despite the fact that the student’s mother explained that he was Rastafarian and a central part of the religion is not cutting your hair, the superintendent told her it still was not allowed. When she asked for documentation he explained that he was not a lawyer. That’s your tax dollars at work, America.
Then in a another Louisiana story, the CDC found that water in St. John the Baptist Parish tested positive for Naegleria fowleri, the deadly “brain-eating” amoeba:
The water in St. John Parish is safe to drink, said the CDC, but special care should be taken not to allow it to go up the nose, which is the route the parasite takes to infect the brain. Once inside the brain, the amoebas cause primary amebic meningoencephalitis (PAM), which is almost invariably fatal.
That’s not terrifying AT ALL.
Team Blackness also discussed the joys of eating tacos and drinking beers for abortion, why one student is carrying her mattress around campus, and how Comcast is messing with your viewing pleasure.
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Amir Khalid
I am so glad I live in Malaysia and not Louisiana.
Paul in KY
Understand that, Amir.
Mnemosyne
I have to admit, I was shocked to find out that in the year 2014, the length of a boy’s hair is still a “thing” for schools. There is a similar case in Texas where a kindergartener was sent home because the school deemed his hair to be too long. Anyone surprised to hear that he’s Navajo? (He was eventually allowed to attend once his family brought in documentation that he’s affiliated with a local tribe.)
rikyrah
Pennsylvania teen in KKK hood arrested for harassing black college students
By Scott Kaufman
Wednesday, September 3, 2014 11:58 EDT
A Pennsylvania teenager was arrested this week on charges related to an August 4, 2014 incident in which he harassed African-American students on Bloomsburg University’s campus while wearing a Ku Klux Klan hood, BloomUtoday.com reports.
Authorities said that Walter Corey Reibsome was wearing the costume in a truck driven by his friend, Frank Rubio, and that Reibsome leaned out of the truck’s window and yelled racial slurs while Rubio blared his horn. “Get out of our town,” the victim told police Reibsome yelled.
The pair were caught because the victim was able to identify Rubio’s uniquely modified truck. Photographs of the truck — and of the duo wearing the white hoods traditionally associated with the Ku Klux Klan — were posted on Rubio’s Facebook page.
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/09/03/pennsylvania-teen-in-kkk-hood-arrested-for-harassing-black-college-students/
rikyrah
When one thinks that the EPA and other governmental agencies are ‘bad’…
you get bacteria like this
rikyrah
you know they sent out a tweet of a study about Black Twitter..
WITH THREE WHITE MEN in it..
then once, Black Twitter got in their azzes…
suddenly they remembered their Black ‘Colleague’….
sigh…
sigh…
And SUPPOSEDLY she’s the LEAD RESEARCHER?
…………….
PragmaticObotsUnite @PragObots
The lead researcher of the #BlackTwitter study is a Blk woman but she wasn’t listed on study’s website until AFTER they received backlash
rikyrah
you know they sent out a tweet of a study about Black Twitter..
WITH THREE WHITE MEN in it..
then once, Black Twitter got in their azzes…
suddenly they remembered their Black ‘Colleague’….
sigh…
sigh…
And SUPPOSEDLY she’s the LEAD RESEARCHER?
…………….
PragmaticObotsUnite @PragObots
The lead researcher of the #BlackTwitter study is a Blk woman but she wasn’t listed on study’s website until AFTER they received backlash
the Conster
Also Louisiana: judge worried gay marriage will lead to incest.
How does a federal judge not look around after years of SSM – more than 10 in Massachusetts – and still think this? Maybe brain amoebas already got to him.
Mnemosyne
@rikyrah:
You gotta admit this part is funny, though:
What a frickin’ clown show.
WaterGirl
Anyone who declares that water safe to drink and shower in should be forced to do just that. Daily.
Drinking water known to contain parasites that kills you. Yum! Oh, and good luck not getting water up your nose when you shower.
bemused
Parish water safe to drink as long as it doesn’t go up your nose. That must make the residents feel relieved.
WaterGirl
@rikyrah:
I’m sure she is. Now.
Paul in KY
@rikyrah: Those are the kinds of losers I would love to see get the absolute shit kicked out of them.
Paul in KY
@rikyrah: I’m sure black twitter will ream them a new one (and rightfully so).
sharl
@rikyrah: As I noted in a comment in an earlier post, Dayna Chatman said she pitched the idea for this study, and in another tweet said she has now gone off to see why the announcement was erroneously posted without her listed as a project “owner”.
It would be fun, kinda-maybe, to hear the discussion between her and Professor François Bar, who was listed as the sole project owner in the original post, as to just what happened here.
If it was an honest mistake, I hope her project doesn’t lose much credibility as a result of this oopsie. But if she let herself be diminished to second-tier/invisible status in the development of this project, she just learned a real hard lesson. There would be a lot of skepticism about a study like this even under the best conditions; from here on out she’ll have to be real careful, and (probably) have to be very persistent and tough with the white dudes who are working with/for her.
dp
You think it’s problematic? You ought to try living here! We just keep chipping away and doing what we can, but the edifice of right-wing stupidity is of Himalayan proportions.
Jebediah, RBG
@WaterGirl:
Absolutely. Sometimes “You first!” really is the appropriate answer.
Mnemosyne
@sharl:
I wonder if Prof. Bar is her thesis adviser or in another supervisory capacity over her. If so, the conversation might be a bit awkward.
Tenar Darell
@WaterGirl: didn’t this sorta kinda happen at Love Canal? They prevented a EPA reps from leaving one of the houses when they couldn’t get a full disaster declaration. (H/T something on environmental justice I saw on PBS).
Citizen_X
@rikyrah:
Let me guess–modified for “rollin’ coal?”
bruceJ
Actually Naegleria fowleri is pretty damned common in surface waters.
The disease you can get is still extremely rare…you have a better chance of getting eaten by a Great White.
WaterGirl
@Tenar Darell: Is it wrong for me to think “good for them”?
Mnemosyne
@bruceJ:
The original story I saw a few years ago was that some people were using tap water for their neti pots without boiling it first, which is how the brain-eating amoebas were able to gain easy access to their brains. Unlikely but still pretty horrifying way to go.
Tenar Darell
@WaterGirl: Nah. I thought “goid for them,” wondered if that would work today. And then I answered that question with – there’d be a tactical team knocking down doors and taking names.
ThresherK
“The water is safe to drink, but don’t let it go up the nose.”
Rendering fatally dangerous the family tradition my brother and I have had going on for decades, in which it is now his turn to say something so funny I snort my drink out my nose.
gene108
Get a school approved head covering and/or whatever the religion prescribes to keep the appearance of long hair covered.
Sikh’s go with turbans.
It can be done, within school rules, with a bit of planning before hand.
ruemara
@rikyrah: If there’s one thing my work experiences have taught me, it’s that black women are either invisible or/& mythological. Unless we are being sassy spirit guides to white persons.
Mnemosyne
@gene108:
I have a feeling that the school is not going to accept a rastacap as an acceptable headcovering, even though it actually is both traditional and religious.
Roger Moore
@gene108:
Assuming the school wants to be accommodating. If the real goal is to humiliate and punish people for daring to be different, they’ll continue to find reasons why it goes against the rules.
Mayken
@Mnemosyne: Yeah it’s pretty maddening but sadly these gender “norms” are still a major thing even in the Year of Our Lord Jesus Jones 2014. Even here in California where this very weekend I heard a 5 year old boy child with hair down to his butt complain that a purple chair was “for girls.” His mother made absolutely no move to correct this, instead getting him another chair. SMFH