A full-page newspaper defends the punishment high school student Darryl George has faced over his hairstyle.

  • Snot Flickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    2 years ago

    Being an American requires conformity with the positive benefit of unity

    Man, these people always out here saying the quiet part out loud these days.

    “If you little fuckers would just CONFORM to how we want you to be, this country would be filled with UNITY.”

    Yeah, because the only “unity” they want is forcing their conformity on everyone else.

  • randon31415@lemmy.world
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    2 years ago

    Being an American requires conformity with the positive benefit of unity

    Tell that to the Texas power grid.

    • Bakkoda@sh.itjust.works
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      2 years ago

      By conformity he just means what the white people in charge want. Not like conforming to rules or ethical standards or laws or the Constitution.

      • WHARRGARBL@kbin.social
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        2 years ago

        Exactly. Synonyms for “conformity” include submission, obedience, surrender.

        Important to keep in mind that the objective of public education is to prepare a productive workforce while conditioning that workforce to stay on its knees.

  • 𝔼𝕩𝕦𝕤𝕚𝕒@lemmy.world
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    2 years ago

    Hey real quick though, because this dude has been defending his or this schools descicion since last September

    Wheres the School Board this superintendant answers to? This school is having an ongoing issue of permitting a violation of federal law (discrimination of a protected class) and allowing violations of state law (CROWN act) to the degree it is in national news for the second time. This same school is why there’s a CROWN act to be violated. Either the board is so massively incompetent to miss this and are not management material, or they are actively encouraging it. I wish I had such a level of job security jesus fucking christ. Fucking rich people get all the goddamn handouts.

  • assassin_aragorn@lemmy.world
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    2 years ago

    To give you an idea of just how fucking stupid this superintendent is – hair discrimination is illegal by TEXAS law. Fucking Texan Republicans looked at this and said “okay this is way too far”.

    Having previously lived in Houston for a few years, let me tell you, Texas Republicans aren’t terribly bright. Being worse than them takes effort.

    • Empricorn@feddit.nl
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      2 years ago

      What’s the point of a law if it’s not only not enforced, but literally ignored by, y’know law enforcement!? Fuck you, Texas. Boycott everything they produce!

      • stoly@lemmy.world
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        2 years ago

        Because when you pass the law, you have completed political theater and that’s what gets reported in the news. The point of the law is to be able to say, “See, Republicans aren’t so bad after all.” Nobody is following up on it later until a story like this come around.

      • prole@sh.itjust.works
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        2 years ago

        It becomes a tool of oppression and retribution. That’s the point. Welcome to fascism.

  • dezmd@lemmy.world
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    2 years ago

    Being American Requires Conformity to an Open Mind, Open Heart, Open Society, Open Cultures, Democratic Ideals, and Mutual Respect.

    None of which this Superintendent Greg Poole demonstrates.

    Edit: You know what, full on fuck Superintendent Greg Poole. Rules for thee, not for me:

    May 1, 2008

    https://www.chron.com/neighborhood/pasadena-news/article/Son-s-crash-has-Barbers-Hill-ISD-chief-in-hot-1790103.php

    Key excerpts:

    When Greg Poole was arrested and put in jail this past weekend, he said he was acting as a father and not as superintendent of the Barbers Hill Independent School District in Chambers County.

    A Texas Department of Public Safety trooper has charged the Chambers County school superintendent with obstructing the investigation of an accident involving Poole’s 16-year-old son.

    The teen flipped his father’s pickup and knocked over a utility pole about 3 a.m. Saturday on FM 565 near Cove, about 30 minutes east of Houston, authorities said.

    The trooper arrested Poole for refusing to make his son available for questioning about the accident, the Texas Department of Public Safety said.

    “Trooper Dunn asked him twice to produce his son, and he would not,” said Stephanie Davis, Texas Department of Public Safety spokeswoman in Beaumont. “He never informed the trooper where he could find his son.”

    EDIT 2: Just to be clear, it’s not the trying to cover for his son that is the problem to look at. As a parent myself, I get trying to protect your children even if it’s poor judgement, everyone is allowed to make mistakes, child and parent alike.

    What I CANNOT FUCKING ABIDE is the insane hypocrisy this fuck demonstrates through allowing exceptions to the LAWS for his child that he will defend and go to jail over, while demanding someone else’s child fall in line to school guidelines that are malleable and far less rigid in both application and enforcement than any legal criminality. RULES FOR THEE NOT FOR ME.

    When you objectively consider all of the information, it looks a hell of a lot like run of the mill racial prejudice.

    • Ann Archy@lemmy.world
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      2 years ago

      Kid was obviously drunk, that’s why his dad kept him from the cops, so he would have time to sober tf up for the breathalyzer.

      Castrate people like this.*

      *allegedly

      • dezmd@lemmy.world
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        2 years ago

        We’re on the same page for the ‘fuck this guy’ sentiment but I don’t specifically fault him for poor judgements made while trying to protect his kid. At the very least his son left the scene of an accident, but most likely his son was driving recklessly and/or drinking (drinking is the only remotely rational reasoning as to why a parent would go so far as to go to jail to keep the kid away from police in that scenario). Parents can be irrational when it comes to protecting their kids.

        I fault him for being such a piece a shit that he will publicly in-a-goddamn-full-newspaper-ad demand conformity to malleable school rules of someone else’s kids, while breaking the law himself to keep his own child from having to conform to society’s legal rules.

        • Ann Archy@lemmy.world
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          2 years ago

          Look, we’d all do the same for our kids and more, you know that, it’s the hypocrisy that’s the problem obviously, but I know we already agree.

    • yuriy@lemmy.world
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      2 years ago

      Wow, a police officer in my town did this with his wife when she crashed into my mom while leaving a liquor store at noon. She did a blood alcohol test the next day, and that ruled she wasn’t drunk at the time of the accident.

      • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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        2 years ago

        You csn get arrested for not snitching on your own sons location?

        You can get arrested for obstructing a police investigation. In this particular case, it appears that the father picked up and removed his son from the crime scene. Possibly also tampering with the crime scene. He has made himself an accessory to the crime after the fact. No different than a get-away driver for a bank robbery.

        Also, I dont think holding a father responsible for the crimes of his son

        The father isn’t being indicted for crashing a pickup truck. He’s being held for obstructing justice, which is an entirely different crime.

          • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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            2 years ago

            His son shouldn’t be on the road if he’s crashing a five-ton vehicle into a telephone pole. Hiding him in order to sober him up means putting him back out on the road to do this shit again.

              • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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                2 years ago

                I won’t fault anyone for not wanting to turn their kid over to police over property damage

                When the same guy is pulling kids out of school for their haircuts, I will absolutely fault him. This guy has no concern for anyone outside of his immediate social circle. He’s immiserating children under the pretext of conformity, while keeping his drunk-driving son on the road to potentially kill another family with his reckless behavior.

                Its easy to when you already have a reason to dislike them.

                The contradiction between behaviors - one that’s strictly authoritarian for “conformity” sake and the other that’s hostile to basic traffic laws - illustrates a guy who has no business operating in an administrative capacity.

                • abraxas@sh.itjust.works
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                  2 years ago

                  Bingo. If he kicked a kid out for locs and turned his son over to the authorities with a rousing “laws were broken, and I’m not asking for mercy” speech during sentencing, then he’s just an authoritarian-loving jerk and you can respect that even if you won’t grab a drink with him.

                  But this guy just likes to exert his white authority over black people. Not his innocent lilly-white drunk-driving son.

          • dezmd@lemmy.world
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            2 years ago

            I meant using his sons fuck up as an example of him being a bad person.

            That’s where everyone is going off the fucking rails in different directions from my edit.

            I get trying to protect your children as a parent. I’m a father myself and can fathom a reaction of trying to protect a child to the point of going to jail over something.

            You entirely missed the point yourself when you misunderstood the issue as related to him being held responsible for the crimes of his son. He committed the crime of obstruction regardless of whatever crime his son was suspected of, but that’s not even the problem here.

            What I CANNOT FUCKING ABIDE is the insane hypocrisy this fuck demonstrates through allowing exceptions to the LAWS for his child that he will defend and go to jail over, while demanding someone else’s child fall in line to school guidelines that are malleable and far less rigid in both application and enforcement than any legal criminality.

            This all reads like some purebred racial prejudice fully baked into governing committees remaining alive and well in pockets of Texas even close to major cities. Not that it’s that different literally everywhere else that isn’t a major metro/suburb/college town.

  • Username02@lemmy.world
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    2 years ago

    What’s next? All students are required to wear white skin and blonde hair to adhere to conformity?

  • Son_of_dad@lemmy.world
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    2 years ago

    Conformity to what? That kid’s roots are just as American, if not more so, then that of the white principal.

    • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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      2 years ago

      Sort of the joke with these “PoCs need to learn to conform!” You never seen white kids held to the beauty and wardrobe standards of their minority peers.

      Kids who show up to school in blue jeans aren’t dinged for dressing informally. Kids who bleach their hair or have it curled aren’t harassed. Nobody is losing their shit over some dipshit in a dented pickup blasting “Rich Men From Richmond” on his after-market speaker system.

      “Conformity” is entirely white-facing.

    • RaoulDook@lemmy.world
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      2 years ago

      It’s like that dumbass has no concept of reality but what he imagines it should be like. Being American obviously doesn’t require “conformity” if you think about it for 5-10 seconds. All it requires to be American is to be born here or go through the citizenship process, literally.

      The reality that all Americans should see is that we have a nation of many cultures and ideals that we are free to conform or not conform to. Freedom to be yourself is inherent in the concept of America in general, I would assume for the majority of humans in the world too.

      • Asafum@feddit.nl
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        2 years ago

        Right wing propagandists have been pushing the message that a mixed society can’t function because we “aren’t all on the same page culturally.” This asshat is just following that line of reasoning, saying that “we all must be identical so we are all on the same page.”

        Also, bring up communism just for laughs and watch as they pontificate on the myriad ways communism forces equality and how that’s bad… Fun stuff…

        • Ann Archy@lemmy.world
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          2 years ago

          I am most definitely not on the same page culturally as Those People.

          And by Those People I mean fat middle aged white racist pieces of shit.

    • Ann Archy@lemmy.world
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      2 years ago

      “We let you go from slavery, isn’t that enough? You should be grateful, instead you’re acting up, tsk tsk som peoples just can’t be civilized”

  • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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    2 years ago

    If you want to know why this school is so fucking awful, this is from the school district’s about page:

    • stown@sedd.it
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      2 years ago

      I guess we can make some assumptions about the school board members and funding sources.

    • Waldowal@lemmy.world
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      2 years ago

      “In Barbers Hill, student educational needs about the benefits of petrochemicals comes first!”

  • funkless_eck@sh.itjust.works
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    2 years ago

    Compromise, conformity, assimilation, submission
    Ignorance, hypocrisy, brutality, the elite
    All of which are American dreams
    All of which are American dreams
    All of which are American dreams
    All of which are American dreams
    All of which are American dreams
    All of which are American dreams
    All of which are American dreams
    All of which are American dreams

  • Thann@lemmy.ml
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    2 years ago

    Being an american requires conformity

    Says the guy with the confederate flag in his living room

    • AquaTofana@lemmy.world
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      2 years ago

      I still CANNOT believe he chose to phrase his justification like that.

      One of the things we’re supposed to have is freedom to express ourselves however we see fit so long as it doesn’t hurt anyone else.

      My parents have a huge “Fuck Joe Biden” banner on the front of their house, and the county hasn’t stepped in to be like “You can’t have a two foot tall ‘Fuck’ on public display”, and yet this guy gets in trouble for wearing his hair in a manner that’s comfy to him???

      I shouldn’t be shocked because I live in Texas, however, I am. Maybe I’m not cynical enough.

        • AquaTofana@lemmy.world
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          2 years ago

          No, I’m white as white can be. I know that’s the reason but I’m just flabbergasted that this kind of racism can still be so blatant in 2024.

          Ugh. I really do try to be the “I love humanity” person, but this story in particular just disgusts the fuck outta me.

          I wish the George family would open a gofundme for legal costs because I’d kick some dollars their way in a heartbeat.

          • Ben Hur Horse Race@lemm.ee
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            2 years ago

            I hear you.

            I honestly used to say I loved humanity. Each year and each observation of us as a species as made me grow more cynical and pessimestic regarding if most people are are “good” or not. The inability of people to not become childlike and selfish was during the beginning of covid was the final piece of evidence for me.

            I genuinely believe if they made a gofundme they’d widely be accused of grifting, cause, you know, projection.

            Please don’t give up on optimism, love and hope though, glad to hear some people haven’t :)

            • AnarchistArtificer@slrpnk.net
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              2 years ago

              I find it hard sometimes, but I do genuinely believe that if humans have a fundamental nature, it’s a good one. I think the problem is that the system we live under punishes vulnerability and incentivises zero-sum thinking.

              I used to be a real shitty person because of this. I faced a lot of ambient bullying in school, so I trained myself to always have a cutting retort ready for if someone tried to hurt me. I was still a decent person outwardly, but inside, I was turning my heart and mind to toxic sludge. Eventually I realised how nasty my internal dialogue was and it shocked me enough that I committed to try and change, but I don’t think I could’ve made the progress I have since then without the kind of community where I can learn what emotional vulnerability looks like and how to see that as a virtue.

              A lot of hateful people seem pretty scared underneath it all. It doesn’t justify their hate, but it does make me feel sympathy towards them. I wonder what kind of person they could be if they had an environment where they could properly grow as a person.

              • Ben Hur Horse Race@lemm.ee
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                2 years ago

                Yeah 100% of everything you’re saying makes sense.

                You sound likea very thoughtful person. Most people are no where near as thoughtful as you are in my experience. Also humans evolved to have a zero sum mentality as we evolved in a resource-scarce world. Now that that is changing for a certain portion of the population, we’re in no way inclined to start thinking differently. Some folks are, but most aren’t.

                You’re right about fear and hostility though for sure. Don’t stop being compassionate! You’ve lifted my spirits a bit for what its worth :)

  • Dark Arc@social.packetloss.gg
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    2 years ago

    Being an American requires conformity with the positive benefit of unity

    We must be living in different Americas. This country loves nothing more than rebellion.