Editor’s Note: This post, including headline, has been updated to include new information that dramatically alters the context of the article. The student’s name has also been removed from the story, given the new information.
As reported by WSUA9, the black sixth-grader who came forward with allegations that her peers held her down and cut her dreadlocks has recanted her story and apologized. NBC Washington, however, reports that the girl maintains she has been a victim of bullying, as per the family’s attorney.
Immanuel Christian School released a statement, including in part: "While we are relieved to hear the truth and bring the events of the past few days to a close, we also feel tremendous pain for the victims and the hurt on both sides of this conflict. We recognize that we now enter what will be a long season of healing."
The student’s family also released a statement, including, "To those young boys and their parents, we sincerely apologize for the pain and anxiety these allegations have caused. To the administrators and families of Immanuel Christian School, we are sorry for the damage this incident has done to trust within the school family and the undue scorn it has brought to the school."
Original story below.
A 12-year-old girl who attends Immanuel Christian School in Springfield, Virginia, alleges that three of her male classmates told her that she “doesn’t deserve to live” and “shouldn’t have been born,” pinned her to a playground slide, and cut off several of her deadlocks.
The student, who is black, says that the three classmates who said and did this are white boys. They are all in the same sixth-grade class at the private school, which costs about $12,000 per year to attend.
Something else of note? Immanuel Christian School is where the wife of the vice president, Karen Pence, teaches part-time, a school that has a policy banning LGBTQ students, parents, and teachers.
The student recalls that the boys held her hands behind her back, covered her mouth, and described her hair as “nappy” and “ugly” while chopping off her dreadlocks.
WUSA9 reports that this attack was exceptionally synchronized. She says that one of the sixth-grade boys covered her mouth with his hand, another held her hands behind her back, and the third used scissors to cut her dreadlocks. It wasn’t a joke, a game, or a misunderstanding. And it’s definitely not okay to dismiss it as “boys being boys.” This is assault, plain and simple.
The student says the attack occurred last Monday, but she didn’t tell her family about it until Wednesday, when her grandmother mentioned that her hair looked different. Why? She was afraid of retaliation if she told the truth about what happened. This in itself points to trauma and fear.
Her family wants the boys removed from the school. They met with the school on Thursday and an investigation is ongoing.
"It's very painful," said the student’s grandmother, Cynthia Allen. "I want to see them dismissed from the school. I want to see something done."
The student says this is not the first time the boys have bullied her. She alleges that they’ve called her names in the past and stolen her lunch. Notably, the school claims to have a zero-tolerance policy for bullying. "We take seriously the emotional and physical well-being of all our students, and have a zero-tolerance policy for any kind of bullying or abuse," Immanuel Christian School said in a statement released to WUSA9 after the station asked how the allegations are being handled. "We are deeply disturbed by the allegations being made, and are in communication with the family of the alleged victim to gather information and provide whatever support we can. We have also reached out to law enforcement to ask them to conduct a thorough investigation, and further inquiries should be directed to the Fairfax County Police."
The student says that after the attack by the boys, "They ran off laughing, and I was just sitting there." The image of white boys laughing after attacking women is particularly disturbing, especially when one considers Dr. Christine Blasey Ford’s testimony about two young men, including now-Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, and their “uproarious” laughter at her expense during their attack. Haunting.
Of course, there are differences in these two situations. It’s difficult to conceive that this attack wasn’t racist. Describing her hair as “nappy” while forcibly cutting it makes it clear, for one. And their alleged description of her hair as “ugly” has racist roots: Black women’s hair has long been upheld by media and societal standards as less attractive than white hair, and even less clean. These nasty stereotypes and myths go straight back to colonialism. Today, states and cities are finally passing bills to protect black employees against hair discrimination, because it has been rampant for so, so long.
It’s unknown how many students of color—and specifically black students—attend the school or are in this particular class. No word yet on where teachers were during this alleged playground incident.
You can watch an interview with the student below: