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Tyler Williams was also a goalkeeper for the Lions basketball team at D-II University of Arkansas-Fort Smith last month, and he was about to return for his senior season as top scorer in the program. 's to be abruptly sacked from the team of new head coach Jim Boone on August 16th. Williams said he was fired because Boone did not allow players with dreadlocks to play for him.
Williams returned to Oklahoma and enrolled at Southern Nazarene University. The story of the latter became viral last weekend after a UAFS student published excerpts of a letter sent by the Williams family to school, describing "flagrant and demonstrative" discrimination. against their son Boone.
Williams spoke to the Oklahoman and provided the newspaper with a copy of a recording of her family's meeting with Boone on August 16th. "Kicking the team just because of the hair is wrong," Williams said. "I just felt disrespectful and devalued after he told me."
According to a transcript of the meeting, Williams reminds Boone: "You talked about my hair and you do not like it and do not want to recruit anyone with locks like mine."
Boone replied:
It's not that we do not recruit them, but we make it very clear that once they come in, they will not do that anymore. I told you, however, because you were here before me, that I did not think it was right for me to tell you that you had to cut your hair, that I would let you have them.
Williams then asked if Boone did not want to have players in his team "with hair like mine," and Boone replied, "Probably not."
Later in the meeting, Boone tells Williams that he has a problem with "the face of our program" with dreadlocks. When Williams' mother proposes a California law prohibiting employers from discriminating because of their natural hair, Boone says, "I do not have to live with that. I do not live in California, so I do not have to deal with that. "
The Williams family wrote:
Every student-athlete has the right to wear natural hairstyles without fear of repercussions, exclusion, judgment or a feeling of abandonment of a team sport. Tyler must be able to go to school and do his fieldwork and off the field, without feeling any pressure to change his appearance based on the "comfort level" of someone else. .
[…]
Styles such as dreadlocks, braids, cornrows and, of course, afros, can not be dissociated from black culture. Boone's action of controlling black hair is a form of ubiquitous racism and bias.
The full letter can be found here.
[[[[Oklahoman]
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