A black teenager says he had to take off his Black Lives Matter mask in his graduation rite in York, Pennsylvania, last month. Dean Holmes told CBS News that he dressed with him because the lives of black people are “in danger right now.”
Holmes, 18, broke his tail at the prom at York Catholic High School through the principal on July 28 and “was forced to take off his mask,” according to a Facebook viral post where his father, John, indexed his grievances. to school.
Holmes said that “her son’s freedom of expression censured her when she forced her to take off her mask or face the very genuine option of not graduating.” The school did not take into account any express warnings about mask labels or clothing related to the mask, he said.
The message also points to Dean’s past shocks with the school, adding that he wrote an essay about his passion for racism at a personal school that did not allow him to read at a festival because he was “too controversial.”
“As a father, I cannot bear my son to be publicly humiliated, that his basic human dignity will be crushed in what has been one of the happiest days of his young life,” Elder Holmes said. “My son has been literally discriminated against with the naked eye because of his race and his former civil rights activism, and this latest action is a component of a discrimination trend and practice in York Catholic and cannot remain unanswered.
He said his son’s delight “is incalculable and traumatic and will stay with him for the rest of his life.”
York Catholic responded to the father’s claims about the mask incident on his website, claiming that Dean had been privately invited to remove his mask before entering the church where the rite of commencement was taking place. Their decorum follows a culture in which messages are not allowed in caps or dresses, depending on the school. This position now includes masks.
“Any graduate dressed in a cap, dress or mask with a message would have been asked to take it off,” the school said.
Vladimir Duthiers of CBS News spoke to him and his father about the experience.
“All lives matter, but the lives of black people are in danger right now,” Dean said. “You know, they’re not safe in their own skin. It’s like you can draw attention to that to show your support.”
The student’s father how strangers supported his family.
“You know, with the Internet and social media, we have a voice,” he said. “The outpouring of other people of such a positive race has been so glorious to see.”