Rasta inmates spend 10 years in isolation for hair

Rasta inmates spend 10 years in isolation for hair
AP
By DENA POTTER, Associated Press Writer Dena Potter, Associated Press Writer – Sat May 8, 12:00 am ET

JARRATT, Va. – Kendall Gibson would seem to be one of Virginia's most dangerous prisoners.

For more than 10 years he has lived in segregation at the Greensville Correctional Center, spending at least 23 hours every day in a cell the size of a gas station bathroom. In a temporary home for the worst of the worst — inmates too violent or disruptive to live among the rest of society's outcasts — he has been a permanent fixture.

He is there, he says, not for his crimes but for a crime he will not commit — a crime against God.

The only thing imposing about Gibson is his long black dreadlocks, resting on the front of his shoulders so they won't drag the ground as he shuffles along in his orange jumpsuit.

It is his hair — winding locks he considers a measure of his Rastafarian faith — that makes him a threat, according to Virginia Department of Corrections Operating Procedure No. 864.1...

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100508/ap_on_re_us/us_rastafarian_segregation

If you're gonna wear it long in prison, seems you might get strangled easier.

who doesn't want to be part of the gang culture is getting religion.

His hair wouldn't make him a huge target, if that's really the case.

He just needs to stuff it into a Rasta hat.

Solitary confinement for hair is cruel and unusual punishment. Methinks he's part of some Jamaican posse and that's the bigger concern.

who all had hair well past their butts, had to all get their hair cut above the bra line because an incident nearby where a woman had burned more severely than she would've if her hair had been shorter and not full of hairspray. The father took that to heart and demanded all the girls get their hair cut for safety reasons. It was quite traumatic at first.

That having been said, I think it is wrong to restrict someone because of their hair.

like crossing the street? driving? going outfuckingside the house?

continue to live in this house the hair has to go." They were a very close knit family and he wasn't questioned, and as far as I knew during that time, they never complained nor attempted to regrow it past that length. I guess his concern made sense to them, and they determined it to be a wise choice given that it didn't impinge on their freedoms, like it didn't keep them from crossing the street, or getting a job, or anything.

Your analogy sucks, iow.

I do think these laws are generally too broad, but I don't think it's a big deal.

You see all those black prisoners out working the fields, just like the good old days before the Civil War.

Virginia prison system sucks big time.

Hair style is one of them.

That makes no sense whatsoever.

Although given their treatment of gays, Rastafarians can go stuff it, for all I care.

How many "religions" have pop music about murdering homosexuals?

You strip away the old identity to build something new. Hairstyle is part of how many people perceive their identity. You strip it away to build anew. The same thing happens in military boot camp, for the very same reason.

Boo hoo.

Man to man is so unjust...Marley