The father of a six-year-old banned from his first day at a private Christian school in Florida because of his hairstyle has accused the school of bias.
Clinton Stanley Jr was withdrawn from A Book's Christian Academy after his father was told the African-American boy would need to get his dreadlocks cut as they went against school policy.
But Clinton Stanley Sr has called that decision biased, an accusation the school strongly refuted.
A petition launched in response to the incident called dreadlocks a "hairstyle specific to students of African descent" and deemed its prohibition at the school "unacceptable".
School administrator Sue Book told The Washington Post the school had never allowed long hair in its nearly 50-year history and the father had been provided with the school's rules when his son was enrolled.
But Mr Stanley said he never saw a handbook, "or else I'd have never put my son through this embarrassment".
Reverend John Butler Book, the school's founder, said: "Obviously, I'm not racist. In our school our song is: Jesus loves the little children of the world, red and yellow, black and white."
A Facebook video Mr Stanley filmed of his son's first day showed the ordeal as it unravelled. As he found out about the policy Mr Stanley, a religious man, said: "And they're supposed to be Christian. In their book it says God has hair 'like wool'".
He is now organising a community meeting to "discuss discrimination policies that target black hair and black children in schools".
The incident has drawn the attention of Shaun King, a well-known civil rights activist, who has written extensively about the Black Lives Matter movement.
Newshub.
