(Sun-Herald) – The $1.1 trillion ‘cromnibus’ spending bill that Congress will vote on this week deals with weighty matters of war and peace, health and immigration – and hair styles?
Tucked into the defense appropriations portion of the 1,600-plus-page bill is a directive for the secretary of defense – currently Chuck Hagel – to report to congressional defense committees on how the Pentagon is doing in carrying out revised grooming standards after minority female service members complained that descriptions of certain hair styles were ‘offensive and discriminatory.’
‘After conducting a review, the Secretary of Defense issued new guidelines for grooming policies to specifically address concerns that certain grooming policies discriminate against African-American service members with natural hairstyles,’ the bill states in the ‘Female Servicemember Grooming Standards’ section on Page 15 of the Department of Defense Appropriations division of the measure.