Court TV has details on Dillard’s response to a federal lawsuit complaining about higher prices charged black customers in the department store chain’s hair salon in Montgomery, Ala.
A defense brief submitted in Alabama federal court cites numerous supposed characteristics of black hair that make treating it more “time consuming and technically demanding than fulfilling the minimal (or non-existent) conditioning needs” of the typical white customer.
Vaughan Thomas, who filed the suit, tells Court TV that “hair is hair” and the price should be the same for everyone.
Added her lawyer, Patrick Cooper:
“It’s amazing to me that a Fortune 500 company would use this kind of pseudo-science in court to prove that it takes longer to wash African-American hair,” Cooper said.
“The day they can show me that every black woman in the country has the same hair is the day I’ll ask the judge to dismiss the case immediately.”