(Paris) Black women forced to straighten their hair, mockery against redheads or even blondes: the National Assembly in France voted on Thursday for a bill against “hair discrimination”, despite reservations about the usefulness of a such initiative.
The text of the deputy from the island of Guadeloupe Olivier Serva (independent group) was largely adopted at first reading, by 44 votes to 2, before being transmitted to the Senate where the reception reserved for it by the majority of the right and the center is uncertain.
The text is inspired by legislation in force in part of the United States, in particular “ Crown Act » promulgated in 2019 in California against hair discrimination.
“In France, discrimination based on physical appearance is already punished in theory,” agreed MP Serva. “But from theory to reality, there is a gulf,” he stressed, pleading to “clarify” a “misunderstood or poorly understood law”.
Olivier Serva spoke of “black women who feel obliged to straighten their hair” before a job interview, “redheaded people, victims of many negative prejudices”, or “bald men”.
His proposal clarifies the law by adding hair discrimination textually to the list of discrimination punishable by criminal sanctions. With the aim of preventing employers from forcing their employees to straighten their afro or hide their braids and dreadlocks.
Taking a “benevolent look” at this text, the government relied on the “wisdom” of the deputies. It has “the merit of highlighting this type of discrimination”, even if the law “already allows us to fight” against it, noted the French minister responsible for Equality between women and men and the fight against discrimination. discrimination, Aurore Bergé.
“Black woman from the Republic of Guinea”, “I am here with my braids, my wigs”, described MP Fanta Berete, member of the presidential majority. “When I was applying for certain jobs, I was told that I had to straighten my hair. Yes, my mother, who was a worker, had to use her savings to buy me locks,” she testified.
“Systemic racism”
Speakers mentioned a decision of the Court of Cassation at the end of 2022. The highest court had ruled that the company Air France had demonstrated a discriminatory “difference in treatment” by prohibiting one of its flight attendants from the port Afro braids, although authorized for hostesses.
The left supported this text in the face of a “real, serious and political” problem, which affects “mainly racialized people”, underlined Danièle Obono, deputy of the radical left, denouncing, like the ecologist Sabrina Sebaihi, a “racism systemic”.
This last term made the right bristle. In the tumult, MP Xavier Breton castigated a “militant ideology”, “words which only aim to fracture our society”. He fought the proposed law, “talkative law”, “a headlong rush” towards a “list of discriminations” at the risk of establishing “a hierarchy”.
On the far right, Philippe Schreck called for “not to mock or mock” this proposed law, but questioned it. “Are we taking care of the daily problems of the French” in a “virtually bankrupt” country? “It would be good to quickly move on to something else,” he demanded.
In the presidential camp, some have expressed their reservations, such as MP Lise Magnier who fears that such a law would complicate the task of the judge, to arbitrate between hair discrimination or based on origins or physical appearance.
Some jurists also doubt the usefulness of such a law. For mee Eric Rocheblave, lawyer specializing in labor law, this is a “bad idea”, because “there is no legal vacuum”.
But Olivier Serva assumes the “symbolic” dimension of his text, because “the symbolic is political”.
Although the phenomenon of hair discrimination is difficult to quantify, certain high-profile cases have left their mark, such as that of former government spokesperson Sibeth Ndiaye, whose Afro cut led to numerous harsh comments upon her taking office in April. 2019.
Audrey Pulvar, deputy to the socialist mayor of Paris Anne Hidalgo, or recently Eve Gilles, Miss France 2024, have also had to face criticism and mockery.