It’s almost Halloween, the time of year when sadists pretend that candy corn is not Satan’s butt plug and masochists terrorize their taste buds with pumpkin flavors, which is essentially sweet potatoes with low self-esteem. It is also the season when white people think it would be cute to cover their faces in shoe polish and use blackness as a costume and a comic device.
An Iowa school district already under state supervision for discriminating against minority students is now investigating one of its own for breaking the district rule against doing dumb shit.
Megan Luloff, a first-grade teacher at Walcott Elementary in Walcott, Iowa reportedly showed up to the Walcott American Legion’s “Boos Bash,” a Halloween party for the Grown & Stupid (and also how I describe a Trump rally), wearing blackface.
According to the Quad City Times, Luloff reportedly came to the party with her entire crew, who dressed as characters from the cult classic Napoleon Dynamite (A “cult classic” is a film that made no money because only white people think it is interesting).
This is the part that makes me curious. Do people who wear blackface have true friends? I once tried to wear a T-shirt whose V-neck was cut a little too deep and my friends made me go back into the house and change before I went out showing all my cleavage.
Who goes out with someone wearing blackface? Why is it always a cabal of dummies with weak chins, eyes that are precariously close together and undefined jawlines? Did they meet up at the party or did they ride to the party together while one of the friends kept saying: “Oooh, girl, your minstrel makeup is killing it!”
Megan the Minstrel chose to dress as Lafawnduh, a black character I would describe right now if I had watched more than 22 minutes of Napoleon Dynamite before I stopped saying “what the fuck is this bullshit?” and breaking the DVD into shards, one of which would eventually cut my pinky toe.
“The wearing of blackface is never appropriate in any circumstance by any person,” Davenport School District Superintendent Art Tate said in an email. “The issue is under investigation by the district.”
The Davenport School District is currently under strict supervision by the state of Iowa for discriminating against minority students. The district reportedly placed a disproportionate number of non-white students in special education classes and disciplined minority students more frequently and handed out harsher punishments than it did to white students.
Linda Hayes, the liaison for the district’s disproportionality initiatives which is a fancy title that means “watcher of white people to make sure they don’t keep being racist,” said of the Luloff incident:
“I cannot clearly articulate how offensive and appalling it is to people of color.” she said. “In light of our recent developments within the district [the previously referred-to fuckshit], this was in very poor taste, not to mention totally out of line with regard to professionalism.”
“We are working very hard with professionals from across the country and within the state to assist with the problem of disproportionality, and one of our own is fueling the fire with blatant racism,” Hayes added. “All I can say is it’s very sad, and totally unacceptable.”
The school district issued a statement that said:
The district was very recently made aware of these images of a district employee at a non-school related event, and an internal investigation is currently ongoing. The board does not condone the insensitivity these images depict and is very disappointed something like this is now connected to our school community.
The district strives to provide a quality education enriched by our diverse community, in a fair and supportive environment for all. The images run counter to the respect, values, and beliefs the district promotes and should not be a reflection on the District as a whole.
This situation is not taken lightly by any member of the board. The district will determine how to best address the matter after further investigation.
Toby Paone, a teachers’ union representative, said the union does not comment on personnel matters, explaining that an investigation would involve an interview with the teacher and possibly other people at the party, especially any district employees. The disciplinary action, if any, would be dependent on whether or not the allegations against Luloff were substantiated.
Neither Palone nor Luloff replied to The Root’s requests for comment about my pinky toe. To be fair, we didn’t ask for a comment about the blackface...
We already knew that was stupid.