"Where's your black lipstick and red eye make-up?"

... is what a friend asked me who sent me this story:

A ninth-grade student has accused officials at a Southern California high school of discrimination for suspending him for wearing lipstick and eye makeup.

James Herndon, 16, said the five-day suspension imposed Monday by administrators at San Bernardino's Pacific High School was unfair because females are allowed to wear cosmetics on campus.

Herndon says his black lipstick and red eye makeup express the Wiccan religious beliefs he shares with his mother, a priestess in the neo-pagan faith.

Around Samhain, I do get into the dark eyeliner thing but come on. This has absolutely nothing to do with Wicca so kid, stop saying it does.

Don't get me wrong: the kid should be allowed to smear anything on his face that he likes without being suspended from school. You want to smear red crap around your eyes? I don't care. You want to smear red crap around your eyes and say it's freedom of religion? That bugs me. B/c witches who don't smear shit all over their face get the stigma from kids like this who do. People don't take my religion seriously when someone uses it as an excuse to smear red shit around his eyes and freak out his classmates.

Is he performing rituals at school? Does he believe that wearing the makeup will help him in class? I don't see anything in that makeup that conveys Wicca. It conveys weird, sure, but Wicca? No.

I think this kid should just stand up and say, "I wear it b/c I want to." Period. Why does it have to be a Wiccan thing?

The people who should be truly pissed off about this are legitimate teen Wiccans. I don't know about you but I hear a teen say, "I'm a Wiccan" and I kind of cringe. Like, "Yeah I bet you are," which is a terrible prejudice to have but this is the kind of thing it stems from. I'm sure a great number of teens treat Wicca and witchcraft as a serious expression of faith and spirituality. Then there are dabblers (or posers) who use "Wicca" as an excuse to wear black lipstick and act withdrawn and gothy. I don't know what I'd do if I were a teen witch; I bet I'd be damn pissed at the posers, that's for sure.

It's no different than these new-found bible thumpers and holy rollers playing "who's holier than thou?" with each other. If I were a Christian, I'd be damn pissed at the posers and come-latelys I'm sure.

I wonder what's really going on in this story. On what grounds could they ban him for wearing makeup? Or for expressing his religion, if that's indeed what he's doing. I'd like to see his HP mom too. And what is the red shit anyway?