Maryland teacher Marquise White has been facing a lot of backlash over the past few weeks after he posted a video on TikTok of young girls in his classroom taking out his braids.
The school officials in Prince George’s County released a statement that they reassigned White away from the classroom, pending the outcome of an investigation.
White, who goes by JaQ Lee on social media, has continued to make TikToks, defending his actions and commenting on other people’s opinions of his actions. White recently posted a video of a White man getting his head bedazzled by his students and wanted to know why that teacher wasn’t receiving the same backlash he did. White then opened up about why he thinks he was publicly ridiculed.
“I firmly believe that I was attacked, and let me add this in here, mainly attacked by own community. I was mainly attacked by my own community for the most part, “White said. “I firmly believe that I was attacked because I’m a young, handsome, Black man.
Marquise White, the male teacher in #PGcounty MD who previously received backlash for allowing students to take down his braids, is questioning the outrage and gives several examples of others who did something similar but were not scrutinized. #marquisewhite #teacher #news pic.twitter.com/MeyS5b9VbG
— Cultural Crown_Official (@culturalcrown) May 20, 2024
“People who watched this video and thought anything weird, or anything suggestive, saw me, was attracted to me. I got tattoos, I got an attractive energy, attractive aura, you can sense that through the video. Since you can sense that attractiveness, or sense you are attracted to me, you projected your own thoughts, ideologies, traumas and experiences, onto me and my children, and that is a hill I’m willing to die on 1,000% of the time.”
White continues by saying if he was a woman or if he was White it wouldn’t have been a problem that he was getting his hair unbraided.
“Y’all mad at me for creating bonds with my students. At least they’re not fighting me, at least they’re not fighting the teacher. At least my students aren’t smoking crack in the bathroom,” White said.
