In a decision that has left human rights lawyers everywhere reaching for a very large glass of something medicinal, the Supreme Court of the United States has declared that prison guards who forcibly shear a Rastafarian inmate's dreadlocks cannot be sued. The case, which involved a clearly traumatised gentleman whose religious locks were hacked off like a particularly aggressive hedge-trimming incident, was dismissed on the grounds of 'qualified immunity.' This is a legal doctrine that essentially means 'we can do whatever we like, and you can't touch us for it.'
Naturally, this has caused a bit of a flap in the corridors of British human rights organisations. They have issued statements that are so full of indignation and fury that you could practically hear a collective intake of breath from Islington to Edinburgh. One spokesperson, no doubt wearing a slightly-too-small tweed jacket and clutching a Fairtrade latte, declared that 'this sets a dangerous precedent.' The precedent being, I suppose, that if you are in an American prison, your religion only counts if it involves a tie and a copy of the King James Bible.
The plaintiff, a chap by the name of Arthur C. Brooks (not the libertarian thinker, I checked) was a Rastafarian inmate in a Texas prison. For years, he managed to keep his dreadlocks in a neat bun, a hairstyle that was, in his faith, a sacred expression of his covenant with God. But then, enter the prison's 'Grooming Policy,' a bureaucratic masterpiece that apparently allows for the taming of wild hair at the point of a pair of scissors. Guards, presumably with the enthusiasm of a barber on a sugar rush, cut his locks. When he sued, the court decided that this was a perfectly acceptable violation of his religious freedom because, well, the guards didn't know it was a violation. And now they can't be sued for it because of a magical immunity cloak.
Britain's human rights brigade, led by the likes of Liberty and Amnesty International UK, have predictably gone absolutely spare. They have labelled the decision 'a grotesque betrayal of religious liberty' and have called upon the UK government to issue a strong condemnation. However, given that the UK government is currently preoccupied with other matters, such as deciding which shade of beige is best for ministerial offices, this is unlikely to provoke anything beyond a vaguely worded letter.
The absurdity here is not just that a man's sacred hair was chopped off by people who probably had the emotional intelligence of a brick. It is that the law has now effectively said: 'We don't care about your God, we care about our haircut policy.' The Rastafarian faith, which venerates the unshorn mane as a mark of spiritual integrity, has been reduced to a mere nuisance in the face of a bureaucratic comma.
Let us not forget the sheer cosmic lunacy of the term 'qualified immunity.' It is as if we have given the state a get-out-of-jail-free card for anything less than actual murder. If a guard had, say, accidentally sat on an inmate's lunch, he could be sued. But cut off his religiously mandated hair? Absolutely fine. The message is clear: your soul is your own, but your hair belongs to the state.
As the news of this ruling trickles across the pond, I can only imagine the reaction of British judges. They, who pride themselves on a certain level of decorum and respect for hair, will no doubt be horrified. A British judge once threw out a case because the defendant's hair was 'inappropriately exuberant.' But at least we have our priorities straight: we will judge your hair, but we won't cut it off without legal redress.
So, here's to Arthur C. Brooks, whose dreadlocks were sacrificed on the altar of American jurisprudence. And here's to the British human rights groups, who will now pen strongly worded letters that will be filed in the great circular bin of history. Meanwhile, the prison guards sleep soundly, immune from justice, their shears still glistening in the moonlight.
In the end, it was a close shave for justice. But then again, justice has always had a bald spot.
