Earlier this year, Colorado joined a growing list of states that have banned natural hair discrimination. Colorado’s CROWN Act (Creating a Respectful and Open World for Natural Hair Act) went into effect on September 14, 2020 with the goal of preventing racial discrimination premised on a person’s natural hair type or race-based hairstyle.
The CROWN
A hairstyle can reflect or be part of a sincerely held religious belief or practice, and may thus require a reasonable accommodation by employers. But can a hairstyle be a racial characteristic under Title VII, even if it is not part of a religious belief or practice, and thus be out of bounds for regulation
A couple more reader comments about our post about dreadlocks and mutable characteristics. Put another way: can forbidding dreadlocks in the workplace when it is not worn as a matter of religious belief still run afoul of Title VII as race related?
Shana Goodman, an HR administrator in the Atlanta Area:
“I think