At Six Flags, the Don'ts of Dos

Walt Disney Co. also holds its employees to a grooming policy that limits some ethnic hairstyles, agreeing only six years ago to allow mustaches and three years ago to let men wear short cornrow braids.

"The hair has to be clean, natural and polished," said Jacob DiPietre, park spokesman for Walt Disney World. "I don't think dreadlocks are allowed."

Linda Jones, who edits a newsletter called Nappy News for people who wear ethnic hairstyles, said "it is very telling" that theme parks forbid such styles for employees.

"Why not point out mohawk or mullet [styles], too?" Jones asked. "They only specify dreadlocks, and who is more likely to wear those styles? Are they saying that styles that aren't in keeping with the European aesthetic are not professional?"

Critics of these Afrocentric styles, she said, include some African Americans. At Hampton University in Virginia, for example, male students in the master's in business administration program with hairstyles deemed "extreme" are restricted from certain activities, such as meeting with visiting corporate executives.

Sid Credle, Business School dean at the historically black university, said the policy was set in 2000 by a group of students. He said the policy was not discriminatory, simply pragmatic: For business students, "drawing attention to themselves as being different" is a negative.

The recent dust-up at Six Flags America probably resulted, said Goldberg, the national spokeswoman, from the effort by the new general manager, Terry Prather, to enforce the policy since he came on board in February. The Largo park was taken over last year by Washington Redskins owner Daniel M. Snyder, and its new management has pledged to tighten up operations at the park -- and make it more "family friendly."

Prather, who is black, said that allowing employees to wear hairstyles that violate the park's policy would lead to customer service problems. He said he has dealt with the ethnic hairstyles of his children, ages 23 to 33. "I totally understand it," he said. "I live with it."

He denied that the policy was antiquated or discriminatory, although he understands why some employees might be upset.

Prather and Goldberg said exceptions are made for employees with a religious or medical reason for not cutting their hair. But Hall, who wears a character costume all day, said he was ordered to change his long, straight hair despite his views as a Muslim.

"They first told me to pin it up, but when I did, they told me I couldn't wear it pinned up," he said. "They are still telling me sometimes that I have to cut it. I've got three supervisors who are all white, and they're the ones who tell me about cutting my hair."

Dianna Johnston, assistant legal council for the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, said questions about hair fall under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, which prohibits discrimination based on race or national origin.