California education chief calls preschooler 'stupid dirty girl'
Richard Riordan calls preschooler 'stupid dirty girl'
The conversation, videotaped by KEYT-TV, took place July 1. The girl, 6-year-old Isis D'Luciano, asked Riordan if he knew her name meant "Egyptian goddess."
Riordan replied, "It means stupid dirty girl."
After nervous laughter in the room, the girl again told Riordan the meaning of her name.
"Hey, that's nifty," he said.
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State Education Secretary Richard Riordan jokingly told a child her name, Isis, meant "stupid dirty girl," prompting the head of the California NAACP on Thursday to call for his resignation.
Ok, he was kidding with the little girl who seemed to understand the little teasing, and it sounds like she wasn't terribally upset about the whole thing. Riordan showed poor taste, but this incident is best described as tactless.
But Alice Huffman, president of the California chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, said Thursday that Riordan "is not suitable to lead education in our state" and should be removed.
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Democratic state Assemblyman Mervyn Dymally, who had scheduled a protest by civil rights organizations, canceled the demonstration after an apparent mix-up over the girl's racial background.
Dymally was quoted in the San Jose Mercury News Thursday saying the child was "a little African-American girl. Would he (Riordan) have done that to a white girl?"
The girl is white, with blonde hair.
Dymally did not return telephone calls. His office issued a statement Wednesday calling Riordan's remarks to the girl "outrageous and irresponsible," then issued another statement Thursday saying, "To err is human; to forgive is divine."
"Race is not a factor in this issue," Dymally said in Thursday's statement, adding that Riordan had apologized a second time. "It is time for us to move on."
OK, lets see if I have this right, because the girl is white its not such a big deal now. Any attempt to minimalize this event would have been sure to have attracted outcries of racism, That is that it was a little teasing that was in poor taste and no harm was done. This would be just as true if little Isis were black.
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