This is a response to the Op Eds written by some of my fellow Caucasians who seem to rest the blame with the young black wrestler from Buena who was forced to cut his dreads or forfeit the match.  Most are saying the same blanket statement, “he should have just followed the rules”, but they fail to mention the rules that Alan Maloney broke himself, such as being late to the meet and also failing to say anything about his hair at the prematch inspection.  They also forget to mention the failure of the NJSIAA to act when they knew that Maloney made racially disparaging comments to a fellow black referee.

We all remember when the Lacrosse team in Haddonfield had their season canceled due to a racially charged comment that one of the players made.  The parents and students circled the wagons and even claimed that the Black Superintendent had some sort of an agenda against their children, but the community supported a “no snitching” culture and nobody ever stepped forward as the culprit.  The alleged agenda wasn’t based on racially charged comments made by the Black Superintendent, as were proven to be made by Alan Maloney, it was just the fact that he was a black man that made them suspicious of his decisions he made about their children.  

Could you imagine if the black Superintendent was also overheard calling a fellow white administrator a “blue eyed white devil”, do you think he would have just been suspended pending an investigation, as Maloney has been, or would the Lacrosse parents prepare him to be tarred,  feathered, and fired? Would a school with mostly Jewish students allow a Referee, known to hurl racially biased slurs at a fellow Jewish Referee, to work their matches? We all know the answers to those questions, so why did the NJSIAA allow Maloney to Referee black students matches?  

The Buena School Board has made the decision that Maloney is not to Referee anymore of their matches no matter the outcome of the pending investigation by the NJSIAA and I am urging other school districts to join them.  If you have any student athletes of color it is your job to protect them from discrimination, so please join Buena in doing what the NJSIAA should have done long ago, fire Alan Maloney!

Patrick Duff