New Jersey’s North Plainfield High School football team is alleging that they have been victims of racial taunting by an opposing school. North Plainfield was set to play Summit High School on Saturday, but when they arrived at Summit’s away team locker room, they found a disturbing greeting.
“Right away, there was a banana in the door,” North Plainfield player J. T. Valley told CBS 2. “And we told our coach, we’re like, ‘Coach, there’s a banana in there.’ So we took the banana, and then all of a sudden, they put another one. And we took the banana out, and there was another one in there. And they kept on putting them in there.”
North Plainfield’s football team consists of more than 50% black players, so this, of course, immediately struck a nerve. The coach did his best to calm his players down before the game started, but many players admitted to tearing up when they saw the bananas.
Summit Superintendent Nathan Parker said in a press release that a student admitted he was responsible for the series of bananas, but explained that it was a good luck tradition that keeps teams from peeking in on or overhearing each other through the hole in the door.
“Racism is unacceptable. We do not tolerate it in our schools, on our fields, or in our community.” Parker wrote. “While the nature of this act was misunderstood, the fact that others felt targeted is taken very seriously.”
“You can’t get in the mind of a kid,” North Plainfield assistant superintendent Robert H. Rich told The Huffington Post, later adding that “Summit says there was no malicious intent, or racist intent, but our kids, our players, feel differently.”
The NJSIAA is conducting an investigation into the incident. Both schools have been directed to submit their reports on the incident by this Friday.
[h/t Huffington Post]