Parents demand principal be fired after posting about lynching on Facebook

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Parents at a Florida school are calling for the principal to be fired after making racist posts on Facebook.

Principal Kimberly Stidham of Duval Charter School is currently on leave after making the Facebook posts in question. Particularly concerning to parents were lyrics from the country song “Beer for my Horses,” in which lynching is mentioned: “Take all of the rope in Texas, find a tall Oak tree, round up all of them bad boys, hang them high in the street for all the people to see that.”

“She’s a principal, she should know better and she should do better,” one parent told Action News Jax. “I’m speaking out because I’m hoping to bring awareness to other parents. Not just minority parents, but parents who have their child there in general.”

— Public schools grappling with Confederate names, images — 

“Everything I saw kind of had an anti-black sentiment to it,” she said. “It definitely left me thinking, that um, if not hatred, that she at least had some severe prejudice against minorities, against black people.”

Stidham has since issued a statement in response: “I am absolutely devastated that my personal political views were perceived to be racist in any way. I am a firm believer in equality, justice and respect for all individuals and I recognize now that some of my posts could have been misunderstood.  I appreciate the fact that those who were offended brought this to my attention so that I could rectify the situation. I encourage anyone who has any concerns about this to come to me directly so that we can discuss it further.”