Redhead Abuse

If ye have tears, prepare to shed them now for Prince Harry of England and Nicole Kidman, victims of prejudice by an unfeeling society against the ginger-haired.

In Britain, ABC reports a rising tide of discrimination with one family driven from its home by anti-redhead grafitti, vandalism and physical assaults and a waitress awarded $35,000 in a suit for “ginger abuse.”

The U.S. has been spared thus far, possibly because only 2 percent of the population is (pace Clairol) naturally red-headed, while in Scotland and Ireland more than one in ten are subject to ginger-phobia, often expressed by rude remarks from strangers in the streets.

The notion that persons of such color are untrustworthy can been traced as far back as the belief that Judas had red hair.

The plight of carrot tops has not yet resulted in organized resistance, but there has been a revival of interest in the Sherlock Holmes story, “The League of Redheaded Men,” which would now, of course, be “Persons.”

Back here, the American response has been typically defiant--T-shirts with a ketchup bottle labeled “Saucy Redhead.”