OPINION: Dazed and Confused – The Atlanta Voice

The owner of Rocky’s Barbershop, a small black-owned barbershop on Piedmont Road in Buckhead, is confused. Rocky Jones allowed his small barbershop to become the site of a small business panel hosted by two Republican congressmen, Byron Donalds (Florida) and Wesley Hunt (Texas), and Dr. Ben Carson, the former U.S. Secretary of Housing and Urban Development under Trump. And somehow Jones has gone on the record saying he didn’t know it was an event hosted by Trump’s surrogate. He didn’t know it would be political in nature.

Yeah, sure, buddy.

I was there that day, as were over 30 other media members. I’m not sure we would all have crowded inside and outside the barbershop on a hot Wednesday afternoon if it was just “locker room talk.” I was invited by a member of the Trump campaign’s communications team. As a member of the media, I jumped at the chance to cover a black small business owner who was actually openly supporting Trump’s re-election campaign. Only Jones must have been confused about what was going on.

A few days after the panel, the day before the first presidential debate between President Joseph R. Biden and former President Donald J. Trump in Midtown, Jones went on a small media tour to explain his participation in the event. He didn’t realize that hosting the event would result in negative reactions from customers. He didn’t realize that hanging “Blacks for Trump” and “Never Surrender” signs in his barbershop would be interpreted as support for Trump’s campaign. I’m happy to say on record that he didn’t realize that Trump lost the last election in Georgia by just over 12,000 votes and that some of the people who voted against Trump and for Biden were customers of his barbershop.

But don’t cry for Jones. He was financially compensated for the time his barbershop was closed to customers. I saw him leave the barbershop several times before the event began, and each time he saw more and more media at the door. At one point he even said to me, “The Atlanta Voice, huh,” while looking at the logo on my work polo shirt. Jones is no fool. You can’t run a successful business in Atlanta and be ignorant of your surroundings. He knew what was going on, and now seems to regret ever getting involved. He chose a side, if only for a few hours, and apparently the wrong one, at least as far as his business was concerned: cutting hair for black men.

In the black community, hair salons are safe spaces where we can talk about whatever is going on in the world. On Wednesday, Jones set up his business, signs and all, as a safe space for Trump surrogates and supporters. As an American, he had every right to do so. The backlash and the dazed and confused aftermath he is now experiencing are now his own. Trump has moved on.

Editor’s note: This column represents the opinion of the author and not of The Atlanta Voice.

Related