A Florida Atlantic University student claims that he was turned away by the school's library because he looks and acts like a woman.
The student, Abdul Asquith, says that he needed to check out a laptop for school work on Wednesday. But, he says, the librarian turned him down because his student ID says he's a male, but that he "sounds, looks, and acts" like a girl.
Asquithm who is gay, says he does at times wear clothing that could be identified for woman. But at the time he was trying to check out the laptop, he was wearing a FAU hoodie. He was also wearing shorts, and had his hair pulled back.
"It looks just like me. I identify with my ID I wasn't there dressed up," he told WPTV. "I didn't have a dress on. I wasn't dressed in character."
Asquith claims that the campus librarian took a look at him, and then the ID, and then refused to give him a laptop.
"She looked at the ID and looked down at it. She said, 'You sound, look and act like a girl and in this ID is a man, therefore I'm not giving you a laptop,' " he said.
Asquith's friend, Samantha Lemessy, witnessed the whole thing go down, and is asking FAU to apologize to her friend.
"Because he acts a certain way, he can't possibly be this? It shouldn't even be like that," she told WPTV.
Asquith eventually got the laptop he needed, but not before having to go to three different librarians to finally get cleared for it.
For now, he is in contact with the school's diversity council. But neither FAU nor the library has yet to comment on the incident.
Asquith, who said he is distraught over what happened, says he plans to continue speaking out against the way he was treated.
"If I don't speak out, who's going to speak out? People need to start speaking out and addressing this every time this happens," he said.
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