Tennessee vice principal placed on leave after blaming girls for dress code policy: report

The assistant principal of a Tennessee high school was placed on administrative leave Wednesday after a video of him blaming female students for a dress code policy that prohibits athletic shorts went viral.

In a video produced by journalism students and posted to the Soddy-Daisy High School YouTube page, Jared Hensley, the vice principal and athletic director, said "girls ruin everything" while explaing the athletic shorts ban, the Chattanooga Times Free Press reported.

"If you really want someone to blame, blame the girls,” Hensley said. “Because they pretty much ruin everything. They ruin the dress code, they ruin...well, ask Adam. Look at Eve. That's really all you really gotta get to, OK. You can really go back to the beginning of time. So, it'll be like that the rest of your life. Get used to it, keep your mouth shut, suck it up [and] follow the rules."

The video angered many parents and has since been taken down from the school's YouTube page along with every other video posted to it, WTVC reported.

Hensley’s comments brought rebuke from school officials.

"We find the comments about young women in this video inexcusable, as the sentiments expressed do not align with the values of Hamilton County Schools,” Superintendent Bryan Johnson said in a statement. “The situation is under investigation, and this employee has been placed on administrative leave effective immediately.

Fox News reached out to Hensley early Thursday and did not immediately receive comment.

Johnson added that the district holds “employees and our leaders to a high standard, and these comments do not match the high expectations we have for our employees.”

The Chattanooga Moms for Social Justice, an activist group, shared the video in hopes to bring attention to Hensley’s comments.

"I have no doubt that Mr. Hensley will claim he was joking," said Taylor Lyons, one of the co-founders of the group. "However, given the current social climate, his comments are insensitive at best and wildly inappropriate at worst. To suggest that 'girls are responsible for ruining everything since the beginning of time and will continue to do so' is completely unacceptable and he needs to apologize."

Others said they were “disgusted” and “flabbergasted when they saw the video, the newspaper reported.

Hensley wasn’t without his defenders.

"There's a lot going on right now to be worried about this in Soddy-Daisy,” said Rhonda Thurman, a Soddy-Daisy school board representative. “I'm having a real hard time getting upset about this. I'm not worried about that right now. He meant absolutely no harm by this.”