The teacher, who was under investigation after a viral TikTok video showed his students taking his braids out during class, is now speaking out. Marquise White says he’s facing so many attacks because he’s good-looking.

“I firmly believe that I was attacked, and let me add this in here, mainly attacked by my own community. I was mainly attacked by my own community for the most part. Anyway, I firmly believe that I was attacked because I’m a young, handsome, Black man.”

In the social post, White shared a video of white students bedazzling their white male teacher’s head and wondered why that teacher wasn’t being “executed” like he was.

White continued his explanation about his good looks. He said, “People who watched this video and thought anything weird, or anything suggestive, saw me, was attracted to me. I got tattoos, I got an attractive energy, [an] attractive aura, you can sense that through the video. And, since you can sense that attractiveness, or sense you are attracted to me, you projected your own thoughts, ideologies, traumas, and experiences, onto me and my children. And that is a hill I’m willing to die on 1000% of the time.”

It’s being reported that teachers must adhere to “personal boundaries by maintaining proper space,” and “demonstrate appropriate behaviors,” per the school district’s code of conduct. Also, teachers are asked not to record student faces and voices unless teaching in a performing arts or career technology class. White claimed that his students’ parents approved of his TikToks.

White still works as a teacher at Prince George’s Schools; however, he’s been reassigned out of the classroom pending the outcome of the investigation.