You know how the old internet meme/adage goes: Haters gonna hate!
Last week, the Facebook page for the Naturalista Cosmetics line was overrun by racists. They posted disgusting comments and racist videos in an effort to derail and denigrate the owner, Padrica Norfleet. What happened next is where it gets interesting.
I initially read about this over at Black Girl with Long Hair and decided to check out the page and show some support. I didn't find the racist posts, but I did find an overwhelming amount of support from what seemed like an army of people of various races, including Caucasians.
As a natural, I've come under my fair share of "haters" who have nothing better to do but talk about my natural hair. That's okay. They are offended by my choice and I'm glad that they are. I will not apologize for my hair, and by extension, my blackness. For the most part, it's been nothing but support from people of all races in my own natural hair journey. While society has made strides in learning to accept natural hair as a fact of life that we don't have to deny or hide, there are some people that are obviously threatened.
I thought I knew a little something about hair until I got my hair braided into a simple chignon last weekend. My stylist was bragging about how she put in a 28 piece weave earlier that day, and a 27 piece weave the day before.
"WTF is a 28 piece weave? Does it resemble chicken nugget specials?" I thought to myself.
I just kept saying "uh hmm" as she braided because I was trying to get through her Nicki Minaj ring tones and the yelling at her kids named "Sharpie" "Sha Sha" and some other shit.
Later that night, after I greased the shit out of my throbbing edges, but was quite pleased at the facelift I got because my braids were so damn tight, I googled "28 piece weave" and was flooded with information. How did I not know?28 pieces weaves are the latest thing going since, weave tracks.
Better than putting money down on some property.
I was absolutely fascinated and simultaneously puzzled at the weave industry that black people have so little a financial stake or profit.
Weaves have evolved like KFC wannabe chicken. Just like the genetically altered poultry, the chickens have gotten bigger, and the process of growing them have gotten more sophisticated, but the end result is disaster. Just like you don't have any chicken, you don't have any more hair.
Like the fake KFC chicken, weaves are made to generate money, though not created for proper body maintenance. Cooked up in a Korean and Chinese labs with synthetic materials and pasted on our heads with scalp searing glues, the resemblance of 28 piece weave and a chicken is quite uncanning.
Can someone please explain why we leave weaves in our hair until the whole office can smell the rank order of unwashed scalp, sweat and caked on hair products seeping through?
Ugh.
Okay, and one more thing. The black tar glue plastered onto the head with the cap. Gross.
For those of you who are as uninformed as I am. I dropped a video for you. Why are we more versed in weaves than in let's say, saving money. Nice moustache chica.
I know I'm a little late, but I wanted to add to this.
You know, going natural has not always been easy. It was very hard in the beginning. It was difficult, not to deal with other people because that was the easy part, but to deal with myself. I did not realize how many years of mental conditioning I'd experienced until I went fully natural back in 2008. It was a process for me to learn to say, "I love my hair" and truly feel it.
I finally decided to see what everyone was talking about yesterday, and the hype is well deserved. I don't know why it brought tears to my eyes really. After all, it's just a Muppet. But there was so much joy in the little girl's voice, and there was so much to rejoice over.
It was such an unusual show of self-love directed at young black girls. Most of what we heard growing up was the usual message about how our hair was bad, or too difficult, in need of taming. I don't ever recall anyone, not even myself, saying, "I love your hair" or "I love my hair."
It brought tears to my eyes because clearly there is some kind of shifting toward the right direction and our children will benefit from that. I'm hopeful.
Show this to your nieces, daughters, cousins, sisters, grown and old. The lie that our hair is this "one trick pony" that can only do a certain thing has always been bullshit. We need to get to a collective point where we all can say without a doubt that we love our hair.
I have always found American Apparel to be ultra trashy clothing. I haven't even been able to buy a single piece just because whenever I got to the website, I feel like I'm actually surfing the web for porn; and, I'm assaulted by emaciated looking women; women who look like they've just done a line in the bathroom, or drugged with Rohypnol.
Now American Apparel is no stranger to controversy. It usually stems from their trashy images, but this time they are in some hot water for being materialistic douche bags. What I found most interesting about the post was this:
Another former AA manager says that she received the following instructions as to what kind of black girls she should try to hire during the company's open calls:
"none of the trashy kind that come in, we don't want that. we're not trying to sell our clothes to them. try to find some of these classy black girls, with nice hair, you know?"
i will remember that forever, especially the "nice hair" part. he was instructing another manager and i on who to look for during an upcoming open call, and i sat there dumbfounded, listening to him speak while the other manager made "uh huh, got it" sounds on her end of the phone. the other manager on the call with me later became a district manager, and at one point instructed me to tell two of my employees (both of whom happened to be black females) to stop straightening their hair. i refused to do this, but wondered if the mentality behind her request was related to what dov had said.
If you're asking yourself if they asked them to stop straightening their hair (and most likely go and stay natural), don't You read that correctly.
I am not surprised by this. American Apparel's CEO Dov Charney is a little pervert who is living out his teenage revenge fantasies to screw impressionable, and quite thirsty, chicks who want to model. I'm also not surprised that a fashion establishment has an issue with black consumers. We know the game. What I am totally surprised at is the possible implication, for once in all my 28 years of life, that natural hair is nice hair...
You know what I'd like to know? I'd like to know who in the hell made up the rule about women shaving under their armpits. Who made up that rule? Who was the person that first did it, and signed it into law. Was it the same person who decided that shaving the pubic area, and giving it the Kojak look was the way to go? Seriously, I'd really like to know. Personally, I think the only reason to "go bald" is if you have a receding hairline like Wayne Brady. But err, it's not like anyone sees under your arms, nor your pubes.
Chances are, most of the women reading this will say that the woman in the clip above is nasty for not shaving under her arms. I'm pretty sure some of the guys will feel the same way as well. Interestingly though, none of the men will ever admit to not having sex with a woman because she was too hairy. For real though, what man do you know would turn down an opportunity to have sex with a woman because he found Dr. J's fro under her arms. I know I wouldn't.
And speaking of too hairy: if its nasty and unattractive for a woman not to shave, how many women would be accepting of a man choosing to shave his pubes or keep his pubic area completely shaven? Ok, so I'm not a woman, but if I were, having sex or seeing a man look like an 8yr old with a very big penis would be a turnoff? Dammit, you're supposed to have hair down there. Personally, I find the woman in the clip above attractive. But hey, that's just me. Yes, I have a thing for hairy women. Now, when you're talking about the hair on her legs poking out of a pair of tube socks, umm, that's a little too much.
Apparently some of the people who saw the video above felt the need to comment and contact this woman (on YouTube) with their displeasure. In the next clip she justifies why she doesn't shave. You know what? I'm kinda feeling her in her response. It has to be liberating to do or go against societal standards of beauty. You know, kinda like the Afro being a symbol of rebellion or Black Power back in the day? The only thing that bugs me about her is that she has this long ass weave on her head and her underarms are unshaven. I mean, I could be wrong, but if you have an afro under your arms, why in the world do you have a weave?
So do women shave because, well, some guy said it was nasty? Or do they shave because some woman decided that it was what's best? Somebody lemme know please. Because if there really is no medical benefit to shaving your armpits and pubic area, isn't it, well, kinda dumb?You know, kinda sorta like buying clothes for your pets? India Arie had a song a while back where she said "I am not my hair." Women, Black women in particular took to this as a song of female empowerment. I thought it as pretty cool at the time. But did they ever stop to think of which hair the woman was singing about?
“He who warned uh, the British that they weren't gonna be takin' away our arms, uh by ringing those bells, and um, makin' sure as he's riding his horse through town to send those warning shots and bells that we were going to be sure and we were going to be free, and we were going to be armed.” -- Sarah Palin on Paul Revere
