People are really trying to come at me about my hair! I have never been so upset in a conversation about hair...
An acquaintance ( not even considering her a friend) of mine and two of my close friends and I started talking about hair. This conversation comes up all the time between women but when you're the only natural in the room you feel like you're about to be cornered.
This acquaintance asked me my reasoning behind going natural (I'll get to that later). I let her know and it seemed like she was very derogatory toward natural, as if she was expecting me to start attacking people with relaxed hair. Of course I wasn't going to do that but she doesn't know me that well.
The reason why I got so upset was because she told tell me that I wasn't really naturally or more or less that I was a hypocrite because I still straighten and dye my hair.
Let me just give the breakdown on how I feel about hair. Hair is hair. If I want to straighten my natural hair it is a completely different concept than using chemicals to permanently alter the state of my hair. And that's what it is, a state, as in when I wet it, it goes right back to being curly. Relaxed hair doesn't do that, plain and simple. Relaxed hair has been chemically altered and if you want curly hair you have to curl it with heat or some other method. I do not permanently alter my hair.
Yes, I dyed my hair. Does that make me a hypocrite or does that just make me someone who likes to experiment with different looks? People take hair so seriously when in reality it shouldn't be given that much value.
I know that natural hair is not always acceptable but people walking around with their relaxed hair broken off or their tracks sticking out of their heads are acceptable? Its okay if you hair looks like crispy straw, as long as you got that perm, girl! Are you kidding me?
This is my last point and I'm going to try to leave this topic alone...for a while.
Why do we feel the need to be someone that we are not? I say we because I was once relaxed. I went natural because I just started to question why I even needed a relaxer. Was it because that was what was done to my hair since childhood? That's no excuse. For me, there was no legitimate reason why I needed to relax my hair. No matter how much I did it I wasn't going to look European, I was still going to get made fun of by the white kids I went to school with, but it was okay because my hair wasn't "nappy"? I literally got my scalped BURNED so that I could look "presentable", yet I was still the laughing stock of my peers.
Is it really worth it? No matter how you wear your hair, there are people who will degrade you and insult you and tell you that you're not good enough. Why can't we just lift each other up? Why don't black mothers and fathers tell their daughters that they're beautiful just the way they are?
We live in a really messed up society and we, as African-Americans, have really got to start lifting each other up or else we will continue down this self-destructive road of ignorance and self-depreciation. I'm breaking this cylce.
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