"I'm afraid... It's your hair..."
Imagine being a child and hearing that from your teacher, as she escorts you out of your honors class. Then imagine being removed from honors classes and shoved into regular classes, as if you've done something wrong.
The only crime being that you're a natural hair having, black girl.
The 8-year-old girl had been in class, without problem, for half of the school year and suddenly (in the past 2 weeks) it's affecting the teacher's allergies. She's allergic to the girl's hair... I'm allergic to bullshit. Is this teacher allergic to the hair product, or is she allergic to blackness?
To add insult to injury, the school actually stood behind the teacher, by allowing this to go on and removing the child from her honors classes.
Natural hair tends to offend Caucasian people (not all, but a good portion). I have experienced this first hand time and time again. The stares, the glares, the dirty looks... Even rude comments. It's as if our natural hair is threatening or menacing.
Us embracing our blackness and our natural beauty is threatening to white supremacy and the eurocentric beauty standard/ideal. All throughout the media you see beautiful, black women who are pressing, perming, dying... And trying to be less than black. There aren't a lot of natural hair wearing women shown in media.
Even the commercials are full of black women with long, straight, relaxed hair blowing in the wind. I very rarely see (and it's only recently that I've seen it at all) any commercials of black women with beautiful, natural hair.
Top black movie actresses and entertainers? Straight, relaxed hair... Or wigs and weaves that are long, blonde, straight... No traces of natural hair.
A lot more of us are going natural. This is a beautiful thing... But there are even more of us who are giving into a standard of beauty that we can never meet.
"The relaxer makes white people relax."
To me, this is a sign or gesture meant to show our willingness to assimilate and to conform. It symbolizes us "renouncing our crowns" and rejecting our blackness. It shows how we, too, believe in the eurocentric ideal of beauty.
This 8-year-old little girl has had what is probably her first taste of discrimination and hatred of her blackness. We black women should be up in arms about this and any instance of a little girl being made to feel unpretty for who she is.
The message we are constantly sending to little black girls, is that they are not pretty and they are not good enough. We are not teaching them to value themselves or see that they are beautiful. They are queens! Yet no one tells them nor shows them this.
Some people think that hair isn't a big issue. I argue that it is a big issue. It may not be the largest obstacle we face, but it is an important issue, none-the-less. It is one way that we act out our oppression on ourselves. Sistahs not being able to find the beauty in themselves is a very big issue.
Furthermore, I consider the outward appearance a reflection of what is going on within the person. If I wear blue contacts, dye my hair blonde, try to make my nose thinner, relax my hair... What am I saying to the world about what beauty really is? What am I saying my ideas of beauty are? (Read my blog on natural hair HERE)
My thoughts on the teacher: She should be fired. She needs a job where she doesn’t have to be around people and their “chemicals” (melanin). This doesn’t just need to be “looked into,” as the school said. This needs action. Why would we trust the school to “look into it,” when they’re the ones who allowed this to go on?!
In closing, let me say, kudos to the mother. I have never seen a caucasian and black mixed child that had a caucasian mother who knew the importance of natural hair. So, give thanks for that. That will be one less bit of confusion for the young girl.
Peace, Love and Elevation.
Written by: Genesis/Queen Tiye
4 comments:
I can't believe this foolishness...the oppression continues.
I am so sorry that this happened. However, I am curious why we get upset about these sort of incidents, but continue to let our women be degraded in videos and by our men. For that matter why do we continue to let our men walk around with their pants around their ankles like clowns and don't call them out. We continue to call ourseloves the "N" word and pretend that its okay! If we are to embrace our heritage and our past then lets do it ALL the time..what do you say?
this is crap, yet school kick kids out white and black over their hair color, ect all the time. its not just one sided.. if the teachers focused on teaching instead of classifications of the children i think we'd get ahead.
Have you seen the old vs new nair commercial?
Ads have definitely not changed.
Prime Example:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWdBEya3qu8
notice in the "old ad" the black chick has curly hair and in the new one, she has a wrap...
I get angry every time i see this ad. It insinuates that Natural hair is "old' & "out of date" as well as a thing of the past.
The only ads that have women with natural hair are those geared towards the african american community and that are made by us. White America would much rather that we look like them.
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