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I didn't
need
Chris Rock
to tell me the sodium hydroxide used in relaxers could
harm my scalp.
I got my
first perm at 13, and every six weeks for about a dozen
years after, I religiously went for touch-ups. Ouch! The
stinging was so bad that my eyes watered, and days later
my scalp would be dotted with scabs. But my hair — I
say with my best Rock imitation — was silky straight.
And that's all that mattered, right?
Still,
when Rock and a chemist demonstrated in the comedian's
much-talked-about documentary "Good Hair" how
those same chemicals could disintegrate a Coke can, I
was shaken to the core.
I have
been wearing my hair in dreadlocks for nine years now.
At least for me, the 95-minute movie was a reminder that
I will never, ever use a chemical straightener again.
But an
untold number of black women subject themselves to this
process when they relax their tresses — including my
mother, my sister, and many of my closest friends —
for a host of psychological and professional reasons. In
the corporate world, African Americans often get the
message that natural hair is not OK.
Rock's
take on black women and their hair issues was amusing
and in many places enlightening. He and producer/writer
Nelson George
traveled to
Greensboro, N.C.
, to visit Dudley's hair-care company and to
Atlanta
for the famed Bronner Brothers International Hair Show.
He even
went to
India
, where the majority of "remi hair"
(top-quality weave hair) is collected from Hindu temples
during a religious ceremony — a situation with a hefty
dose of irony, no? Here are Indian women giving their
hair away as a form of sacrifice, and black women are
sacrificing thousands of dollars for lace-front wigs and
weaves fashioned from it.
(Speaking
of remi hair,
Terry Briggs
, owner of Jaguar Luxury Beauty Showroom,
West Philadelphia's
home of the affordable lace-front, made two appearances
in the movie.)
Rock was
very forward-thinking in his discussion of the
"business" of hair, but where he dropped the
hot-comb was in his lack of sensitivity. He didn't
address why modern-day black women are still choosing to
change the natural texture of their hair, trying to pass
off yards and yards of Indian hair as their own.
It's not
that I wanted Rock to dwell on the painful history
that's shaped our definition of beauty. We all know how
slavery and discrimination within the black community,
compounded with America's love affair with all women
blond (not to mention skinny), left generations of black
women feeling that their natural kinky, curly, sometimes
dry, most-of-the-time unmanageable hair was deemed
completely unacceptable.
This is,
after all, why the movie shows a 3-year-old getting her
first perm. (That made me shudder, too.)
But I
wanted — no, I needed — black men to take this issue
seriously. Instead, Rock relied on brothers for his
comic relief. He talked to them in barbershops, egging
them on to complain about the burden of paying for their
women's weaves and whine how they can't run their
fingers through women's hair without serious
repercussions. They say they get yelled at, or worse,
their fingers get snagged on the weave's tracks.
The
reality is, however, that most black women pay for their
own hair and continue to straighten what's theirs
because they know it's what men prefer. Clearly, Rock is
aware of this. His wife is a beautiful woman, but Malaak
Compton-Rock's hair is long and straight (who knows how
much of it is really hers?). Can he be held accountable?
(It's worth noting that Rock's daughters — who were
the impetus for the documentary — appeared in the
movie, but his wife didn't.)
It was
the questionable reactions I knew I'd get from men that
gave me the longest pause before ultimately going
natural. But I also realized that although I appreciated
the attention of men, I had to take responsibility. I
couldn't let something so personal — the natural state
of my hair — be dictated by the expectations of men
unknown.
When I
announced I was going to cut off my relaxer so I could
start locks, my loving father teased me, "Honey,
you aren't going to find a man with hair like
that."
Shortly
afterward, a guy I was dating wanted to know if I was
going through a phase. We stopped seeing each other.
Then when
I committed to going natural, I built myself up. I
convinced myself that my hair is beautiful as is, and
that I didn't need chemicals to feel adequate. As a
result, I put myself on a black pedestal where the more
socially conscious natural sisters stood.
Today I
realize that stance was nuts, too. One thing that black
women feel they need and don't have — especially when
it comes to hair — is the freedom to make choices
based on their heart, not societal pressure.
Deciding
to relax or not to relax should be viewed merely as a
choice — like being blond or brunet, curly or
straight, short or long. But until it is, there still
will be little girls who feel they have no choice.
The good
that came out of my "conversion" is that I
learned to accept the hair that God gave me — and it
turns out, I've discovered men who like it, too. I
learned not to force it to do what it won't. And that
took the pressure off, leading me one step closer to
happiness.
This
awareness is what truly stopped my eyes from watering
and healed the scabs.
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