Calling me the N-word will only make me think you’re astonishingly ignorant, but nothing can compare to someone saying something cruel about my hair.
My hair is my baby, and it’s a huge part of my culture. When someone says something so deranged about my hair, it makes me think they are chronically insane.
As a mixed-race person, my hair can change from an afro to curls, braids, and twists. As a creative person, I try to do my hair myself and I feel proud of what I do with it. But, when people comment on it negatively it just wrecks all my self-worth.
I’ve been called a lot of things, including fried ramen noodles, cotton ball hair, and nappy hair [n word]. But that’s only the tip of the iceberg regarding what people have said about me.
For context, nappy is a way of saying tangled for Black people, but not all black people have this type of hair; only a small subsection of Black people qualify for this. As a mixed guy, my hair is nowhere near to having nappy hair. But saying that to anyone, even if they do have nappy hair, is extremely racist.
It’s my hair, and even if it’s nappy, who gives you the right to say anything about it?
While the movement “Black is Beautiful” is a huge part of Black culture, I never really felt that my hair was beautiful. People’s comments about my hair hurt me so much that I felt disconnected from my culture. My afro was my pride and joy, and it symbolized how my people came together through the struggling times and empowered each other.
“The Afro hairstyle signified a return to Black roots and demonstrated the ethos of the ‘Black is Beautiful’ movement,’” the National Museum of African American History & Culture said.
Cornrow braids are a huge thing for Black people, but it’s far more than just a hairstyle. During slavery, Black people would map out escape routes on people’s heads with braids allowing people to flee from their masters and start anew.
For the last couple of centuries, Black people’s hair has been seen as a bad thing, and people have been forced to assimilate to white culture, which caused them to chemically demolish their hair to just get jobs. But the Creating a Respectful and Open World for Natural Hair (CROWN) Act of 2019 gave people of color the right to wear their hair however they wanted without being discriminated against.
Hair has so much cultural significance, such as displaying tribe statues, religion, heritage, and so many more things. For me, hair is a way to relieve stress and express my creative side. My hair is a way to bring my creative vision to life.
I take time doing my hair, and I try hard to make it look good, and for someone to say something so malicious, I wouldn’t even wish it on my most abhorred enemy. It makes me wish I wasn’t Black.
I thought if I had no hair, I could avoid the comments, and it worked, but cutting off my hair was like removing the mane off of a lion. It just isn’t right. I have gotten a buzz cut so many times throughout my life just because I felt so uncomfortable and unwelcomed because of my hair. And a week right after I cut my hair, I regretted doing it so much. I want people to do whatever they want with their hair.
People say hair holds memories, and it’s so true. Every time I see my hair, I think about all the things I’ve gone through, and it just reminds me that being Black isn’t something I should be ashamed of. My hair is my life, my culture, my soul, and letting someone steal that ray of sunshine from me won’t ever happen again. I wish for all my people who love their hair to let no one make you feel bad for it.
