The Natural Hair Community Dragged Me | How do I feel 3 years later?

The Natural Hair Community Dragged Me - please read the description box!
This was off-the-cuff and I left out one or two important points.

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Hair-lo precious person,

I'm going to need you to watch this in FULL and pause to read the text. I don't usually talk about things like this but Mayowa's recent video on the topic and the discussion it sparked inspired me. A few years ago the natural hair community dragged me under this video, which was shared by Healthy Hair Journey on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/p/Bji2pMrHJ_a/

Mayowa's account was harrowing to listen to and the comments were blatantly texturist - you can hear them talk about it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7HorvdXLVP4
They also make content about queerness and colourism that's worth checking out. They did not at all deserve that and for this space to truly be the progressive transformative space it claims to be, we do have a great idea of interrogation and unlearning to do.

The natural hair community dragged me too but my story is slightly different from theirs. While some of my comments were blatantly texturist, others were likely, in hindsight, simply critique. The community could of course be a wee bit less unkind, however (who am I kidding, it's toxic af). I used to view wearing my hair in a minimalistic way as a sign of pride in my texture (and I still do). That meant that when people didn't like my fuss free almost bohemian-esque styles, it felt like they were dissing my texture.

In reading Emma Dabiri's book and learning more about how West African beauty ideals differ from European ones, I realised that there's something slightly European (albeit subversive and radical af) about the way I wear my hair. According to Emma, in the 1800s, the Romanticism movement shaped the kind of carefree natural effortless beauty ideal many of us still value today. African hairstyling, on the other hand, broadly speaking is not generally done with 'effortlessness' in mind. There's a Yoruba proverb that captures this: "A woman's plaited hair is her beauty". While I love and embrace my texture, I don't really mould it or style it in the traditional sense. For me, there are two main reasons for this. Firstly, I've learnt that through minimalistic handling, I'm able to retain length and this is something I want. Secondly, I love the carefree look and I use patience and gentleness with my hair as a way to practise being patient and gentle with myself. That said, my understanding is that from a West African perspective, beauty comes from the intricate styles that the hair can be moulded into, and not just how it looks on its own. It follows that on the multiple occasions (Black) people have criticised my hair for not being "done", they may well have been channeling an ideal that pre-dates colonialism.

That's not to say texturism does not exist. Of course it does and it's frighteningly prevalent in our own natural hair community and throughout the African diaspora. I know that my aesthetic would be more readily accepted on a platform like Healthy Hair Journey if my texture were looser and my hair were shinier. They would definitely would not call it 'dry' when it was damp with leave-in in it. There's a double standard. This is also why it's subversive af to sport 4C hair, with the same laissez-faire attitude as someone with a looser texture, and take up all the space. It's still a reclamation of my texture. It's still valid... but so are perfectly coiffed hairstyles.

Nigel did not edit this video, as you can likely tell 🤣

The beauties behind me are: Kimmaytube, West African Baby, yours truly, Protective Princess, Nappy Headed Jojoba, StarPuppy, Indigenous Strandz and Green Beauty.

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