So, I've been wondering, why are people so bothered by naturally curly hair and why do they want people to like basically stop embracing their God given hair?
Today, I stepped into the nurse's office at school and one of my teachers (well, she doesn't teach me anymore) was on the hospital bed thingy their and the nurse for like the elementary school was beside her. I was with the nurse whose office that was (the secondary nurse). So, my "ex"-teacher was like, "why's your hair like this? It's pretty messy. You're graduating soon that may be why 'cause you don't normally wear your hair like this." So, yeah, my hair was a lil bit messy 'cause i didn't really bother with it yesterday and today (cramps yesterday, headache all day today). I wasn't upset about the teacher's remark, but what came next from the elementary nurse. She was like, "and her hair is natural. I don't know why she doesn't want to relax it." I was then asked by the other nurse, "when are you going to relax your hair," and I was like, "never," she was like, "so, how long are you planning on staying natural," I was like, "till I die." The other nurse was like, "you should put some relaxer on your hair."
I happened to have an old picture of me with me and the teacher was looking at it, she gave it to the elementary nurse and she was like, "your hair's different here. It looks different," and I was like, "'cause it was relaxed in that picture," and she was like, "why don't you just put a little relaxer in your hair now," and I was like, "I'm not going to." I was getting rather pissed at this point, but I didn't let it show. I'm like, "what's the fuss?"
A girl in my set (last year of high school) was sitting at the nurse's table and was like, "there's something you can use instead of a relaxer to get your hair straight. It's called a Brazilian keratin treatment." My reply was straight on, "I'm not going to get a keratin treatment."
The teacher then asked me what I was planning to do with my hair for my graduation. What I like about her was that she was ready to accept my choice here. I told her that i was planning on threading my hair to stretch it out then I'll figure out some way to style it. She was cool with that. Thought it was a good idea. Then out of curiousity, she asked why I was so against changing my texture and I told her that my hair was really long when I was younger, I got it relaxed and then it broke to nape length and remained that short. She noticed that my hair was longer than that now so she had this, "'hen it's a good idea you stopped getting relaxers' attitude (God, bless that woman).
I'm sick and tired of having people make a fuss about my natural texture and getting it straight. Some people if dare to right out assume and say, "YOU CAN'T COMB YOUR HAIR!" and I'm like, "what the heck, I can't get a comb through my hair, why would you just say that I can't?" (actually, I don't say heck when I'm usually talking because I don't know how people take it around here). People would be like, "I don't want hair like yours, it's too thick and curly," and I'm like, "I never asked you if you wanted hair like mine."
Back here, people seem to hate their natural textures. Ever since the introduction of relaxers. People watch those ads. with long flowy hair or they want as some BLACK woman stupidly put it, "the WHITE girl flow." Many people want to be who they're not. Okay! So, people may say it's easier for me - I'm mixed race. I have the tightest curls in my family (well, apart from my dad (black)) and if you've been following my blog, you'll know that my curls have been getting tighter and tighter over the past few months (about a year or more now). People would go, "but your hair's soft so you can afford to be natural," and I'm like, "my hair isn't normally like this. Proper care is what got it to this state." my mum says that the main thing that pushed her to go natural was that many people hated and were against naturally curly and kinky hair here and she wondered why. Okay! so, my mum hated her curls and that's why she started relaxing her hair years ago, but hey God gave us this hair so why should we hate it? I am so proud of my mum right now she's growing out her hair and yes, she's tempted to get a relaxer, but she's more of in a "cut off all the straight parts or relax" position. However, she can't stand to have what she'll call short hair, but others might call medium length (she gets some pretty powerful shrinkage like I do, by the way). She's at BSL (or below it now, haven't done a new length check for her *we add in her relaxed ends when checking the length of her hair, by the way). Some people have been like, "we see you're going natural," and then they go on about how they can't dare do it and my mum starts to tell them that they can and encourage them heck, she refers to my blog and she's gotten me a queue of people waiting for hair care tips and advice (that reminds me, I've got to get to that).
If people get tattoos or piercings, some people'll be like, "why are you destroying the body God gave you?" People quote, "you are wonderfully and beautifully made," they say, "God made us perfect" et cetera, so why can't many of those people accept their natural textures? They go, "it's too nappy, too kinky, I can't comb it, it doesn't look good," UMMM......weren't you made perfect and beautiful, why d'you want to change something God made perfect?
You get my drift here right?
(Oh my days, I used the word 'drift' in this context! Like, I never do that!)
What are your views on this topic?
p.s My brother flew down here (got here today) and I was like staring at his hair. I L.O.V.E his curls. Oh! and guess what? He finally decided to use a sulfate-free shampoo (one of mine) he still doesn't use a conditioner and his excuse is (and he said it today), "i'm not a girl, I'm a guy, I don't need conditioner." He'll eventually get around to using conditioners (I am rather convincing in a subtle way) :)
