ya damn right, what she said.

the NY Times recently ran a piece discussing black women and hair, ostensibly attempting to break down why black women choose to either relax our hair or wear it without chemicals. one of my favorite bloggers at What Tami Said broke this article down like a raggedy lawn chair.

i am really starting to go from ambivalence to annoyance at all the discussion about black hair. when i read some articles discussing it, i keep getting that queasy feeling i had in high school when my english teacher, an older white man who'd never been inside a black church, decided to demonstrate for our class what being inside black churches was like. started off okay, and then veered off into a show of him mocking what he didn't understand, with my classmates happily playing along in the call and response.

and i sat there, the only black kid in the room, shocked and pissed.

i just had a conversation earlier this week with the Mister about black women and hair. he made comments similar to those in the NY Times article, about how all women are constantly changing their hair by getting perms, changing the color, or cutting it. i tried to explain to him that when you live in a society that tells you the hair that grows out of your hair is ugly just because it's not straight, the need and desire to conform to that standard weighs much more heavily than the desire a white woman may have to go from blond hair to red or to get a haircut.

there are plenty of black women who decide to stop relaxing their hair that describe the same feelings: relief. self-acceptance.

and there are plenty of women who relax their hair and feel the same damn way.

i just want to get to the point where we aren't constantly forced to talk about it!!

can't the hair on my head be just that, instead of the dumping ground for others' issues, demand, insecurities, and judgment?