To illustrate why Jada is winning all the points with me:

"They question why I would LET Willow cut her hair. First the LET must be challenged. This is a world where women, girls, are constantly reminded that they do not belong to themselves; that their bodies are not their own, nor their power of self-determination. I made a promise to endow my little girl with the power to know that her body, spirit, and mind are HER domain. Willow cut her hair because her beauty, her value, her worth is not measured by the length of her hair. It's also a statement that says that even little girls have the RIGHT to own themselves and should not be a slave to even their mother's deepest insecurities, hopes, and desires. Even little girls should not be a slave to the preconceived ideas of what a culture believes a little girl should be."

--Jada Pinkett-Smith

(via Lavender Labia)

I wanna play in his hair...

Reblogged from Fuck Yeah Curls Curls Curls

Obsession with the haircut is still strong, in case y'all were wondering

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18° 15' N, 77° 30' W

This girl with the haircut I want AGAINNNN

Reblogged from Fuck Yeah Curls Curls Curls

Another picture of the haircut I'm drooling over

Reblogged from 18° 15' N, 77° 30' W

I Skyped with my mother for over an hour today

after talking on the phone with her for almost an hour and then talking on the phone with her again for about half an hour afterwards. The purpose of our video chat was so that I could see her newly shaved head, so as to be able to weigh in on the topic of whether she should wear her bald head to work when school starts again in September or hide under hot ass wigs for the next two years or so until her hair grows back to a length similar to what it was before. 

As soon as the video connected, a smile slowly spread across my whole face. One of those genuine full smiles that I try not to do in pictures because I don't like the way it makes my face look. 

My mom: What?

Me: I think you're beautiful.

My mom: Stop lying.

Me: No, I'm serious. I think it looks great.

This is about how much hair is on my mom's head right now. It's salt-and-pepper, but mostly salt. She's "...getting used to" it. I feel like I'm finally seeing her for the first time, and I love what I see. I love the unencumbered view of her face; it says "this is me. This is all I am and all I have for you." It is vulnerability and beauty all wrapped up into one. 

Maybe I'm romanticizing it. This isn't happening to me. It is, however, making me remember how wonderful it was to feel like I was seeing myself for the first time when I went natural. It's making me revisit the idea of getting a (fairly drastic) haircut. 

I am intrigued by tapered fros, a la:

My mom and Choosing Pancakes love it. KS doesn't think I could pull it off. EY is hesitant to say maybe. What say you?  

To anyone who has ever criticized a Black woman for caring too much about her hair

Have you all gathered here? Do I have your attention? Okay, then let me direct it to the comments that I wish I couldn't believe that people are making about 16-year-old Olympics Gold Medal winner Gabby Douglas's hair. 


Actually, before I do that, let me reiterate: this little girl is sixteen. She's from Virginia Beach and left home at the age of 14 to live with a foster family in IOWA, of all places, so that she could train with top-tier gymnasts. She's one of the five gymnasts on the US Women's Gymnastics Team to just win a gold medal for our country. I have complete confidence that none of you will ever do anything this badass in your lives, so please, enlighten me, how you have the audacity to watch this little girl spin and fly through the air like it's easy and then criticize her HAIR?

on another note, gabby douglas gotta do something with this hair! these clips and this brown gel residue aint it!
— C. Renée (@misDOScentavos) July 27, 2012

People are talking about her "beady beads" (the tiny curls at the nape of her neck), about her "needing a perm," asking why her parents couldn't have gotten her micros or box braid extensions...


This little girl just represented our country in what I understand is, to most people in the world, this epic global battle and KILLED it. She is actually on top of the world. But none of that matters to people who not as an Olympian, not as a gymnast, not as a young woman, not even as a young Black woman, but as hair that must be representative of something (everything) else. The fact that she just landed perfectly from that routine (which could be replaced with any other accomplishment imaginable, let alone one that requires idk, intense physical activity) is irrelevant when weighed against a tiny curl being out of place.


This is what Black women are up against in daily existence. This is why relaxers as a multi-billion dollar Black female consumer market make sense. This is why going natural is a radical act of self-love and societal defiance. This is white patriarchal oppression to the highest--it has done its job so well that we've taken over the responsibility without even realizing it. 


Now, all you critics who are reading these, I would like you to join with me in a gesture of understanding what you have done wrong. Please raise your right hand so that it is about even with your ear. Repeat after me, "I, [name], am ridiculous for perpetuating the idea that Gabby Douglas is her hair and nothing more, and ridiculous further for projecting any sort of meaning onto her hair in the first place." Now, please move your hand rapidly to the left so that it may make stinging contact with your cheek. 


#Imdone

My mother, who recently shaved her head after one too many bouts of crying while throwing out the strands and strands of her post-chemotherapy hair that came out in the comb every day, to me on the phone yesterday:

I have to admit, My, I felt like you. It was so nice to go out in the rain and not have to worry about my hair. 

She also recently sported her nearly bald head in a Wawa, instead of wearing her bandana or a wig. She said people were staring at her, and it was hard, but I could barely hear that over the sound of my swelling pride.

Whyyyyyyyyyyy are these sold out?!

Check back here periodically to see when they're back in stock.

I cannot express how much I love this

Reblogged from La Belle Vita

Dreadlust:

Reblogged from It's a Go on the Fro

I wish I could have been a part of this all the time.

We're fighting the same fight, but it seems so...diluted. My opponents are invisible, as is my army. My artillery is made of scholarship, of words, numbers, and history, whereas theirs was physical, involving bodies, marches, and when the occasion called for it, guns. I want the feeling that my militancy is part of something larger.

But I digress. 

Kathleen Cleaver of the Black Panter Party answers the ubiquitous question of "why" Black people wear their hair naturally:

"I got 99 problems, but a perm ain't one!"

I'm kind of in love with the "Shit __________ Say" videos, and this is definitely among my favorites. I'm familiar with SOOOOOO many of these struggles, haha.

Natural Hair as a Statement

Lyrna, Vogue.It contributor and Editor of Lurve Magazine, in an interview with Natural Belle

One of the questions I get asked most often about my hair (after how do I get it to curl like that, to which I always have to answer, sorry, honey, that's just my curl pattern) is whether I feel like I'm making some kind of statement by wearing my hair in its natural state. At first this question used to offend me. Like, damn, can't a sista do something for her damn self without everyone trying to attach some larger meaning to it? (Side note: I now understand why my friends with tattoos sometimes get mad when people ask what the tats "mean," which I myself am guilty of. Oops. #gottadobetter) 


So once upon a time, I would have cosigned Lyrna's statement. I still appreciate the sentiment, but in the time between when I first embraced my natural texture and now, I've come to realize that every. little. fucking. thing. in our lives is political. Feminism said it first, but there's absolutely no separating the personal from the political. In my humble opinion, there is very little (if anything) I can do as a Black woman that isn't making some sort of statement in the face of a larger society that still actively tries to stereotype us in every imaginable way. No matter who we are, what social categories we fall in, or what exact boxes other people try to shove us in, choosing to be fully and openly ourselves rather than bending and squishing and silencing ourselves to fit whatever is "in" in the moment is making a statement. We pick our clothes, accessories, and hairstyles for a reason, even if that reason is just I like this/think I look good with this; as Facebook has taught us, "liking" something can be an incredibly powerful social tool. 

But I like imagining a world in which we don't have to see our choices as political, a world where style is just style for everyone, regardless of race, gender, sexuality, etc. That would mean that we as members of the human race have come to see all social categories as capable of all the variation imaginable, and that choosing to do things that run counter to dominant society would no longer be stigmatized. Being free to understand our choices simply as choices would require the end of marginalization, fetishization, and the questioning of authenticity. And what a beautiful world that would be. 

But until then, yes, my hair is a statement. So is my style, the music I like, the way I carry myself, my vocabulary, and basically every other stylized choice I make. The statement I'm making? Bitch, who gon check me?! Here I am fucking up your schemas. Deal with it.    

Gorgeous:

Reblogged from 18° 15' N, 77° 30' W

A conversation with my little brother:

who is 16, after he learned my Twitter handle:
 

W: Your Twitter name is @SuchanAFROholic?!?

Me: Yeah...so it matches my blog.

W: You have a BLOG?! My sister is a ...blogger?

Me: Yup! It'll be my two year blogging anniversary next week! 

W: *looks at me quizzically* You've changed a lot since you started wearing your hair like that. (By "like that" he means in its 3c/4a kinky-curly natural texture, rather than fighting losing battles with flat irons and humidity on the daily.)

Me: This is me. I just finally started letting it show. 

In my next life

I want dreds. Everything about this woman is ON. POINT.

Reblogged from As far as i'm concerned...

 

All I want for Christmas is a fro this gorgeous:

But my mommy got me lots of hair accessories and a new detangling comb! So I'll def be working what I've got!

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Hairspiration

Reblogged from As far as i'm concerned...

Reblogged from Fuck Yeah Curls Curls Curls

Reblogged from 18° 15' N, 77° 30' W

It rained today

and not one fuck was given. I <3 my kinky-curly hair.