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The other side of privilege: dark skin with "good hair"?

saywhatyouwant

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https://blavity.com/the-other-side-of-hair-privilege-dark-skin-with-good-hair

There were subtle signs throughout my girlhood that taught me just how important my hair was. And sometimes, it felt more important than the other parts of me. That time when I was six years old and decided to cut off a pigtail. It felt good, so I kept clipping. Afterward, I received a spanking that was memory worthy according to my sister. The time a couple made a bet in the mall over whether or not my hair was real or being asked—sometimes not—to touch it. Or the times I was told my hair was "pretty and curly" instead of, " Nia you're pretty." Or the time I won best hair as a superlative in high school because I was the girl that would wake up two hours early just to curl and flatten it.


My hair was my prize. It made me exotic in some instances and a point of fascination for my peers. From experience, people's surprise was how could this girl—a dark skinned girl—grow 3a/3b hair? As you can imagine, I got many questions, including the "what are you mixed with" or "where are you from?" Of course, the answer to any of those questions about my lineage were, "I'm black, mixed with black," but that didn't seem like enough to satisfy the mystery.


And this went past feeling like I needed to consult other black women before any major hair changes (friends, family members, etc.) or bear the burden of answering the questions that felt like an attack on my blackness or be considered "ungrateful." Because my hair was "manageable" and the hair that they dedicated products to, I had nothing to "complain" about because my hair wasn't really "black." I had that privilege, and any positive reinforcement or compliment about the way I looked started with my hair. But none of those women in the commercials looked quite like me. They were lighter, with looser curls. So naturally, as a teen struggling to carve out who I was, I attached a lot of that self-worth to my hair. That was the part people really liked about me, and it helped me like it, and myself, too.


But it was hard to get away from. Before I knew what fetishizing actually meant, " good hair" was a compliment. Male partners would comment about how unique my look was or how they just loved curly hair. After a while, I felt invisible under it. No one could see me under all of this hair. Everything positive I felt about myself, or good, was about the hair on my head, so the "you're pretty for a dark-skinned girl" registered as "your hair is pretty for a dark-skinned girl."


That privilege made me feel isolated during conversations about hair and beauty. It meant I couldn't relate to other women friends and relatives with courser textures because I had that "good hair" that was "easy" to manage. And I understood! Research has certainly shown that there is a hair bias against black women, and a woman with a fro often experienced it most often. The assumption about manageability, rooted in the racial politics of black women's hair meant anything close enough to "whiteness" meant that you have it "easy." But it was also having the privilege of my "good hair," that seemed to make up for my darker complexion—and I internalized the guilt about the extra attention, even if It felt wrong. I was attractive in some circles, not pretty enough in others, and other times, a big question mark. And I did many of the self-hating things to make myself "prettier": staying away from the sun, fighting to remain a certain size and flattening my hair to the point where heat damage was a bit of an understatement. I was trying to force my body and skin to catch up to my hair—the one thing that made me feel accepted, beautiful.


And this is also why I struggled with the idea of pretty privilege early on. There was a reason none of the girls with my texture were as dark as me. Darker skin women still aren't considered palatable or acceptable in media and advertisements. So when you see pieces of yourself represented in ways that were negative/nonexistent and affirming all in the same breath, it's confusing as hell as a young black girl.


I was grateful that the natural hair movement could empower black women to wear their hair as they wanted, but the whirlwind of colorism and hair privilege also impacted the way I felt about my texture. If it didn't look a certain way—frizz-free and mostly flat or coiffed—I grew frustrated. My hair felt separate, a personality all her own that I had to police and gel into submission to maintain the right image of natural beauty.


And I'm still standing, after years of combs, self-esteem and elastic bands broken, trying to start a new relationship with my hair on my terms. The truth is, this hair on my head, that people fetishized and praised, never really felt like mine. And reclaiming that space even on my own head, as many black women know, takes time and is so much more than skin deep.

Thoughts? As a brown skinned 4c/b girl I can kinda see where she's coming from. In my family most of us have had long, manageable hair, and if nothing else, it was thick with edges and all. So even though I don't have "good" hair, I definitely get comments relating to how my typical afro doesn't seem to behave so typically. I still get asked why it's soft and how I manage to get it so smooth when I bun it.

BUT

There were some underhanded comments and I feel like she's placing a fair bit of blame on her kinkier haired sisters for the way she feels/felt.
 

LoveSupreme

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Yes, I've mentioned before that I had a dark brown school friend, who was beaten up daily because of her two very long plaited braids. That was the only difference between her and the other black girls: She had a mixture of Native American and African American in her, so that her super long hair was a mixture of kinky-coily hair. Smart, nice girl. I am proud to say that she married a psychiatrist and lives down the street from where Michael Jackson lived.
 

Noodles

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I don't think she is shading anyone. It's like if a black woman is honest about how she is treated by other black women, unless it's to praise them or walk on eggshells, she is lying or a b!tch or as she said "ungrateful". Can't we tell the truth, here? You know she got all sorts of mixed messages from other women. It's a result of us all being fµcked up by white supremacy, not a blame game.
 

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I've seen this even when the hair is just long. I know a woman who constantly proclaims herself to be beautiful and uses as a justification her long hair. It's relaxed and shoulder length. She talks about her hair all of the time. I notice other people talk about her hair too when they talk about her.

It's all so strange the things we humans focus on.
 

DolceDiva

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I know this thread is going to be a mess. Smh.

I see (and experienced) what she's saying. I dont feel as though she's shading other women. She's more talking about our culture and the things we place on a pedestal. Those things often tend to be things that are attributed to being anything other than Black. I hope she continues to grow and heal from all of the toxicity we encounter.
 

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I've seen this even when the hair is just long. I know a woman who constantly proclaims herself to be beautiful and uses as a justification her long hair. It's relaxed and shoulder length. She talks about her hair all of the time. I notice other people talk about her hair too when they talk about her.

It's all so strange the things we humans focus on.

Shoulder length is considered long?
 

BadderNBoujee

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I don't know but I wonder am I the only one who has yet to see what privilege a darker girl with looser 3a/b has. What privilege is that? Cause I know many women with that hair texture who are darker and I don't know any who had a privilege growing up socially. I'm being honest.
 

Noodles

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My hair is 3 something, god knows with these labels. When I was about 11 or 12 I started relaxing my hair and I remember girls cooing over it, "ooo, you have hair like a white girl!" because it was so straight. I didn't know how to feel about it but I definitely got the message that my hair was something to be prized because it was so straight. It messes with your head. I actually went natural long before it was popular again simply because I was too lazy to deal with all the crap needed to get that "white girl hair", relaxing it, blowing it out or taking forever to put it into little rollers. I hated it.
 

Autumn Melody

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Well, I can see where she's coming from. I'm sure some of us here have a feature that others incessantly comment on, to the point where if you lost it, you would lose your identity also.

Shoulder length is considered long?

It was considered long when I was younger! Now that people know how to take care of their natural hair these days, it's considered short/medium. At least where I live.
 

Sheeeesh88

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I have experienced what she's saying. A lot of black people assume if you have looser curled hair that "grows" you must be mixed and will repeatedly ask you what you are mixed with. They hardly ever accept when you tell them you're just plain black because black to them means ugly, kinky, and dark. Sad but true.
 

saywhatyouwant

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Yup. Like I said in op growing up my relaxed then permed and originally natural hair varied between shoulder and mid back length.
Back in the day in England there was animosity between black Africans and black caribs and Africans were teased for having "undesirable" black features - dark skin, big lips, tough hair esp as many caribs have white/Asian lineage so they didn't always look like that.
ANYWAY cos my hair isn't tough and was longer than most of my peers I was asked a lot if I was carib then when I confirmed I wasn't I was asked if I was fully African.
Then when I went natural everyone was amazed that I could get my edges to lay down or wear my hair in a smooth bun and that my hair didn't feel like steel wool to the touch.
I don't even have "good" hair. It's okay-ish looked after 4c/b but I still get where she's coming from.
 

KeiraNyongo

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Stormy_Weather

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Her story resonates with me because I'm not light skinned but my hair is 3a-3b and from childhood until now people always have something to say about my hair in connection with my complexion. There's either this fetishizing of it, that I'm exotic because I'm dark with "good hair" or there's a disbelief that someone my complexion could have hair my texture.

There's no real privilege per se, but in some people's eyes having "good hair" elevates you above the average darker skinned black woman whose hair is in the 4's and so you don't necessarily bear the brunt of their colorism/featurism because your hair texture means that you're somehow "Other." But there's a whole list of other bµllsh!t you have to put up with because of it. Like the author said, sometimes you get the feeling that people only find you attractive because of your hair and not because of your other features or you as a whole
 

WidowPrince

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I have experienced what she's saying. A lot of black people assume if you have looser curled hair that "grows" you must be mixed and will repeatedly ask you what you are mixed with. They hardly ever accept when you tell them you're just plain black because black to them means ugly, kinky, and dark. Sad but true.

And what confuses many in cases like these is when the subject has darker skin. They assume that in order to be of mixed race, one would have to be lighter skinned as many are stuck in a black, white binary of racial understanding. Growing up (East african and Indian) with a 2c hair texture and darker skin. I was and still am harassed, examined and squinted at daily. My favorite comment is "how did you get your hair like this?". Being born this way is not a good enough explanation for these people. I see here that the focus is on black people but white people are the same way just more subtle.
 
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I was at a pool party last year and there was a little dark skinned girl with long, jet black type 2 hair! Even when it was wet, it barely waved. It was pretty mesmerizing.

Adults were going on and on about her cuteness when she was a chubby, average looking kid that facially didn't look any better than anyone else. I don't think she would have been noticed if she had short, coarse hair. However, she seemed to get singled out---adults talked to her more and asked her if she needed food, etc...It was very apparent what was happening.

In my experience, long hair is definitely objectified in the black community whether you are dark or light, but if you are dark, you are especially made aware of it. I can see how the author feels some conflict about it.
 

WidowPrince

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Her story resonates with me because I'm not light skinned but my hair is 3a-3b and from childhood until now people always have something to say about my hair in connection with my complexion. There's either this fetishizing of it, that I'm exotic because I'm dark with "good hair" or there's a disbelief that someone my complexion could have hair my texture.

There's no real privilege per se, but in some people's eyes having "good hair" elevates you above the average darker skinned black woman whose hair is in the 4's and so you don't necessarily bear the brunt of their colorism/featurism because your hair texture means that you're somehow "Other." But there's a whole list of other bµllsh!t you have to put up with because of it. Like the author said, sometimes you get the feeling that people only find you attractive because of your hair and not because of your other features or you as a whole

I hate the fetishizing. I notice a big difference in how people behave when my hair is pulled back tight in a bun (I intentionally do this often just to have days off away from harassment) versus down or styled where you can see the texture and length. The saddest thing is that the only people who do not annoy me or try and fetishize me in any strange way are white men. They simply see a black woman and if they plan to marginalize and/or degrade me, they are going to do so on that fact alone. Black men on the other hand are the worst followed by non-black Latino men. I have come to the realization recently that I avoid these races of men for this very reason. The hyper physical and radicalized approach turns me off almost immediately. "I see you got that good hair!" is not a pick up line but an obvious indication that the individual suffers from internalized racism.

White supremacy is the worst social poison. I remember growing up and never understanding why black women with 4b and 4c hair textures were taught that they had "bad hair" because to this day, I see not a thing wrong with it. It is beautiful and versatile hair.

I was at a pool party last year and there was a little dark skinned girl with long, jet black type 2 hair! Even when it was wet, it barely waved. It was pretty mesmerizing.

Adults were going on and on about her cuteness when she was a chubby, average looking kid that facially didn't look any better than anyone else. I don't think she would have been noticed if she had short, coarse hair. However, she seemed to get singled out---adults talked to her more and asked her if she needed food, etc...It was very apparent what was happening.

In my experience, long hair is definitely objectified in the black community whether you are dark or light, but if you are dark, you are especially made aware of it. I can see how the author feels some conflict about it.

This is so sad as it messes up the self-esteem of the girls with more kinky hair textures. They internalize these messages at a young age and grow up feeling insecure. They become fixated with hair and featurism. They end up feeling obligated or socially pressured to cover their hair with wigs, lace fronts and weaves instead of loving their natural beauty.

The fact that the black adults were so programmed to begin treating her differently is indicative of the level of conditioning black people have collectively endured in a white supremacist society. Many of use are unable to begin to help our children detangle themselves from this mental web.

I am physically similar to the girl in your post. I became so used to being stared at for long periods of time when out that I began avoiding eye contact as the staring was always intrusive.

There was a social wedge between me and other black women who immediately saw me as an outsider or threat coming to oppress them in some way. It hurt. Black men were awkwardly racial and physical in their pursuit. They perpetuated a lot of the insecurities and pecking orders black women felt and were forced into. I have always been resentful of this as many gleefully participate in objectifying, dissecting and trampling on the self-esteems of black women.
 

bigshirley

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examples of this:

Bernice Burgos: Bernice is lusted after by many. Undoubtedly she's a very attractive woman. But what makes her "exotic" and interesting to most is that she has chocolate skin with fine hair. Hell colorstruck men like T.I. will even give her a pass for her skin because her hair makes her overall look "foreign" or simply not black.

Bernice-Burgos-8.jpg


Brittany Sky: Brittany found herself in the spotlight when Kendrick Lamar chose her, a darkskinned woman, over a lighter skinned model as his leading lady in his Poetic Justice video. Her signature is her "baby hair" (a result of having a looser curl pattern). In her instagram comments someone always finds a way to mention her hair instead of just complementing her beauty. She was even nicknamed "BabyHair Brittany" in high school

3yUOf_sj.jpg
 

HotDamn

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Obviously to her and her fans it is. I'm just telling you what I see. She acts like her hair is actual gold.

I don't doubt what you see. I don't think should length hair is long. I don't know anyone who does. I thought maybe my standards were too strict or something.

Are her fans kind of hairless?
 

Pinky12345

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3a/3b hair is VERY rare in black women, especially dark skinned black women. I've never seen it.

This is why people may think she's mixed.

Most black women, including light skinned (full black) have type 4 hair.
 

WildSweetOrange

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3a/3b hair is VERY rare in black women, especially dark skinned black women. I've never seen it.

This is why people may think she's mixed.

Most black women, including light skinned (full black) have type 4 hair.
Depends where you live.

Among West Indians it is not rare at all.
Obviously this is due to generations of admixing

I'm not saying it's common but i went to school with dark black girls who had ****** hair
 

Jbaby2008

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Her story resonates with me because I'm not light skinned but my hair is 3a-3b and from childhood until now people always have something to say about my hair in connection with my complexion. There's either this fetishizing of it, that I'm exotic because I'm dark with "good hair" or there's a disbelief that someone my complexion could have hair my texture.

There's no real privilege per se, but in some people's eyes having "good hair" elevates you above the average darker skinned black woman whose hair is in the 4's and so you don't necessarily bear the brunt of their colorism/featurism because your hair texture means that you're somehow "Other." But there's a whole list of other bµllsh!t you have to put up with because of it. Like the author said, sometimes you get the feeling that people only find you attractive because of your hair and not because of your other features or you as a whole
I dated a handsome, beautifully dark man with thick curly hair and it pissed him off that people focused so much attention on it. I think it actually made him feel insecure, as if that was the only thing that made him attractive.
 

ben33

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Depends where you live.

Among West Indians it is not rare at all.
Obviously this is due to generations of admixing

I'm not saying it's common but i went to school with dark black girls who had ****** hair
Dougla not ******. A ****** is someone who is 100% east Indian, while a Dougla is half black and half Indian.
 

junnie

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[MENTION=171908]WidowPrince[/MENTION]

...a simple thumbs up was not enough...you said it!
 

GabrieleChristo

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Depends where you live.

Among West Indians it is not rare at all.
Obviously this is due to generations of admixing

I'm not saying it's common but i went to school with dark black girls who had ****** hair

Many West Indians with a looser hair texture are typically generationally mixed with Arawak and Taino Indian heritage from what I've been told.
 

GabrieleChristo

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A font in another post said it best:

In the black community,

light-skin/loose hair/euro-features > dark-skin/loose hair/euro-features > light-skin/kinky hair/afro features > dark-skin/kinky hair/afro features
 

True Artist

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Bernice Burgos resembles a young version of my grandmother, from complexion, features, down to the waist length curly/wavy hair.

When she went to college (the 30s) she was noted for her appearance. Her nickname was "Mutt." My grandfather saw her as homecoming queen and said *on sight* he was gonna marry that girl. In their case, he took her into his almost completely high yellow family maybe despite complexion, maybe in part because of her hair.

There is a MAJOR undercurrent of black males who value straight hair on a darker girl. That way they can appear to be "down" while ...

Yall don't hear all these men who "hate weave" and "love natural hair," but ignore 4as and drool and lust and break their necks after girls with long hair? Thems the ones.
 
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Dougla not ******. A ****** is someone who is 100% east Indian, while a Dougla is half black and half Indian.

Jamaicans dont use the word Dougla. That is more a Trini term.

Jamaicans say ****** to represent 100% Indian to mixed raced Indian/Black. We dont differentiate like that.
 

DanniS_

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examples of this:

Bernice Burgos: Bernice is lusted after by many. Undoubtedly she's a very attractive woman. But what makes her "exotic" and interesting to most is that she has chocolate skin with fine hair. Hell colorstruck men like T.I. will even give her a pass for her skin because her hair makes her overall look "foreign" or simply not black.

Bernice-Burgos-8.jpg


Brittany Sky: Brittany found herself in the spotlight when Kendrick Lamar chose her, a darkskinned woman, over a lighter skinned model as his leading lady in his Poetic Justice video. Her signature is her "baby hair" (a result of having a looser curl pattern). In her instagram comments someone always finds a way to mention her hair instead of just complementing her beauty. She was even nicknamed "BabyHair Brittany" in high school

3yUOf_sj.jpg

Or Tatiana Ali
latest

f63fa3d74da2ac96052ed2156378b8ba--tatyana-ali-black-magazine.jpg
 

ben33

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Jamaicans dont use the word Dougla. That is more a Trini term.

Jamaicans say ****** to represent 100% Indian to mixed raced Indian/Black. We dont differentiate like that.
Other Caribbean islands including my island use the word Douglas. It is popular in Trinidad because they have the highest percentage of people of East Indian descent. Don't understand why Jamaicans would use the word ****** to describe Indians mixed with black despite knowing the meaning of the word ******.
 
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That's fine that your island says Dougla. It means nothing to me. I was just pointing out that [MENTION=197637]WildSweetOrange[/MENTION] wasn't necessarily wrong since you were correcting her. If she is Jamaican like me then what she said is correct for her.

My cousins and friends who are half Indian, will never refer to themselves as Dougla. That's just the way it is. Culturally, it is what it is. We are allowed to have some differences.

Other Caribbean islands including my island use the word Douglas. It is popular in Trinidad because they have the highest percentage of people of East Indian descent. Don't understand why Jamaicans would use the word ****** to describe Indians mixed with black despite knowing the meaning of the word ******.
 

ben33

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Many West Indians with a looser hair texture are typically generationally mixed with Arawak and Taino Indian heritage from what I've been told.
Few Caribs are alive today. They are mostly found on the island of Dominica and you can find black Caribs on the island of St Vincent. As for the Arawaks they were mostly located in the greater Antilles (Cuba etc) and only a few are alive. Some outsiders usually think that Caribbean people are exotic, but we look like any American. We are white, black, people of Asian and east Indian descent.
 

Mercedes1

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My sister is dark skinned with 3c hair. We're Nigerian with one grandparent from the caribbean. I think it happens with East Africans too.
 

GabrieleChristo

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Few Caribs are alive today. They are mostly found on the island of Dominica and you can find black Caribs on the island of St Vincent. As for the Arawaks they were mostly located in the greater Antilles (Cuba etc) and only a few are alive. Some outsiders usually think that Caribbean people are exotic, but we look like any American. We are white, black, people of Asian and east Indian descent.

Some of you all (with mixed heritage) have a distinct look though and AAs can tell the difference (due to hair texture and distinct unusual features). My Trini friends had a very "Indian" look although you could tell they were also black and a Jamaican friend of mine was Chinese Jamaican and often got asked if she was Hawaiian. They looked completely different from the AA friends I grew up with. Most AAs in the mid-Atlantic and SE regions have a look that is somewhere between West African and mixed-race (with strictly white and black features). I would say that we tend to resemble Nigerians the most as far as facial features are concerned.
 

Dani_Blanco

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I won't say it's a privilege but, you do get treated like a prize. I'm brown with fine thin hair. Sharp tiny features and people do fawn over stupid ish like that. I don't feel it's helped me advance or anything.
 

Matheo455

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I don't know but I wonder am I the only one who has yet to see what privilege a darker girl with looser 3a/b has. What privilege is that? Cause I know many women with that hair texture who are darker and I don't know any who had a privilege growing up socially. I'm being honest.

I believe it's just an obnoxious mentality of this generation to be as socially conscious as possible. It comes off to the point of parody, with all these reaches in terms of listing so many facets of experiences as a privilege. Which in turn trivializes the power of the word, an example is this whole safe brown bµllsh!t term.

Furthermore, I find it weird people take the comments of clearly ignorant people as some form of privilege. Maybe it's just the social awkwardness due to the influx of social media?? ah well..
 

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