Nappy Hair and Imus
Nappy...Nappy...Nappy.
Nappy hair. Some folks don't
understand why Nappy-headed in
the now repugnant Imusi-fied
phrase is offensive.
Everybody understands the ho part.
Now, nappy-headed is cleary directed
at women of African descent. Black
folks are the only people on the planet
with the uniqueness of kinky hair.
(And if you're not Black and you have
kinks -- you know where it came from:
the Motherland.)
Our hair is different from everybody else's.
The Western standard of beauty has turned
this phenomenon into a negative.
Sisters have bought into this so-called
disfigurement....and are running like hell
from it -- faster than an uppity Black
person turns off VH-1s I Love New York.
What do we do? Anglo-size our hair with long,
straight weaves, braided extensions, wig out
Beyonce/Tyra style, add extended pieces...
And you know what? It appeared all of the
Rutgers team members had perms. Their
nappiness was on the chemical down low.
Bottom line, we are not embracing our kinkiness.
When you say, "Nappy-headed," it pukes feelings
of shame, unattractiveness, repulsiveness.
This just doesn't start in a sister's childhood
when too many of us have have heard, "Come
over here you nappy-headed child!"
It's imbedded in our brain memory. The abomination
of slavery; where we covered our heads because
white folks took a distaste to our hair. There's
an occurrence in 1847, when a slave owner wrote
to his overseer in Paris to purchase enough
handkerchiefs for each female slave on the
plantation...
All sisters have an arsenal of demeaning
hair-stories.
Hearing nappy-headed ruptured a perennial
open wound.
Sisters...we are still...in the 21st century at
war with our hair!
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