Okay, I’m going bring up black hair care for a hot minute. Hey! Don’t you roll your eyes at me. It’s in line with Spencer’s mandate to write about things he’d never think to write about. Spencer? Would you write about black hair care? Okay, then. Feel free to blast past or stick around and maybe see something new.
Tuesday on Jezebel, over 200 comments were lodged on a post written by Dodai entitled “Do White Families Need ‘Special Training’ Before Adopting Black Children?” The subject was a report that took issue with the 1994 Multiethnic Placement Act (MEPA) that was passed to make it easier for black children to be adopted by families who were not black, namely white families. The report said that color consciousness was important in shaping the MEPA’s policy. Dodai’s post was informative and as usual, well written, throwing in something about Angelina Jolie’s dedication to providing all of her children with cultural references personal to each of them. (Call me, Ange.)
The subject was deep. (In answer to the question, one commenter cut the bull and said “yes.”) Right off, black hair care became commenters’ subject matter, focusing on Zahara Jolie-Pitt. Jezebel posts a lot of pictures of Zahara because the child is adorable, her daddy’s rich and her mama’s good lookin’. As usual, something is said about the need for someone who knew what they were doing to pay attention to the child’s head of hair. I, along with those I can only construe as my fellow black women commenters, do a lot of the saying. It may not seem important to an observer, but those many comments about hair were directly on point to the topic of the post.
Black hair shouldn’t be washed every day. Black hair can’t be combed when it’s dry. Black hair hates fine toothed combs. Black hair needs some kind of heavy leave in conditioner. Black hair is delicate and breaks easily. Black hair can’t run wild on a consistent basis. Black hair running wild consistently will loc. Black hair is not slippery. Black hair is shiny. Black hair will hurt you like the torments of hell if the kitchen (the finer hair at the nape of the neck) is tangled. Black hair eats rubber bands. Black hair on little girls should be braided so the ordeal of getting the hair did is not a daily one. Black hair being braided is a joy to watch. Black hair being braided is hell to endure. Black hair loves bright ribbons. Black hair ties us together. Black hair will wend its way through generations and all manner of multiethnic dilutions and peek out to show its gentle or harsh nappy edges proudly. Black hair is extraordinary.
Something to embrace if the morning, and I mean the whole morning, is spent doing an adopted child’s black hair.
No comments:
Post a Comment