If you are spending time constantly arguing about what is natural hair, because you have natural hair, and aint nobody gonna tell you nothing, and your own situation is breaking and shedding like crazy, then your priorities need work.
A hair strand is a pretty simple thing, our goal is to preserve it so that we can enjoy it, how you preserve the strand is what we are here to educate and get educated on.
How a relaxed girl takes care of her hair, might be slightly different from a natural girl, and might also be different from a girl who has bleached blonde hair. The point is, how you get there and the information available to ALL of us is what matters the most rather than the differences between us.
How we can move forward
The thing is, after the scramble, the bickering and the discussions we are still left with the same problem of caring for our hair. To start, we suggest you go back to the beginning, pull out your little black book where you wrote down your goals 7 years ago, and see where you are.
Have you met your goals? What changed and do you need to add more goals to the list or just do the whole thing over again because things have changed in your life?
We also suggest that when you find yourself getting emotional about debates and issues that do not help you personally just tap yourself on the shoulder, shut down the device and go deep condition your hair, in other words walk away and get in tune with what really matters.
Additionally if you create content on YouTube or a blog then write or demonstrate something that somebody can learn something on so that we keep the practical stuff in circulation giving some balance to what goes viral. Debates are great, I will be the first to admit that, but your hair is worth more than the stress of an argument that just might be bigger than you.
In that spirit, if you are new here, please start your healthy hair journey at our beginners page. Happy growing ladies!
Originally posted 2014-07-09 15:00:08.
Wow, excellent post! I think many of us are well over the natural vs. relaxed vs. wigs debates. My email has been flooded with blog posts dealing with those issues. Don’t get me wrong. The discussion is enlightening and brings necessary awareness, but I would love to see more innovative articles and videos focusing on how to keep hair healthy. Learning the science and history of black hair care may possibly interest most readers.
I really appreciate your article. A little over a year ago, I heat damaged my hair using an over the counter keratin product. Even though I went to a salon and had to get it cut, I continued my destructive hair behavior of flat ironing and blowing drying until even touching or washing my hair made it break. Nine months ago I found this site and I have grown my hair from neck length to the top of my back currently by using the information found on this site. I have relaxed hair, but I read all of the articles and sucked in all of the knowledge. I also became aware of this debate over relaxed vs. natural. I had no idea it even existed to be quite honest. I don’t consider myself trying to fit any kind of image, I just like my hair relatively straight. When I see black women wearing whatever style of hair, relaxed, natural, weave, braids, I just think of it as choice in style and nothing else. I wanted healthy hair and I have managed to achieve that in a relatively short amount of time. Now I am focusing on length retention. This site gave me the knowledge to be able to do that.
I really didn’t understand all the fuss in the first place. Hair is hair….period. If a caucasian woman thinks she can learn something by going on a black hair care site then more power to her. This reminds me of when an actor does something really bad and everyone has to blow it up by talking about it. If we don’t give it wings, it can’t fly. If white women want to ‘infiltrate’ our hair sites, don’t pay them any mind. Don’t read what they say, don’t go on their blogs and don’t view their videos. Eventually, they will go away when they realize that they don’t matter. Some of them NEED our hair care sites because of their hair types but if we stop the nonsense, they will see that they won’t get under our skin and maybe, just maybe, they will start other hair care sites for themselves and just leave is alone. I truly believe that we need to just take a chill pill and calm down. They will NEVER understand our struggles…period, plain and simple. But we can’t teach them if they don’t want to learn. Let’s stop making it about them and go back to making it about us.
You know I have seen too many heated conversations about black women’s hair and how to wear it. I also noticed that most comments posted come from level headed people who can care less about how other black woman choose to wear their hair. Makes me wonder… Where are these negative ideas about black women’s hair really coming from?
The answer is plain and simple Extremist its the people who have a negative
attitude. Instead of standing on common ground they feel that their way is the only way forgetting that there is always anotherway to get where u wanna go.
My thing is this, though im natural but why does everyone feel that they have to go natural and do the same style as everyone else? I personally believe in more versatile looks such as straight hair, wavy or etc…instead of always doing the same thing like curly hair and afros….just saying
Of course! This is one of the many irrelevant things we “go so hard for” that will keep us divided, and yield NOTHING in the form of progress in the end.
I, for one, am well & truly TIRED of all this hair drams about what’s natural & what isn’t. In my daily life I don’t hear this mess ! Women just wear their hair the way they want to & that’s that. No arguments,no hassles, no drama. But on the internet it’s a whole different matter. All these “much ado about nothing” & “sweating the small stuff” type arguments, much of which are childish & show the insecurity & latent self hate still stuck in some folks’ minds. I first went natural in the late 60s thru 1981 , before getting curly perms. Back then there was definite hair pride in wearing our huge afros. In fact some girls with loose curls were trying to get kinks to get that look. Even white kids with curly hair grew them. Some folks criticized others for not growing or wearing an afro but by & large the afro days were very upbeat & prideful with no petty arguments even tho we had few products besides grease & water. Here I am natural again, doing the BC in 2009 & there’s all this hassle about hair. IT NEEDS TO STOP !!!
Yes like this one^^ Smh. Let’s just all be happy about rocking our natural hair. Hey be happy if you are relaxed to. I mean hey We are not our hair #IndiaArie. Let’s just be glad we got some. We are blessed for that already.