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*not all Black men
…but enough Black men come at us sideways and get things twisted like a Slinky to make me want to presently clear my throat, crack my knuckles, and get a few things off my ample chest. Today’s address is prompted by the inane ramblings of one Mr. Cory Haywood, in a fetid diatribe that he calls “From Hair weaves to Colored Contacts, Black Women Have Been Appropriating White Culture for Decades.”
Mr. Haywood’s thesis statement seems to be that, “Envelope-pushers Miley Cyrus and Kylie Jenner are often targets of criticism because they appear to be driven by an insatiable obsession with urban culture. This qualifies as one of the purest examples of hypocrisy in recent memory.” And straight out of the gate, he asks, “Hey, sisters: How does it feel to be hypocrites?”
At this point I’m going to Kanye myself with an Imma let you finish, but… moment: we haven’t even gotten past sentence two of Mr. Haywood’s blathering, and we can already clearly see that it is the kind of low-rent rant that we ordinarily wouldn’t give the time of day. And indeed, I’m generally far too busy to devote a thousand words to every degenerate misogynist pig with a wi-fi connection and a WordPress username, but I’ve got time today.
This particularly virulent strain of “man” is doing far too much damage, and Black women have enough to battle without the call coming from inside the (racial) house. These hotep hustlers in sheep’s clothing are often men that we should be able to look to for community, and they’re too busy looking down on us or stepping over us to even notice or care that they are causing divides between us. So, even if we completely dismissed Cory’s trash collection of un-sentences and twists of phrase on sight, as well we probably should, they speak to a bigger problem that I would like to put to a bed forever.
The very first thing that needs to be said is that intelligent people know how to make a case for their opinion without denying the existence of the situation at hand altogether, and in his inability to do so, Cory betrays himself in exposing his fundamental ignorance of what appropriation even means.
The entire internet might be about to collapse under the weight of discussions of appropriation, and I know I’m about to add another one to the mix, but I’m sick of seeing my sisters and myself attacked as though we’re making something up when we’re not.
To think of cultural appropriation as merely “one culture doing stuff from another culture” is to be painfully obtuse. To say that Black women wearing straightened hair and colored contacts is the same thing as Kylie and Kendall wearing cornrows and dreadlocks is to completely ignore the power dynamics of race and fame.
(One of) the sad thing(s) here is that you could have just gone on a run-of-the-mill tirade against Black women because you don’t like us, or, even better, you could have actually put something good into the world and reminded those of us who unfortunately do still intentionally and exclusively aspire to Eurocentric standards of beauty that our Black is beautiful.
There is absolutely a case to be made against the pervasiveness of mainstream media’s definition of beauty as Whiteness. You could have fought that enemy instead of doing battle with us. Instead, you actually let us in on how the rusty wheels creaking forward in your head led to your terrible decision to write what you wrote, saying; “I could rip into the backwards logic of those who disagree with Kylie Jenner’s decision to enhance the size of her lips and rear-end. I could probably come up with 100 reasons why she isn’t guilty of appropriating black culture. Or instead, I could turn the argument around and accuse black women of appropriating white culture. It would be easy: all I would have to do is compile a list of common practices that black women use to make themselves look more European.”
Did you think that my ire at reading your words, being a Black woman, would lead me to say well he has a point there… C’mon, son. You can’t disprove something you believe to be false by likening it to things that are proven to be true. All you’ve done is assign an incorrect label to practices that have, indeed, gone on for decades, but you being incorrect and unclear on vocabulary doesn’t alter the thing you’re describing, just the language you’ve erroneously used to describe it.
In completely bulldozing the actual concept of appropriation with your denigration of Black women who’ve had rhinoplasty or who’ve dated white men, you’ve told a lie with a grain of truth, but you’re focused on the lie. And even if your despicable misogynoir here was hyperbolic in nature, you took a wrong turn on that route because I’m on the receiving end of far too many attacks on my Black Woman-ness to let you run wild over my spirit in service of your failed point.
But no, your every syllable is so steeped in hatred of Black women that it comes across even in your punctuation. A genuine discussion of that ugly grain of truth, that some Black women have internalized self-hate and aspire completely and intentionally to Eurocentric beauty standards or other standards of whiteness, would not crack whips over Black women’s backs, but rather look us in the eyes and affirm our worth, as ourselves.
Yes, there are Black women who emulate Eurocentric beauty standards to the extent of altering their bodies and hating themselves. Still. In 2015. And there are also Black women with weaves to protect their natural hair as they grow it out underneath. There are Black women who have weaves because they like to whip their hair back and forth when “Drip Drop” comes on in the club. And there are Black women with weaves who have them because they want them and simply don’t give a shit about your opinion and analysis of them or their hair.
If you tell someone, from birth, that their natural assets are not good enough, or not as good as what those other people over there are born with, and then give them the means to acquire what those other people who have been declared better than them have, and they acquire them, you don’t blame that person. You blame the systems that told them the lie that someone else is better than them in the first place.
If they grow to understand and recognize the lie, but still choose to uphold and disseminate it, that’s a different story altogether. And if you tell that other group, from birth, that they are superior simply by virtue of what they were born with, and they recognize that the “less than” group actually had some pretty cool features, and they can acquire them and succeed with them while the “less thans” remain less than, that’s a problem.
That’s the appropriation we fight against when we bemoan the continued celebration of Kylie and Kendall’s “envelope-pushing” hairstyles, while Black women’s natural and braided hairstyles are still often restricted , insulted, or at the very least, not exalted and encouraged at a mainstream level.
This is where Mr. Haywood and his type like to get all kumbaya and say that racism is ending, or even over; that the world is a melting-pot of cultures and to claim anything as belonging to any particular culture is to uphold segregation and prevent progress; that when I bring up systemic power differentials, I’m the fool for “giving” someone else power over me; and that I’m the problem for behaving as though racial inequality is still a problem.
Let’s cut that crap out here and now.
Kylie Jenner does not have personal, individual, power over me, or over any other Black woman who chooses to wear her hair in cornrows. Just like Iggy Azalea, as a person, does not have individual power over Azealia Banks as a person. However, within the entertainment industry, Iggy has achieved more (by monetary and award standards) while working with far less, and with affectations of Blackness that are not as rewarded when present in actual Black women in an undeniably Black genre.
Next, the Corys of the world will want to argue that Kylie and Iggy et al “don’t mean anything by it,” and “why shouldn’t they be allowed to wear whatever hairstyle they want” or whatever. Well, if you don’t understand that lack of intent does not prevent impact, I invite you to look into that very basic concept and get back to me.
I completely agree that Kendall and Kylie and Miley aren’t intentional white supremacists on some Jim Crow level who set out to specifically ruin a Black girl’s day every time they sit in their hairstylist’s chair. They’re not explicitly thinking about denigrating us, because they’re likely not thinking much at all. And to many of us, that blatant abuse of privilege makes it worse, and that’s why we point it out and talk about it: the casual denigration by way of cultural theft by those in power is destructive in its very thoughtlessness and frivolity.
All cross-cultural style and art exchange and experimentation does not qualify as appropriation, and even we as Black women have to carefully consider our choices, as we are not immune to trying on the traditions of certain Latina, Asian, and Indigenous cultures that have been sickeningly and regularly trampled under the foot of appropriation.
Ironically, Black people who defend this sort of cultural appropriation while hating on Black women with certain hairstyles or white boyfriends are actually upholding a poisonous strain of self-hate that centers white supremacy, in consistently caping for the white girl with cornrows and seeing every interracial relationship as massa taking “your” woman.
If you don’t believe us when we speak of our insults and a hairstyle can cause you to reject Black women as a whole, then you were never here for us, and you are the true anti-black one. Not me.
Too many have tried to give all Black men a bad name for me to sit idly by as you do it too. The many wonderful Black men who are here for us, and allies of all races and gender identities, are already laughing at you, and now we seek to silence you.
Representation matters. Honoring ethnic and cultural traditions and fighting for racial parity matters. Well, a least they matter to us. If it isn’t important to you, be brave enough to be that asshole who says “I see what you’re saying and I just don’t care.” Be strong enough to wear your wackness on your chest. Say “that doesn’t impact my life,” shrug, and walk away. You always have that option, and we’ll just have to overcome without you.
