Aibu to abandon my beliefs to get ahead. Afro hair.

[ShortFro]

Aibu to abandon my beliefs to get ahead. Afro hair.

NC

The majority of black women you see in the uk do not actually have their real hair on display. Often only other black women will be able to tell.

For many reasons (I’ll expand) but largely due to setting an example to my daughter, I’ve worn my hair in its natural state for the last few years.
Obviously I’m not Lupita the Oscar winner (!) but it looks something like this.

(Lupita pic)

I have noticed that I am treated differently with my hair like this. Often ignored/ followed in shops etc. Please don’t tell me I’m imagining this. There are probably millions of posts on the internet talking about this.

I hate being treated like this, told I look ‘unprofessional now’ etc. My hair is always clean & cut professionally - it’s just not processed in the way most people are used to.

Options.

1. Keep it as it is, be often treated badly. Miss out on opportunities. Be true to myself.

1. Wigs = conform to the ‘accepted’ standard. But they are itchy and hot plus it is mortifying if they come off.

1. Weaves - this is what the majority do. This is expensive. To get it done professionally = £200 every 6 weeks. I can’t afford this without serious cuts to the budget elsewhere.

Plus: using human hair, I find the thought of having somebody’s hair in my head repulsive and skin crawling. On the ethical side, many women are exploited to get that hair.

There is synthetic hair but this often looks ‘wiggy’ and fake, like a barbies hair.

When doing weaves on a long term basis the hairline is often damaged.

Even if the photos of Naomi are doctored, I have seen in real life hundreds of women in salons with this problem. The ‘baby hair’ along the airline cannot support a weave, resulting in tension alopecia.

1. Braids. You are facing the same hairline issues as with weaves. You are looking at £50 every 6 weeks plus around 6 hours. In addition I find that they look TO ME silly and overly fussy.

1. Relaxer. This is a process where you take the contents of a box that says ‘caution, use gloves, do not allow to touch skin’ and put that on your head. You can do it yourself like with hair dye or pay around £200 every 6 weeks for professional maintenance. That looks like this

Also, make sure you never get rained on or sweat or it will become Afroish.

1. Long natural hair straightened with straightners... hours and hours of work weekly plus any time it happens to get damp...

What the fuck do I do?

MNMH I do because I've been there. Must be a Mumsnet full moon again or something

Yeah, the last post doesn't even make any sense. We totally overlooked the red flag statement of "no one treats you differently, you only think they do..".. Pffft, Yeah right.

Doesn't mean you should dismiss other people's experiences just because theirs isn't the same as yours.

I have grey hair. I'm 48 and making a statement about ageing gracefully.
Unless we start to see natural hair it will never be normalised.

KennDod - if men grow their hair to long length as women tend to, yes. Men keep their hair short though.

DunkandEggAgain

Exactly. As though you're making things up.

I wound keep it natural. I’d go for the Tia and Tamera look that they have at the moment on their Instagram accounts. I don’t know how they get their Afro hair to go into tight curls (is it product?) but it looks fabulous.
I agree that Megan’s straighted hair looks glossy and gorgeous but the cost must be crazy.
But yea, I think the Afro hair look paired with big hooped earrings looks classy and sophisticated and I’d love to be able to rock that look.
Mine is mousey and straight and sticks to my skull like Marilyn Manson

I love love natural afro hair.

A member of my team has just made the transition from processed to unprocessed Afro hair. She’s v happy with it but has commented that she’s had a lot of comments from other black people about it - and many not complimentary.

Our work place is a large public sector organisation so to my knowledge she’s received no racist feedback at work.

It’s a shit position society has put you in!

I went natural 8 years ago. Grew it out for a year or so with a weave then went from there.

Quite honestly I feel like I've swapped one set of 'problems' for another. Having the kids I was in hospital for quite a while and it was a stress worrying about my hair becoming matted ( I straightened it before I went in to combat it in the end). It takes at least 5/10 minutes to just work the comb and conditioner through my hair in the shower everyday. I am lazy and mainly air dry though which helps. Even worse, the touchers have reappeared. Didn't have touching when I relaxed it - natural hair - I'm like a zoo exhibit sometimes. The touching seems to go through phases though which is something.

Even so, I say go for it. It shouldn't be a novelty to see a black woman's hair. Work would be breaking the law to discriminate too.

Good luck in whatever you decide.

Option 1 without a doubt! Always be true to yourself! It’s beautiful & you can’t put a price on your values.

RomanyRoots that video is really good. Jumped when she burned her neck though!

I spent my whole childhood and teens with everyone thinking I was a boy because whenever my hair was cut it used to spring up to my scalp when dried. More leprechaun than pixie cut.

OP how long is your hair now? Someone mentioned twist out which I now do for special occasions.

@romanyroots, I'm white and have also felt pressure to straighten and control my hair in the past but since I got it short (inspired actually by a comment in nappily valley ''my hair is like a second job'') I got it cut short. It sticks up on end but I kinda like it. Maybe I feel less pressure to have conventional long typical hair now I'm older.

It doesn’t matter what the ladies on MN say, they’re not seeing you and behaving in the way you dislike.

You just have to do what you like the look of. If you like an afro then keep one. It is a waste of time trying to change someone else’s opinion of how they act towards you.

My own tale is that I have thick wavy blonde hair. I hate it when it dries naturally. It does look ungroomed. I have thought this for years. It is not silky soft waves, it is coarse. So if I’m feelin ill or not leaving the house I’ll just leave it to dry and not bother doing anything else.

During the other 99% of the time I straighten it after drying it. It’s not stick straight as I curl it under. Voila, bouncy, thick shiny hair. Only takes half an hour.

Can’t you do something like that? What style would it go in to if it was straightened with GDH or the like?

Do black men have this problem? I don't just mean with discrimination, does their hair also take loads of maintenance? I can't imagine they do in which case the problem is sexism as much as racism.

This is why black men often cut their hair short: it is much more manageable and takes less maintenance. This is a reason why school appearance policies that insist that hair can't be shorter than a certain length can be problematic for children with Afro hair. But schools don't want to hear it.

I’ve had natural hair my whole life but haven’t even straightened it for the past 2.5 years for the same reasons as you- my daughter. I really think the tides are turning with regards to hair and I see so many black women going natural now. Ultimately you’ve got to do with what you feel with, but I’m bias and say stick with natural

I work in a central London office, professional dress code. Ladies with natural Afro hair (or even just very, very tightly curled European hair) tend to wear braids, very short hair or a shortish Afro ( like your picture). All looks very professional, and to my knowledge nobody at work has ever commented (apart from the usual “love your new style” comments).

That said, even though I assume Megan’s in straightened (I don’t know if chemical or just GHD type) I do think it looks processed and still very coarse. Also, it doesn’t look naturally straight as the roots always look fluffy.

When I say 'cut', I mean shave. A black man/boy with a number 1 or 2 all over is pretty normal and looks neat. But then secondary schools say you're a skinhead and have an 'extreme' haircut and put you in isolation.

Black men, white men, any men don’t have this problem. Although men are more vein now (regular trips to hairdressers) theirs is usually short and takes 5 minutes once they’re out of the shower.

I'm white, but I truly hate that black girls from a very young age are taught not to like their afro hair. A girl in DD 11's class and her 9yo sister have their hair straightened.

Every day I learn a new thing on MN. I assumed black women styled their hair because they liked to; like I get mine straightened and highlighted. I had no idea that an afro style took the levels of work you’ve talked of here.

All that being said, WTF do you work or in what field that Afro hair is deemed unprofessional?

Short twist out style - a good compromise between natural but groomed?

@TSSDNCOP I can guarantee that most black women have a childhood memory of having their hair hot combed straight. I think things like that can have a lasting impression of how you view your hair as you get older

mind I had literally no idea. I feel really rather stupid that I thought the incredible styles I see black women wearing were a choice.