Dear Whoopi,
I rarely watch "The View" and usually end up watching it when my cousin is watching. However, when the Pepsi outrage aired I wanted to understand more about what was happening and one of the coverages I stumbled upon was "The View." I was taken back by a statement said by Whoopi “wearing ‘white lady hair’ is appropriation.” I decided to ponder on that statement and after careful considerations, I must disagree.
To begin I guess we should review what cultural appropriation is. It is taking and using materials from a culture that is not your own, there is usually a connotation of not understanding the culture. I am lost as to how wearing a weave or wig is taking from the "white" culture. Wigs and weave are not a part of "white" culture. While hair texture and color is part of genetics and not a culture. Culture and genes are two separate processes that can be interconnected but that does not make them the same thing. It simply does not compute for me.
What exactly is “white lady hair?” I seem to be missing the qualification of what "white lady hair" is. Is it straight hair? Or blonde hair? The same way there are different textures and colors for hair for white people that same logic is applicable to people of color. Last I checked straight hair is not exclusive to the white race. The same way as curly hair is not exclusive to the black race. And although a rare occurrence, there are black people with blonde hair.
But these were just the tips of the iceberg for me. What really hurts me about the statement is the fact that “assimilation” is the main reason why black women wear “white lady hair.” Black people are the most invisible. In other words, western standards always determine how we are seen as it is the standard used for beauty. I was hurt because she said wear your natural hair if you want to cry appropriation. But the thing is not only here in America but even in other countries, black women are constantly told that their hair is unprofessional, unkempt and scrutinized. Black women have been fired for styling their hair in dreads lock and braids or any other protective styles meant to protect our natural hair. For me personally, you can call it an adaptation, self-preservation, assimilation but not “cultural appropriation.”
The fact of the matter is a weave has more to do with me fitting into to society. But braids and dreadlocks are a trend which appropriators can remove themselves from at any time. The only problem is I can't erase my culture nor do I feel the need to apologize for who I am. However, it is not so easy when there is no change to corporate norms and so to survive I must conform to fight another day. That is the sad reality of it. The victim is always expected to extend a hand or give more love but yet the perpetrators are rarely held accountable nor are they required to meet the same expectations.
It is like not having a key to enter your own house. Thus so someone else has to let you in but they expect you to look how they want you to look before you can be let in. Or even being asked to jump the fence even though there's a door that can easily be open. And that is the difference. A white person especially one with more “tamed hair” will never experience this sort of rejection from their own country. Nor are braids, cornrows, or dreadlocks a requirement for anything. Black people cry “cultural appropriation” because people want to borrow from the black culture when it suits them or for fun but are never ready to defend us when we are being scrutinized. “It's all fun and games until someone gets hurt.”
I do not get it either. Why is my natural state not enough? That drives me crazy.
