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Well there it is, the "multi billion dollar weave industry." As long as there is a financial incentive for getting women to change the state of the natural hair, there will be market pressures to get them to do it. Obviously those of us that change their hair from it's natural state will find ways to justify doing it. I'm not convinced this is as much of an issue of Black self hate, as much as it is one of marketing. People can easily justify spending spending money to watch men engage in human cock fighting. Justifying buying a straight-haired-blonde weave is does not seem to be such a heavy lift in comparison. Black women are not the only ones buying straight blonde hair, white women do it too. White women go to the beauty salon get the texture of the hair changed, get the color of their hair changed, but don't have to contend with the same level of grief our Sisters have to. But white women don't have to contend with a lot of things Black women have to... Clever marketers have exploited a weakness in our psyches and created an environment such that many women feel they can be made more attractive by changing the natural state of their hair. This is not a function of "race," it is a function of commerce. Of course the Brothers buy into this and go after the sisters with the long straight hair and white boys flock to the girlies with the long blonde hair. Very few of us, raised in this culture, are immune to this. I like to think that I am, but I know I'm not, not really. That said, I think many Black women spend an inordinate amount of time and money on their hair. I know sisters that spend hundreds of dollars each month doing something to their hair that has nothing to do with the health or well being of their hair. In fact what they are doing may actually be detrimental to their hair in the long term. But it is a waste of time trying to convince a woman that going to the "beauty" parlor for 2 or 3 hours a week is unnecessary, because you are competing against the full weight of brilliant corporate marketers who have convinced women otherwise. Of course there is no shortage of products targeted to make men feel inadequate if they don't have a head full thick hair. I'm glad I'm not one their marks. The stigma of Black men being bald has largely waned. I buy about 50 bucks worth a razor blades a year and shave my head once or twice a week, which takes about 10 minutes. The results present well, are easy on the pocket, and take very little time. Too bad more Black women don't feel they have that luxury.

@NubianFellow I agree with you about Jesus. But I still think black women should feel free to wear their hair anyway they want to. Hair is just one aspect of the whole person. If a sista is accomplished and responsible and intelligent and capable of earning a good living, who gives a fuck how she wears her hair? Nobody's perfect. You just can't throw that catch-all term "self hate" around and apply to everyone who doesn't conform to your criteria. Self love is also about taking care of yourself, about pampering and indulging your needs, about - avoiding jive-assed black men. When taken to the extreme, self love can also be about conceit and vanity and even narcissism. Having said, all of that i would like to compliment you on your writing skills. They are excellent.

The NAACP Is Talking About Boycotting Pro Football If Quarterback Colin Kaeoernick Do Not Get Signed To Play..Black People Should Ask The NAACP Why A Black. Woman Is Not ,President Of The NAACP. Jim Brown Says I Would Not Desecrate ,My Flag Or Anthem..There Is A Right Way To Protest. Former Football Player Shannon Sharpe Says There Is A Right And Wrong Way To Arrest Unarmed Black .Men And Women..Some Successful Black People Think They Are Another Race .If Black Athletes Were Stopped By White Police ,They Would Say ,They Are,Pro Athletes Keep .From Getting Shot..NAACP Should Corrupt Preachers,Crack Houses,Street Gangs,Pimp Houses,Black Men. Sex Trafficking Teenage Girls..

You can work for someone else and create wealth for yourself.

I have generally spent more time on my mind than my hair. Hey if geeks and nerds make enough money they may influence black cultural norms. Would that be of use to the community.

@NubianFellow, thanks again for adding your voice to the mix. I agree 100% with your last post, But if a Black owned business is in the community then putting 10 to 20% back into the community would be trivial. The real problem in doing this is that there are not enough Black owned business to patronize. The other problem is getting people to patronize Black businesses. I currently sell books any way they can be sold; I can sell them directly, direct readers to an author's site, publisher's site, and any large retailer including B&N and Amazon. I'll give you one guess where 99.9% of the people choose to buy their books. @Pioneer1, agreed not everyone is cut out to start and run a business, but Black owned business get FAR more grief and other business for poor service, when I'd argue that we chose get a bit more leeway other Black people. I'm not saying we should tolerate bad service from a Black owned business, but I think we are held to a higher standard than even corporate businesses who benefit investor funding while we have to rely solely on revenue.

@Cynique Thank you for the compliment queen. I do hear what you are saying, which may even be true to a degree. However, consider that a Black queen feels like she is a perfect vision of beauty, after getting a weave. She has the most elegant blonde European weave her money could afford. Now the conflict of interests. She knows her beauty is borrowed. Because she will never be able to grow this hair. Not in a million years. So her new achieved beauty is not from her. That would mess with my brain. I would feel like I was only pretending to be beautiful if that was how I envisioned beauty. But what is wrong with Black hair? Black, African textured hair is one hundred percent human hair. It doesn't look like a horses hair or a monkey's hair. So I see women becoming less beautiful than their full potential, due to media control (They are actually making themselves less attractive). But I already notice something unattractive, which is weak thinking. When we love ourselves, we don't try to change into something we are not. I used to question my own African features as a child and want to change all the things I thought were wrong with me (less caucasian appealing). Luckily I learned to love these very things about me I assumed were flaws, and once I did that, I felt as if I was emancipated from my own thinking. This is what I wish for my Black queens. On the surface, it seems like a small thing that doesn't matter at all. But the truth is much grimmer. This is not a small issue at all. This affects the souls of our queens out there. And I believe, that once this minor issue is corrected, it will greatly impact our entire race, everywhere! Growing up with a half white best friend, I noticed mixed privilege. And I didn't notice it from white people. I noticed it among my own people. We give so much praise and love to people who look the least like us. Then we wonder why people who look almost identical to us feel that they are more superior, better looking, smarter and more capable than us. For instance, the Indians, Arabs, Dominicans, etc. But socially, this is what we empower. And that behavior must change for us to move forward as a people. The issue is a lot bigger than simply creating a multi billion dollar weave industry that some women will actually get their hair done before they pay their own rent! That's how important this nasty weave is to them. It's disgusting queen.

@Pioneer1 I agree brother. Not every Black person is suited to run their own business. This is where we went wrong. For example, I remember attending an all white school for a brief period until I registered myself into a Black high school. I never regretted that decision. However, in the white school, our brothers and sisters were showing out. The white kids were creating businesses and thinking of website ideas. I would hear them converse with one another. The internet was fairly new during that time and nothing how it is now. They were way ahead of us. The most technical thing my brothers and sisters got involved with was building music studios which required a degree of technical skills. But we always seem to fall short when technology is involved. I don't like downing my people but I can't just pretend I never experienced what I did. While we were dreaming of making 40k-60k a year, which is chump change now anyway, those white kids were planning on being our bosses. I think we cut ourselves short too often. Of course, when we run our own businesses we better be prepared to work ten times harder. And when we create jobs for other Black people, they need to learn to be more loyal to us, because we will naturally look out more for their interests without being taken advantage of. The problem is that we raise our kids to become accountants, bank workers, construction workers, and some of our parents raise us to believe ANY job is a good job because "at least you're not doing nothing." That's a trifling thought to put into a child's mind who we should be empowering to conquer the world. But our children are not taught to conquer anything. In fact, they are indoctrinated to behave, cooperate, fit in, think like society, and virtually become slaves. When we think of creating Black businesses, we must understand what that will mean for our people. More abundant jobs in impoverished and urbanized communities. Businesses whose priority should be to put at least ten to 20 percent of profits back into the community that they sell products in, which would create pools of money for our next generation to continue the wealth and start their own businesses. If Black people stopped spending their money on non-black businesses today, by tomorrow we would actually start retaining the trillion dollars wealth that they claim we contribute to this nation. That could perhaps, finally work in our interest and turn some of our hoods into prospering communities. But we do have to realize that most of us will not start out at that top. There are levels to this. We prove ourselves and work our way to something better.

@Pioneer1 You nailed it brother and that makes a lot of sense to me. Our people are too indoctrinated and because I don't know everyone's religious beliefs, I will stay away from religion for now. But I agree, under this current system of white supremacy, we are being slowly destroyed - which in a way, is worst than being destroyed quickly where we could at least realize what's happening and fight back. You also make an impressive observation about the iq of a majority of our people which we should stop failing at addressing. the key is understanding and most of our people have no clue of what is being done and how, especially are precious misguided youth. Also, those of us that do, follow the b.s. for the sake of fitting in with our backward social structure. The result is chaos in the Black community. And if we god forbid, criticize Black people for any reason, then the word coon gets used all too comfortably. So what have we got? A group of people who won't even take criticism from each other for the sake of trying to get it right. One day we will even have the Bloods and Crypts yelling racism because the media won't focus on all the good that they do for the Black community! That's when they are not out killing single brothers or killing their children! Mine as well give the most destructive people in our communities record deals and indoctrinate our children with more b.s. And never scold Black women about their weaves because they could still love themselves. At least until we learn that a Black woman was captured on a viral YouTube video in which she is seen cutting the tail off of a horses ass so she can wear it on her head. The really sad reality is that these things have happened already and it's getting worst and worst. @CyniqueI am not against Black American people acquiring land in Africa at all! I think that will be required eventually anyway. Now we must remember. African Americans tried building our own nation in Liberia. I believe they are still fighting the same war that the US government began during the inception of the country. It was never supposed to be a success. I've recently read that many of the citizens have turned into cannibals. So we better make sure we get our priorities set straight this time and plan it right! But even still queen... I love that idea!

When I was a kid, you NEVER heard Black women refering to eachother as "bitch" or "that's my bitch". I grew up in a Black neighborhood in a Black city and I'm telling you I NEVER heard them use that term in any type of endearment. It was always a term of insult that no one (including another Black woman) would call a Black woman unless they were looking for a shoe upside the head. Then I started hearing it from a few Black female celebrities in the early 2000s. I forgot whether this was in a movie or during a stand-up comedy routine but I know it was some semi-famous Black entertainers who started using it to refer to their friends and I KNEW right then and there it was going to "catch on" and be a term embraced. For too long racist Whites have been able to.....through entertainment....easily manipulate Black youth into doing and saying almost anything they want because too many of our young people aren't smart enough to realize they're being influenced or made fools out of. Just like many young Black male rappers today.....like Kodak Black and Lil Wayne...are being used to encourage young Black males to look and act like clowns and embrass themselves. Women like Nicki Minaj and Beyonce are being used to promote self hatred in the Black community. They're basically telling Black women that if you want to be seen as beautiful, attractive, and want the men to chase you around then you need to lighten your skin and dye your hear blonde. Getting up in our people's faces and arguing with them about this is too often just a waste of time because many of our people don't have the intelligence to understand...comprehend....what's being done to them. Quite frankly, they're too STUPID to recognize they're being manipulated. The best solution is for like minded Black people to organize themselves and start developing their OWN media networks and entertainment venues where we can begin to promote OUR OWN versions of beauty and attractiveness among our people in it's natural forms. It's going to be hard to take a 50 year old man who grows up seeing long flowing wavy hair as beautiful to accept the kinky hair of a sister who's gone natural. But if we get our people as children and start them off as babies accepting kinky natural hair as attractive.....that will be the key to reversing the hypnosis.

Well, i don't think how black women wear their hair is at the core of black problems. In America the black race is pretty much screwed because the self-destructive, dead-end, innercity lifestyle perpetuates itself and is a detriment to the entire race. But black people as individuals can thrive by learning to circumvent racism and by emulating what white people do to achieve a modicum of success. Those who have done this comprise the black middle class who, if we are to believe Mel Hopkins, another poster here, are a segment in society who are doing fairly well for themselves, wearing their hair extensions and designer clothes driving their fine cars, and living in nice homes. What you envision would require African-Americans to relocate in a new territory and go back to square one, a starting point where slavery would not be a factor and where black pride would be nurtured. And that is not necessarily an impossible dream, i guess. White Americans may not be in the majority, but their culture is the dominate one here.

unrelated side bar: @NubianFellow I like the way you link to related content on your website. This is how the web is "supposed" to work. People come here discover your site, go there and discover another site. and so on. Image if more of us did this.... Instead we are rapidly approaching a point where the Facebook is becoming the WWW.