Spinoff of a Spinoff: Does Your Hair Texture and Skin Color "Conflict"

[aegis]

no i dont have that problem. nor am i surprised when i see dark skinned women with silky hair or light skinned women without it. i knew this little boy who was as dark as midnight but had the silkiest 3a/2b curls (in his case he was mixed. his mom was senagalese and his dad was a whole slew of things and had silky hair). actually my friend has a thing for skinny dark skinned girls with silky hair (ha!)

and i remember seeing this little girl with light skin and blue eyes and a head full of blond 4b curls and i thought that was cool looking. my grandma is dark and doesn't have a curl on her head, it's like fine 2a/2b hair or something. and last time i checked, we are not mixed with anything.

i don't really have expectations of features and hair whenever i see black folk. we're such a mix of things.

 

[chrisanddonniesmommy]

I'm light-skinned/yellowbone/redbone/whatever with 3c/4a hair. I don't see any possible conflict with me. My sister is medium-brown with 3c hair. While we do have mixed ancestry, I would think because of the wide range of genetics among African-Americans, you'd see it.

 

[FluffyRed]

*raises hand*

Mine conflict. This may affect my perception of colorism, because I was called beady bead, had my hair break off in Jr. High school, the whole nine.

Then I got older and started going to a stylist, only to have folks dismiss any progress I made with, "well you have 'good hair' anyway." Most of my fam is darker than I am and has way longer hair. I'm the nappiest in my family, the nappiest I've ever seen (i.e. - most "shrinky") and only one person has hair as tight as mine is that I've seen on the web. And that was WHEN I was a member of nappturality. So, yeah, mine definitely "conflict."

 

[FluffyRed]

Anyway... I asked because those two light skinned parents produced a dark brown baby and that didn't sound right.

My grands on both sides are light (3 are light, one is kinda cinnamon) and have chocolate, medium and yellow kids. I have an aunt and uncle who are cinnamon-colored and a little blonde green-eyed Vanessa Williams popped out. The fam thought there had been some infidelity going on for a minute.

Most kids that I see look more like a mix of their grandparents than they do their parents. In my fam's case, that explains all of the above.

 

[Dposh167]

its funny cuz prior to the boards, i would look at Bre from ANTM & think.....what is she? she has to have something in her for her hair to be that texture. I convinced myself that she texturized it. It's like she couldn't possibly have natural 3ish hair.

it was silly of me to even think that back in the day. glad i'm informed now

 

[mezzogirl]

I've always seen people of all complexions run the gamet with hair texture. Nothing looks odd or mis-matched to me. I don't even think twice.

 

[BeetleBug]

No, my texture goes with my skin color b/c I was born with it. No conflicting here.

 

[Irresistible]

I cant even understand what the exact 'conflict' would be

 

[jupitermoon]

I cant even understand what the exact 'conflict' would be

Supposedly, light skinned people of African descent should have "type 2 or 3" hair and brown/dark people of African descent should have "type 4" hair, lol. Prior to frequenting Black message boards, I never knew about dark skinned Blacks not being about to have naturally curly hair.

 

[Irresistible]

Supposedly, light skinned people of African descent should have "type 2 or 3" hair and brown/dark people of African descent should have "type 4" hair, lol. Prior to frequenting Black message boards, I never knew about dark skinned Blacks not being about to have naturally curly hair.

yeah I get the premise of it all

just dont ring a bell in me when I see it , nor have I lived it , outside sources on this never bothered me

I mean I did get when I was younger ' You dont have good hair for being mixed'

none of it ever meant much to me , and I dont view the world that way

if someone is born with what they are born with there cant possibly be a conflict if God made it that way-the eyes I view the world from and most everyone close to me

I understand not everyone does tho

 

[FluffyRed]

I cant even understand what the exact 'conflict' would be

The conflict with many folks' expectations of what your hair texture should be, given your complexion, whether light, medium or dark.

 

[Katherina]

i dunno. i never really thought any combinations were conflicted. my mom is ethiopian, medium-light brown skin and her side is 3a/b hair, so i've seen that.. my dad's family is medium-brown skinned and mostly 4a with long thick black hair (no mixes). my mixed friends in high school had various textures and were all light skinned (bra strap 3b curls / SL breaking perms & appeared to be 3c/4a)...it has a lot to do with how you grew up. as toddlers we make connections...its natural and helps us survive. if as a child you only see light ppl with long hair ... that's subconscious until its brought to your attn later in life when you see chocolate skin with long hair.

i have had some interesting questions depending on where i lived at that time. i'm what you could describe as caramel colered/ medium light brown. where i grew up, the demographic is mostly white american, with some interspersed black american and mixed (no african, hispanic, native, carribean or asian!). there, black girls thought i was mixed sometimes (eg when my hair curled in the pool - i'm 4a though). when i changed locations and was around people of various cultures and ethnicities, people would ask me about my ethnicity more correctly. it all depends on what they saw growing up. because the girls where i grew up weren't used to seeing non-white girls with curly hair, they assumed i was mixed. the ones who had been around people of all different ethnicities knew better.

 

[lovenharmony]

No "conflict" here....I have the hair texture genetics gave me so it is what it is

 

[Irresistible]

The conflict with many folks' expectations of what your hair texture should be, given your complexion, whether light, medium or dark.

yeah I know .......

but anyway, people want to put us in their own nice little neat box of what to expect from us, and what we should all be like across the board. They want to find nice little 'rules' for us to fit in and not break for them to be comfortable-i guess

we are all breaking rules and not living in a box all over the place

its all genetics and DNA for us just as much as it is for the rest of the world

bottom line as many have said, its ignorance

nobody is a walking talking living breathing 'conflict' literally

its how the DNA came together just like for everyone else

I did get the point of the question tho

 

[aegis]

yeah I get the premise of it all

just dont ring a bell in me when I see it , nor have I lived it , outside sources on this never bothered me

I mean I did get when I was younger ' You dont have good hair for being mixed'

none of it ever meant much to me , and I dont view the world that way

if someone is born with what they are born with there cant possibly be a conflict if God made it that way-the eyes I view the world from and most everyone close to me

I understand not everyone does tho

this. the whole idea of your features and hair "conflicting" is weird and it reeks of eurocentrism to me and what we're supposed to look like. genetics is not straight forward like that

 

[MyAngelEyez~C~U]

um, yes, my skin color and hair texture do conflict...

ETA, I have no issue with it.

 

[goodmorningruby]

This is something I get really worked up about. I am mulatto/tri-racial (Black, White and Cherokee). So I am light skinned, but I have mostly 4a coarse hair. And people expect me to have the "good hair"/3abc. (Hate that term) I'm pretty sure when my hair reaches an exceptional length and health, it will be attributed to my racial make-up, instead of my hard work. You know what I'm talking about...."it's because you're light skinned"...

Anyway, this is kind of a loaded topic.....

ETA: I think we all have expectations about how certain people should look like, period. That includes eye color, skin tone, hair texture, etc. It's called stereotyping! But one of the things I really appreciate and am grateful for is that "ethnic" hair is so diversified and it's hard to pigeon hole our hair, for lack of a better way to put it, based on skin tone. (Our skin is just as varied)

But I am not "conflicted"...

 

[Irresistible]

This is something I get really worked up about. I am mulatto/tri-racial (Black, White and Cherokee). So I am light skinned, but I have mostly 4a coarse hair. And people expect me to have the "good hair"/3abc. (Hate that term) I'm pretty sure when my hair reaches an exceptional length and health, it will be attributed to my racial make-up, instead of my hard work. You know what I'm talking about...."it's because you're light skinned"...

Anyway, this is kind of a loaded topic.....

Exactly!

They said all that to me too though

 

[YankeeCandle]

I personally do not get grief because I fit the stereotype of light skin and tightly curly but not afro-textured hair (Andre would probably call me a 3c with some 3b, especially in the back). My grandma woulds stump some sheltered people because her skin is as pale as milk but she has "4a"-ish hair.

I've noticed that the people who are most flummoxed by human variation are those who grew up in a community where most folks fit into one, far-end-of-the-spectrum category. For example, Norwegian-Americans from smalltown Wisconsin and (non-recent immigrant) African-Americans who rarely spent time outside of their own small urban neighborhood have each expressed some statements to me that indicate their limited experience of humankind in all its variety.

I and those of my friends from who came from stunningly internally-varied ethnic groups like U.S. Creole, Guyanese, Puerto Rican, North African, Dominican, Cuban, etc. never had this hang-up that dark skin must always be accompanied by the tightest-patterened hair and that light skin must come with the looser curl territory. All we had to do was look at our own extended families to see that wasn't true.

Ditto my Euro-American, African-American friends, European, and African friends who came from very diverse cities or regions in their countries, where they saw a variety of people from every nation and learned to distinguish between them rather than lump them all together into one blanket category.

Cultural ignorance bothers me a lot because (a) it can be fairly easily remedied but, due to continued segregation and poor eductional techniques, isn't, and (2) the ignorant person usually doesn't recognize their own ignorance (and may even consider themselves an amateur authority on matters of culture and ethnicity) and thus resists absorbing new information or worldviews.

 

[vainღ♥♡jane]

if as a child you only see light ppl with long hair ... that's subconscious until its brought to your attn later in life when you see chocolate skin with long hair.

thank you for saying that. i know we're 'enlightened' on this board, but many times, what people see is what they believe.​

 

[blacksapphire]

yea definately....I'm tri-racial (white, Indian and black) but I have a dark complexion, mocha like I think, and my hair was long growing up , but that's b/c my mom took great care of my hair. As I grew up and stop taking care of it it started to get damaged and shorter and now that I'm taking care of it when it get longer I know the first thing ppl are gonna ask is if I'm mixederplexed, but for now, because my hair is short They accept that I'm black

I hate when ppl see long hair and their automatic response it she's mixed

 

[anon123]

I'm not going to act brand new and lie. I usually do associate skin color and hair type.

Me, too. Or more accurately, I think if you fall within a range of skin colors, you are more likely to fall within a certain range of hair textures. I know it isn't necessary, as one of my good friends as a small child was darker than me but had 2c looking hair. That doesn't mean I don't think there's a statistically significant correlation.

Anyway, no one has ever expressed surprised about my hair texture.

 

[PeaceFlow]

Not really, my hair is different textures but mostly 4ab.

The thing I have been wonderin is that my hair looks soft because I always have a fluffy fro and its pretty healthy right now, why are people surprised its soft. Maybe people expect wouldn't be surprised to find it was soft if I was light IDK.

I think before the board I thought mixed = good possibility of long hair and its generally what I see. Since that Chris rock "how often do you see women with long hair" thread I have been looking out for full black women and still have not seen one. All broken, 4a or b or cut short, its been at least a month of looking. I think also unless you are talking about dark people with mixed heritage I hardly ever see them with 3a/b/c, I don't know if thats anything to do with being in the UK or not.