Earlier this year, I wrote about Beyoncé’s politically charged Super Bowl performance and the scandal that arose in its wake. Half the world praised her for giving Black empowerment a moment in the media, while the other half branded her a racist and threatened to boycott her music.
Beyoncé made no apologies and paid no heed to the angry mob. Instead, she later followed up the performance with the release of Lemonade. Since its release, the album has inspired critical acclaim, a whole new host of pop culture references… and the witch hunt for one very elusive “Becky”.
In her song Sorry, Beyoncé stated:
He only want me when I’m not there He better call Becky with the good hair
Brilliantly Bad Decision
In hopes of capitalising on the spotlight thrown on Beyoncé yet again, two staffers of Glamour devised a brilliantly terrible plan. They fired back at Beyoncé’s Becky with the Good Hair by posting:
I had to see it to believe it. I couldn’t believe that anyone living in a multicultural society, like America or the UK, could be so bloody clueless as to why this would be inappropriate.
The responses on social media further brought perhaps the biggest embarrassment any lifestyle and entertainment brand has faced in quite some time.
Glamour Magazine is not Alone
But I would soon learn that Glamour staffers weren’t the only ones who didn’t quite get it. Many people actually have no idea what this means.
The following day, while Michael and I drove back from the gym, I asked him if he had heard about the incident.
To put things into context here, let me just inject the necessary detail that my husband is White.
Michael raps, has more Black friends than I do, and knows more about Ebonics than I will ever care to learn. Yet, even he was clueless as to why the article was offensive, and as to what on Earth the phrase “Becky with the good hair meant”.
“Isn’t that the whole thing about Jay-Z cheating on Beyoncé?” he asked me.
“Becky isn’t the point. Don’t you know what ‘good hair’ means?” I asked incredulously.
He didn’t.
It was at that moment that I had to step back and re-evaluate what I believed should have been common knowledge and fairly obvious. After all, I come from a predominantly Black country, whereas America is… well… America.
So let me explain why this is not just another minority-tantrum like the many that make it through the media.The History Lesson
Of all the angry tweets directed at Glamour, this one summed up the root of the problem best.
The keywords here are “historical significance”. This is because the phrase good hair wasn’t coined by Beyoncé for Lemonade, or even by 90s rap. It’s been a part of the Black Movement and the Black struggle since the days of slavery, and is deeply rooted in the journey of Black women (and men) from properties to human beings.
To keep slaves compliant, they were taught that their natural features made them somehow less worthy of rights and freedoms than other races. This primarily included the colour of their skin, and the texture of their hair. Coincidentally, these are the two most distinguishing features of what it means to be Black.
After slavery, as civil rights movements took shape and Blacks received their first chance of assimilating into regular society, these differences posed a problem. But while Black skin brought no inherent inconveniences besides people’s personal biases, Black hair did.
Let me explain how.
The Struggle is Real
For most Black women, our hair is still a part of that daily struggle – especially in an era where personal appearances mean so much. Our friends of other ethnic groups and mixes can easily throw their hair into a ponytail in five seconds. But our frizzy hair obeys no law and no man.
Even in the corporate world, many of us are forced to ditch our natural hair, because corporate thinks our kinky locks are too naughty for regular business operations. And at my Catholic school, every ethnic hair-do was banned in the rule books, and as we tried new ones – like my signature Mickey Mouse puffs in seventh grade – those were quickly outlawed, too.
But ironically, the people who notice our hair the most? – is us. While other teenagers mostly worried about body image issues and acne, we worried about that and our hair. Maybe mostly our hair.
Many of us have tried everything – perms, presses, cornrows, braids, and just cutting the damn thing off. Sometimes we’ve done so much crap to it, it just falls off on its own…
And all of that to conform to what regular society decides is good hair – which is essentially not our stubborn kinky hair. Good hair is the Black Community’s bitterly-spoken name for obedient, soft, silky smooth locks of the Mixed, the Asians, Latinas, and of course White folks.
It’s worry-free hair; the hair of the models they put in Pantene ads, and the girls on Pinterest with an effortless bun on the top of their heads.
In contrast, our naturally dry, frizzy hair is bad hair. We are taught from an early age through dolls, school rules, corporate expectations, and the media that our genetically gifted natural hair is not sufficient, fashionable, or appropriate.
To soften the message, the media often puts forward an image that kinky (or nappy hair) looks like this:
This is true to an extent, but more accurately, this is what African hair looks like when a woman is mixed. In other words, if Michael and I had a daughter, she would likely have a similar hair type to either of these two women. Often times, these hair-types become grouped with good hair because it’s “less Black”.
But for most of us, our hair looks a bit more like this:
Imagine trying to get hair that kinky to meet society’s professional, beautiful, and neat standards, like these Beckys with the Good Hair.
And then imagine the overwhelming pressure to meet these expectations. We quite literally get chemical burns from relaxers and heat burns from press combs just trying to keep up. As one tweep summed it up nicely:
The Way Forward
Of course, things are changing now. Many corporations “allow” us to wear our natural hair without causing a fuss. I, for instance, wore my dreadlocks when I worked at Xerox Business Services.
Similarly, many magazines, fashion shows, and movies also feature Black women who embrace their natural heritage; whether they have bad hair, good hair or something in-between.
As we grow older we learn what works for us, and we accept that we’ll just have to spend more time and more money on making our bad hair good enough to meet societal expectations.
In fact, Beyoncé made a strong statement by refusing to chemically alter her daughter’s hair – at least, not yet. However, when that same Queen Bey – the most powerful female symbol in the Black Community – hires a team to make her look like a Becky with the Good Hair, you know we still have a ways to go…
awesome! very well written! However “Becky with the good hair” is meant “another woman whom hair is longer than mine.” AKA a ‘non-African american’ (Caucasian) woman with the better hair. REALLY LOVE THIS TOPIC!! nevertheless, visit my site of poetry http://www.poetrybykiah.wordpress.com . You’ll either love it, or relate.
I take your point, but good hair is more than just length. It’s also texture.
Thanks for reading! 🙂
True.
I couldn’t agree more, awesome post. Great, relevant information.
Thank you, and thank you so much for reading and commenting!
No problem…anytime
This has made my day. Thank you for the good read.
Thank YOU for reading and commenting. I’m glad you enjoyed it.
I know I have to sound like such a hippie, & I get so much crap from people for it – but I really do wish we could all just get along sometimes. It’s a nice thought. We’re stronger together. Not all divided and arguing. The president himself tried to give a speech addressing the matter and was shunned by both parties for : “Oh there’s no such thing as a Utopia” – I just shook my head.
I was screaming at my TV “The man is dropping knowledge on all of you.”
Reblogged this on Lorrie P beauty & style and commented:
Love the content in this post.
Awesome article! Thanks for educating people about this.
Thank you! It was my pleasure!
Great article. I think it’s sad this stereotype of “good hair” that specifically black women have bought into. I fall into the category of the “good hair” as I am a mixed South African / Native American / European descent. My African sisters from other parts of South Africa claim I am not African or as African because I am mixed all the while they wear hair that doesn’t even belong to him. We let our people do that by not being proud of our heritage. Notice it is a term most popular in African culture yet not Caucasians. I’m proud of the movement for African women to wear their hair natural. A famous quote comes to mind. “No one can make you feel inferior without your permission.”
Thank you!
Good hair is a term used by Whites as well, but it’s more about aesthetics than a racially or politically charged statement for them, as shown with Glamour’s Beckys.
I do agree that it’s sad we’ve bought into that, which is why I originally got dreadlocks. Best decision I ever made!
This was such an informative and powerful post with a great message! I tend to stay away from pop culture trends so I hadn’t heard of this Beyoncé controversy but I’m glad to have learned something new after reading this. The media’s portrayal of certain looks characteristic of certain races has always been frustrating to me, especially as a biracial child (I’m half white, half Vietnamese). And even though based on my ethnicities it wouldn’t seem that I would understand the frizzy hair struggle, let’s just say that my dad had a blonde fro in the seventies and so his school removed his picture from his senior yearbook. I’ve learned to embrace my hair (in spite of really sticking out in family pictures with the Asian side of my family), but it still breaks my heart whenever friends with curly or kinky hair feel pressured to conform to the media’s standards and get their hair chemically straightened. However, I think times are slowly changing and people will stop fighting who they are and learn that there is nothing wrong with themselves in their natural states.
I think times really are changing, but it can’t really change fast enough if we don’t try to embrace our heritage more. Of course, it’s all personal choice. But it’s counterproductive to complain about the pressure, say we want change, but give in to it.
Thanks so much for dropping by. I’m glad you enjoyed the post!
I stopped because I saw Beyonce and I am a Beyonce fan. I stayed because the content of your post is interesting. THANK YOU for explaining the whole good hair/bad hair thing; excellent job, well done. Are you serious? The staff at Glamour really did that? o how dumb. And the 2 Beckys posed for the pic? LOL Well, let us keep in mind that about 90% of the world don’t know, or forgot, that Beyonce is an African American. Good Post!
Haha – thank you! I’m not a huge fan of Beyonce but no one can deny she is talented and the most powerful African American female symbol of this generation. I’d say she outranks Oprah at this point.
I’m glad you enjoyed the post and that you found it informative. And you’re right, Beyonce so dominates the mainstream that people like Glamour forget to keep her music in context.
Thanks again!