VIDEO TRANSCRIPT
Hello everyone this is Breanna Rutter author of one of my most popular books the natural hair Bible and founder of howtoblackhair.com for these videos I love to answer the questions that you all send me via email so if any of you have any questions that you like for me to answer check out description box below for more information this video is because of an email that I received from Quanda and Quanda goes on to say that she has natural hair and she feels as though she doesn't fit in with her coworkers because they have straight hair she also goes on to say that she feels the pressure from them to straighten hair and even though she doesn't want to she's constantly feeling judged and criticized for her hair not being straightened so was she wants to know is why is it that straight hair is automatically the standard so thanks Quanda for your email and what I'm going to do is answer for you on three points on why I believe that straight hair is the standard point number one so Quanda my first point is that most people will typically do what they see everyone else doing for the most part in psychology there something called social proof and it really means just that social proof means that even if you see a lot of people doing something that's right or wrong you will typically go along with doing it just so that way you can fit it nobody wants to be the odd man out so say for instance your outside in your somewhere in a busy area you see a lot of people pointing up at the sky and looking up you're naturally going to look up because you believe that there something in the sky that you need to see or say furnaces you're just walking down the sidewalk and you see a lot of people walking in a certain line in a certain direction you're naturally going to go ahead over and walk in that direction just because there may be danger around in a certain area or it may be a reason why everyone has to walk on a certain side of sidewalk so really all of this is happening subconsciously and its just that are urged to make sure that you're not being the odd one out so that way you are in line with what's supposedly right even if the situation doesn't mean that is technically right point number two so my second point is that straight hair is automatically the standard because majority rules the reason why I say this is because really is more of a population thing on why all of us or many of us automatically filled inclination to take on the look of straight hair just for instance here in the United States the population of black people is about 15% but 80 to about 85% of the population are those who are of a Caucasian descent or of an Asian descent and they typically have straighter hair and on the other hand black people African-American people typically have hair that is of a curly or kinky texture so because you will see most people out in society with straight hair you're naturally going to have the pressure to have that look with your hair and then specifically in the workplace if everyone's hair straightened you're naturally going to feel pressured from them just by example of having straight hair so I'm not saying that straightening your hair is right or wrong and in no way a form is you having natural hair right or wrong its just the thing that goes right back onto social proof no one wants to feel like the odd man out and when you are will typically feel that pressure to blend and which are environment and then in the same breath if you would to reverse the roles and it was 80% or more of the US population was black and then 10 to 15% was white our hair will be the majority so then if anyone is walking around with straight hair they will fill that need or have that pressure to change your hair so that way they can fit in with the looks of society and not feel like the odd man out point number three so Quanda my last point I want to mention is that we usually have a way of trying to solve an issue by automatically putting up an emotional answer or emotional defense for why something is the way it is but in most times if we step outside of that and actually look at it through it with a different set eyes then we can figure out what's the actual situation at hand so most people will usually say with their emotions that oh white America just doesn't like our Afro hair and tries make us feel bad for when no one is blatantly saying that for the most part most people don't even know the difference between if something is just curly or if something is even a weave sometimes or whether it’s your natural hair so it just feels like an inclination when we're getting stares or someone is mentioning something about hair is number one everyone is not educated about natural hair or even if the hair did they see on your head is even a weave or whether is not we some of the stuff is foreign to of individuals especially to someone who doesn't have your type of hair for instance a white person so most times if you're ever getting stares and why person does mostly because they may not understand exactly what your hair is or if they have even seen Afro hair before because some women like to where weaves or they like to wear curls or braids so sometimes a lot of the imagery that we put out with our hair is literally brand-new to a certain type of people who have never seen our hair displayed in such a way so instead of emotionally feeling as though white people don't like Afro hair maybe some of them don't but for the most part I believe that is just the thing of a numbers thing is just majority rules when you're seeing everyone with predominantly straight hair which is how our population is here of most people are being white or Asian so if you see a lot of people straight hair your naturally gonna feel as though your pressure to do the same thing or you get stairs are or people are going to go gawk at you or point because is not something that you see most of the time so Quanda does on my three points that I wanted to say because I don't feel as though you are necessarily being attacked maybe subconsciously he feels that way but in most cases it's only because it's a social proof type of thing and if you don't blend in you stick out so I hope you understand and also hope that you can come to terms as far as what does that you should take to make your environment a little bit more of a comfortable place to be when you're working so thanks for your email and I hope everyone else has enjoyed this video who has watched as well you have any comments about this please feel free to let me know what you think and also send me your email messages if you have any questions and before any of you go make sure to sign up for my email list so that way you can be automatically entered into giveaways that I do and also only their update you all with exclusive content so until then I will see all of you in my very next video