I’m white with straight black hair.
I plopped into a chair at a mall haircutting salon last year for a quick trim.
The beautician was a lovely black lady who was a bit chatty.
My straight black hair brought out an odd emotional reaction in her. I got a loooong story about her younger sister’s straight hair, while she and her older sister have curly hair. The oldest sister treated the baby sister differently.Now that they’re all adult, she was still sad and said, “even today, she’ll invite my younger sister out to lunch and ignore me”
I don’t think we understand how deep-seated these issues are with them. She looked to be in her 40’s and it almost brought tears to her eyes.
I really don’t know what can be done about it, it’s their culture.
I was stunned (and this was close to 20 years ago) to learn what my office friends spent on their hair (strightening chems; colors; weaves were just becoming popular). I left that job (it was in a County govt office) because DH and I purchased a house in a neighboring county, but I remember thinking my co-workers didn’t buy real estate due to tieing up all their money in ‘hair’ issues.
It really was irrational and sad.
They call straight hair “good” hair.