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Black History Month: Madame CJ Walker
February 16, 2016 at 4:35 am
(This post was last modified: February 16, 2016 at 5:48 am by BrokenQuill92.)
So I have a bone to pick with the legacy of Madame CJ Walker. She's often hailed as a great inventor. One of first black female self-made millionaires. But no one stops to think that her success was built on the roots denigrating black female beauty. The creation of the relaxer (not invented by her but heavily marketed), and mass marketing of the hot comb is not something we as a people should be celebrating. I'm not saying black women and Al Sharpton shouldn't have the choice to straighten our curls but to pretend as if the history of doing isn't rooted in shame and white supremacy is wrong. And celebrating a woman who helped reinforce Eurocentric beauty standards is wrong.
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RE: Black History Month: Madame CJ Walker
February 16, 2016 at 8:34 am
(This post was last modified: February 16, 2016 at 9:22 am by Regina.)
I don't wholly disagree with you, but I think instead of criticising black people for encouraging assimilation, criticise the system that causes it in the first place. You can't really demonise black people for inventing stuff to "look less black", when they live in a white-dominated society where looking as European as possible brings them privileges. It's a whole system there that we have to critique, not just one individual.
I think considering the context of the time is important as well. This was at the turn of the last Century, slavery hadn't long been abolished, it was a period of high racism when America had the prelude to the KKK and Jim Crow. I don't think at that point it would have been possible for black women to have a fully-fledged natural hair movement, without running into some serious problems for it.
I've just been reading about her, and tbh she did a lot of good work besides that, encouraging entrepeneurship among black women and contributing to NAACP causes. She donated so much money to charitable causes to help black people.
"Adulthood is like looking both ways before you cross the road, and then getting hit by an airplane" - sarcasm_only
"Ironically like the nativist far-Right, which despises multiculturalism, but benefits from its ideas of difference to scapegoat the other and to promote its own white identity politics; these postmodernists, leftists, feminists and liberals also use multiculturalism, to side with the oppressor, by demanding respect and tolerance for oppression characterised as 'difference', no matter how intolerable." - Maryam Namazie
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RE: Black History Month: Madame CJ Walker
February 16, 2016 at 8:57 am
(This post was last modified: February 16, 2016 at 8:59 am by paulpablo.)
When anyone does something considered wrong on this planet it normally takes 4 or 5 degrees of separation for the issue to be blamed on white people, it only took 1 step on this thread for the issue to be put on white people.
I don't personally think there's an issue ANYONE can be blamed for when it comes to most natural laws of attraction and beauty standards (there's some exceptions to this but nothing related to this thread) If you're a man and you're short with a small dick, it isn't the fault of women you can't get sex, if you're a black woman with a huge afro and you live in a society where men on average find straight hair more attractive it isn't societies fault. You're born with it and you can either change it by manipulating your hair style or just accept people on average will find you less attractive. Or just wait for society and beauty standards to change which they often do. I'm still waiting for beards to stop being attractive to women because my facial hair is as tough as metal wire and I'm not going to endure that pain just to look more trendy, but I won't be blaming society or women for finding beards attractive either.
Are you ready for the fire? We are firemen. WE ARE FIREMEN! The heat doesn’t bother us. We live in the heat. We train in the heat. It tells us that we’re ready, we’re at home, we’re where we’re supposed to be. Flames don’t intimidate us. What do we do? We control the flame. We control them. We move the flames where we want to. And then we extinguish them.
Impersonation is treason.
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RE: Black History Month: Madame CJ Walker
February 16, 2016 at 9:23 am
(This post was last modified: February 16, 2016 at 9:31 am by Regina.)
Ok, edited. Happy now?
"Adulthood is like looking both ways before you cross the road, and then getting hit by an airplane" - sarcasm_only
"Ironically like the nativist far-Right, which despises multiculturalism, but benefits from its ideas of difference to scapegoat the other and to promote its own white identity politics; these postmodernists, leftists, feminists and liberals also use multiculturalism, to side with the oppressor, by demanding respect and tolerance for oppression characterised as 'difference', no matter how intolerable." - Maryam Namazie
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RE: Black History Month: Madame CJ Walker
February 16, 2016 at 9:42 am
(February 16, 2016 at 9:23 am)Yeauxleaux Wrote: Ok, edited. Happy now?
I've just started work so I could be happier but I had a really good sleep so I'm feeling pretty fresh
Are you ready for the fire? We are firemen. WE ARE FIREMEN! The heat doesn’t bother us. We live in the heat. We train in the heat. It tells us that we’re ready, we’re at home, we’re where we’re supposed to be. Flames don’t intimidate us. What do we do? We control the flame. We control them. We move the flames where we want to. And then we extinguish them.
Impersonation is treason.
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RE: Black History Month: Madame CJ Walker
February 16, 2016 at 11:30 am
You're now blaming the system for people having certain standards of beauty, which system is this?
Are you ready for the fire? We are firemen. WE ARE FIREMEN! The heat doesn’t bother us. We live in the heat. We train in the heat. It tells us that we’re ready, we’re at home, we’re where we’re supposed to be. Flames don’t intimidate us. What do we do? We control the flame. We control them. We move the flames where we want to. And then we extinguish them.
Impersonation is treason.
