I don't think they understand You're not just talking about my hair at a certain point, You're talking about like me as a person. I feel like for you, will I feel like some of this started with you. Really young. Willow has the prettiest hair, and she just didn't believe it.
I didn't and I'm still trying to believe it. What's up, everybody, I'm Gammy and this is positively gam Every week I have raw, in depth conversations with inspirational people pushing for change on everything from aging, relationships, politics, wellness, to the current issues facing the black community. Okay, joining me is a lovely panel of strong black women, starting with one of my heartbeats, my lovely granddaughter, Willow, and we have
celebrity hairstylist Stacy Cisseron and hair historian Jay Lash. I really wanted to have this conversation. I've wanted to have it for a really long time. I know hair is supposed to be a woman's glory, but I don't know any Black woman who hasn't had a vacillating relationship with their hair. I know I have over the years, and I really think a lot of the struggle has to
do with how we've been brainwashed for centuries. I think that's that awakening and that understanding is something that has been suppressed for so long that I feel like just now even myself, like with me shaving my head and with me like trying to regrow that regrow physically and spiritually,
that relationship with my hair. I feel it so important because as a young girl, it was rough with my hair like it was, Yeah, it was, and that I hated my hair goes back to all the brainwashing that we went through making us feel like we had we had to in order for us to have any kind of self esteem about ourselves. Over the years, it was about assimilating into the culture of the colonizers and the way we looked in the way we dressed. I remember
you got mad one time because I wanted to get extensions. Yeah, we're gonna talk about that. We're gonna we're gonna talk about that. But I just want to get to this point and I want you to get us up to the point where we start mixing. Mm hmmm, you know not Yeah, greapes happening on plantations, and when you start this process, A couple of things happened. Number One, you have people who are now vibracial in their hair texture
is softer, curls are looser, they're considered prettier. And so this is where you start the term good hair, pretty kid, pretty she is. And there is a high arty created with white boats that we've been internalized amongst ourselves. And so there are documented cases of light skinned black boats having separate church ceremonies for themselves from the dark skin black footing. This is during this right, So this is when we start that process. We internalized that inferiority and
start to believe it. And it's been going on for
generations and generations. So you can see how we start separating from one another based on the brainwashing that we've black women with other black women, because like when I was younger, there would be like even family members that were my peers, like my cousins or whatever it was, because I had one cousin that had really beautiful flowing her and every time I would just look at her and I would because you're so beautiful, like I want that, And every time I would bring it up, she would
always just be like, not everyone can, and it would and it would be it was like a real hurt for me, like I was like wow, And then she'd be like trying to be like, maybe you should get a weave, maybe you should get a perm, maybe you should you know, and like all of these things, and like other black women, not even trying to be like no, like you're beautiful, Like we're different, but we're beautiful together. Okay.
So I want to take us back to the good hair, bad hair, because now we we understand where it all came from. But and actually that was a real stickler for me when I was growing up. I hated that because I had long braids and all of that. But the good hair, bad hair, I'm guilty of saying that, what are the proper terms that we should use when we're trying to describe our hair and not the good
hair bad hair? Stacy, let me tell you while you're talking my my brain, my emotions, it's it's such a trigger for us that I have about fifty million thoughts that just came to me. But the first thing that came to me is the reward and the punishment first of all that comes with good hair bad here. So even if you don't want to believe it, like oh I have beautiful hair, I have this I have that we go back to the punishment versus the reward. Okay, so what happens with the person with the good hair?
Are they getting different opportunities, are they getting different chances? Are they being more visible? Are they being taken seriously? Because there's a lot of things that come in with the hair, with the complexion and different things like that. So when I think about good hair bad hair as a professional, I could not refer to it that way. Especially with teaching consumers and teaching hair style this we refer to it more by its characteristics. What does it
look like? Is it straight? Is it wavy? Is it coally? Is it curly? That's more like how we refer to hair texture, hair type, density, perosity, and things like that. But even within our excuse me, I was just saying, because those words don't like throw shade on the person
you're talking now, because they're they're facts. They're now. But I'm not gonna say that I did not hear it growing up and even within having a Caribbean background and in in all of that comes with But the good hair bad hair to me, comes with the punishment versus reward, even though we switch it in our in our vocabulary, in our conversations. We're still gonna be punished somehow. We're still maybe not going to get the job opportunities or get noticed by somebody that we like, somebody that we
are attracted to make. What good hair versus bad here? So this is what I'm saying, so at that's my take. When the good here bad here, we would have to dig a little deeper to correct the punishment versus the rewards. If that's the exact replica of that culture that we pay from the exact same thing, you got different treatment, better jobs right on the plantation for lighter skin, longer hair.
Even with amongst ourselves we do that. So yeah, we're doing the exact same thing, and we haven't unlearned that behavior. It is corpus of rooting. Yeah, good is desirable, desirable, That is not desirable. And I don't know how true this is. We these things pop up on the Internet saying that black women are the least desirable women of all,
which that comes with its thing too. I feel like that I can't tell you how much that narrative, how much I've seen that narrative, and how much I've just been around it, even even people would be like, Oh, it's so interesting that your light skin, but your hair is not how I would expect. It's like always that.
It's always something like that, or it's we wanted to do this hairstyle, Like if I'm going to a photo shoot or something, it's we wanted to do this hairstyle, but your hair is just a little difficult today or something or whatever it is. But they think that it's like totally okay to say. They think it's just Oh, it's just a fact. It's just your hair is difficult
right now. It's I don't think they understand that you're not really You're not just talking about my hair at a certain point, You're talking about like me as a person. And I think that's where a lot of black women just start to feel that worth just starts to just slip away from them. They're feeling of their self worth, at feeling of value because things like that are being said. They're going to work, people are saying, oh, can't you it's standing up so it's so hot, how do you
get your hair that high? Which it's crazy. I feel like for you will, I feel like some of this started with you really young, and I remember just really listen, willowhead the prettiest hair. She has the prettiest hair, and she just didn't believe it. I didn't, and I'm still trying to believe it. I'm still in the process of my little fro. I'm like, I need to nurture you. I'm trying to, like I say mantras in the morning, I like put the oil in my hair. I'm like
really trying to. Like it's a self like regaining that like self love and that because I never had that. Yeah, and I just I never I understood it. I just jad and I just tried so hard to fight that and give her confidence and just tell her how beautiful she had, the the prettiest head of hair. What I will say is that when Mommy showed me the Rough and Stuff music video, that changed a lot because I was like, oh, I'm rough and stuff with my afro puffs, Okay.
I was like, this is my whole life. I wish the audience could actually see us, because you guys, with
your hair right now is absolutely beautiful. And I had pictures a Willow with her hair when she was little, and I just couldn't understand why she didn't see what I saw, and then we're gonna go back to you know, your statement that I was really upset when will I was young and she wanted extensions, and I felt like if we allowed her to get extensions that young, that we were just it was just gonna be downhill after that, because to me, it was an admission that what was
on her head was not good enough. And it was you and Kennedy. It was you and Kennedy and I just there were a lot of basically all of my black girlfriends at the time, we were all just we hate this, like we were all just we don't like the way we looked like. I would wake up in the morning and my hair because my hair is super course, so it would be like to the side and like
a like you know those troll dolls. It would look like to the side like that, and I would look at myself and just feel so ugly and I would cry almost every morning. And I guess I need to say too that it was really just an interesting journey because Jada and I don't have hair like Willows, our hair, our textures. They look at my mom's hair and I'd be like, why don't have to talk? But in our family, there are so many different textures of hair. Like my
mother's hair was straight and silky. So my mother and sister Karen, Karen's hair was so straight that you couldn't braid it. It wouldn't stay we would just it would just come out. And my mother wasn't good with caring for her hair. We didn't really know how to care for our hair. And like, even on my head, there's different textures in my head. Yeah, the name of my neck. For Jada and I, the nape of our necks is the straightest part of our hair. The crown is curlier,
and the sides it's just friends. But it's even like learning to like there's so many different parts of yourself, you know what I mean. Like there's so many different facets of gamming that it's like learning to accept. It's like a microcosm of yourself. Yeah, so you gotta figure it out exactly. You gotta figure it out. We gotta love yourself, love your hair, and that's that's a life journey, you know what I mean. I also feel again going
back to the connection, especially with young girls. I have teenagers, and no matter how much I try to instill in them, it goes back to we want to fit in, we want to feel connected, and we want to feel love. So we can be saying one thing, but it's still going to be based on the reactions of the friends, people you like and people who you want to fit in with. So you can be saying you're so beautiful, your hair so beautiful, but if somebody that she likes,
you cannot control the sparkle in somebody's eye. So maybe you just want to get a sparkle when somebody's I and you don't get it. And and so, no matter how much you try to tell your children love yourself, love yourself, there's this factor of wanting to belong, feel connected, feel love, and get that sparkle that they don't get. So the idea, even as an adult, is to find the sparkle in your own eye. Yeah, and not get it from somebody else. But it's the comparison, and we
just can't help it. I tell you it was painful. No, I would always it was painful, specifically from the cousin who had the really kurt like loose curly hair, and you would always go, boys don't like girls with afros. What I'm saying this is my point. This is exactly my point. So we just have to find a way too. And it's maybe it's just a process for that contrast to see that. I don't know good until I see bad. I don't know love until I see paint. I don't know.
Maybe it's just a part of that process to gain that that self love and connection. Well, we'll say you would just talking about Willow about this self study piece. I think it's really critical because I had a very similar experience. My mother was a hair stylist, is a hair stylist, and so she would quarrel my hair and there's a little girl. I look, I'm like making my little bit. But then when I got older, I started to want something different. I wanted my hair to be longer,
I wanted to be like the other people. I wanted the boys to like me, all of that because but what changed. I cut my hair off when I was seventeen, just cut it all off. And at that moment I started asking myself a lot of questions just about who I was. Fast forward, I'm thirty five and I've been an educator since I was twenty two. And what I
learned in that process two things. Number One as a high school history teacher, I noticed that we spend thirteen years minimum if you go all the way through, if you go on to college, it's more in school, and not any part of that is none of them. And so we spend all of this time being indoctrinated in all of this material, whether it's about government or health, or science or philosophies, from all these other people, and those them are truth, exact perfection, and so that's what
we think about the world. Opinions of other people start to matter more because we're taught that opinions of other people hold truth, not our own experience. We can't heard of anything from everywhere else, and so this self study piece is very big. I think that's critical. And I think there's a song that you have, what is it organization and can classification? That is real, That is so real that when we do that, it creates a hierarchy in our minds at ourselves and others and operate, And
so I think it's self study. I'm so glad you got that from that song. That's so many people were looking at me like girls doesn't make any sense. We need to organize things, it's what we need to I think if we can get out of these boxes, it'll help us to break down the higharchy. I agree. It's one of those things where you can't get free if you don't really know your truth. You are your own perfection.
There is no such thing as perfect, there's no such thing as absolute, you know, Like we're just all on our own particular journeys. But we're in a world that wants to categorize us so much, wants to create a superiority and the supremacy that we are indoctrinated with this, and so then it becomes hard to battle ourselves out. Even with the love of a like a good mother, a good grandmother, like telling us all these wonderful things, we can't get it because everything in the world is
telling us. No expert, they're not the expert they are. Yeah, that's really sad, it's true. It's really sad to think about it now. Wow, And when you talk when you put that on top of the generational trauma of being a black person, on top of that being a black woman, and then you're put into this system. Yeah, it's just a recipe for this is well, it grow down to survival, which is what we have to do. To just to survive.
So I want to talk a little bit. Let's go back to your journey with your hair and back, and what was it like when you cut your hair first time. It wasn't the first time we cut your hair, but it was it was the first time that you cut it off. And I have to admit that we we did a lot of experimentation with your hair because my mom was like, don't want to shave it all off at once. I was like, let's maybe the side, maybe half of the side exactly. But we also put heat
to her hair. We wouldn't permit, but we put heat to it, which again I did not want to do because I knew it was gonna change the texture off her hand, and I knew that wine it changed the texture of your hair. I'm getting this virgin progress. I die gress. I diegress. So you decided that you wanted to shave your hair, what would tell us what that
was about. I feel like all of the pressure that I felt from like even my own peers, even my own black female peers, from society, for myself, looking at the media, looking at women who were deemed attractive or desirable, all of that pressure, I feel like I just wanted to just throw it in the trash, like I just wanted to be like, I don't want to hold this anymore. I can't hold this anymore. This is becoming too heavy, and I just want it gone. I just want to gone.
I don't want to think about it. And you were so young when you made that decision. I did because it hurt very badly at a very young age to the enough, hurt enough to the point where I was like, this isn't worth it at a certain point to feel this pain, like I'd rather just not have it and not even be able to identify with anything that has to do with having hair at all. And I feel like it was more this second time that I cut my hair was more from a place of power and
from a place of love and compassion. But back in the day it was more from a place of I can't handle this anymore. It was more from a place of anxiety. So is your music guiding that? Or is how you're feeling? Is how you're feeling is guiding your music? Oh, how I'm feeling guide every Definitely. That's why there's two years in between each of my albums, because I'm like, not feeling it. Not this year, not this year. Okay,
I'm I'm feeling it this year. So this last time, with the last album that you put out, and you had Tyler just completely shave your head bald, What was that? What was the the process of coming to that? How did you come to that decision that you were going to number one, that you were going to shave your head and then you were going to shave it in that venue. Yeah, it took a read. It took a lot of preparation, obviously because it was and I guess we should talk a little twenty four hours in a
box because people don't really know that story. Yeah. Me, Me and Tyler had been working on this album in New York at Electric Lady for about I want to say, two or three months, and then one day he was like, wouldn't it be so crazy if we just did an anxiety attack just like in the place, like people could come watch it. And I was like, oh my god, that could be super dope. But at first I was like, I don't know, that's a little risky. I'm not sure
you know what I mean. But then the idea started forming and I was like, oh my goodness, like this could actually be really amazing, and so we split up. We split up an anxiety attack into eight different emotions, and the last emotions was like surrender and acceptance. And after going through all of those anger for three hours, sadness for three hours, numbness for three hours, like getting into these like insane emotions, I really felt like this.
It was almost like I had generated it within myself and I didn't expect it to be this powerful like I but I felt that that deep acceptance of the good, the bad, the light, the dark, like I'm here for it and I'm gonna bring I'm gonna love it with
a smile, I'm gonna everything. Everything is here. And I felt like that moment was so important for me to shape my head because it was almost like I'm letting go of my path who I was, you know what I mean, Like I'm letting go of the things that I beat myself up about, I'm letting go of my anxieties, I'm letting go of my fears. And when that, when those locks hit the floor, it was like, oh, honey, I'm a different person today. So in that regard, I
feel like my intentions were way purer this time. And I can really feel that now and even with the re growth of it coming back. Just like you were saying, there's a memory that comes along with tapping into it, and I feel every day and you have to pay attention. You can't just be like the memory is coming. No, you have to pay attention, you know what I mean, Like it's a it's an internal look and every day
checking in and that picture is just getting painted. And I'm so excited too to bring it into like myself and into action. Yeah. I just remember the feeling that I had when you started growing your dreads. It was just a feeling of the acceptance of yourself and I was just so I was like, she finally gets it. She finally is loving herself fully and understanding and believing
that she's beautiful as she is. But this is even another step of that because because when I had when I started growing my dreads, it actually happened by accident, and I was afraid because I was like, oh my god, like I went to my mom, was accident. It was an accident. I I started dread started happening and I was like yeah, and I was like, like I was panicking and my and I went to my mom and I was like, oh my god, what do I do? And she was like, let it be, honey. It was
like grow the locks, mate, why not? And so I grew the locks, and through that I started having a different kind of acceptance. But now I feel like this is even deeper because I want to learn how to actually take care of my hair. I want to learn what it needs, I want to learn how to I just want to learn it. I want to learn it as a being in its own And I feel like with the locks, I was just like do whatever, like whatever.
I didn't really try to take care of it, Like I didn't really try to, you know what I mean? I do. I have to tell you, Stacy, you might be able to speak on this. As I was doing some of my research for this, I came across a video on YouTube and I think it took place in Canada, the French side of Canada, and there was a woman who was teaching young girls and a young black girls in a salon how to take care of their hair.
And I'm telling you, it was such a beautiful thing to watch these girls, because if you don't know how to love and take care of your hair, it's hair is just so important, especially yeah, and how we feel about ourselves. Can you guys speak on that. I actually think I saw that video because I think it was like in French and they translated it. It hits a little different because I have young daughters and I'm always trying to I know, no matter what I say or
instilling them, they still have to feel it. They still have to they still have to feel it on their own. But equally, I do think that I don't stop saying it because they have to feel it. They just yet they have to see more images of themselves as beautiful. They have to learn how to manage and take care of their hair. And that was another reason. I have several reasons why I went natural, even that word. Jay and I were talking about going natural and they the
hair that's going out of your head. But just even them seeing me like this and constantly saying this is beautiful, this is beautiful, or learning how to manage it is another thing. Because one of the girls in the salon that she was teaching got very emotional because she didn't know, she didn't know com it, she didn't know how to style it. It was just a little twist something that she could do to manage her hair, or hearing somebody
say that she was beautiful because of her hair. So I do think that there's so many layers to help to reinforce it. And if we can do it from a young age coming up, it makes it a little easy. It's not going to be easy because it's coming from so many different directions, but we just need that representation. We need those voices to nurture and to let them know it's okay to just be. You don't have to be a cookie cutter. You don't have to be exactly
like the person next to you. And that's like, want to repeat for me, you don't have As a matter of fact, we were having a conversation in the house my daughter. One of them started to develop a little bit earlier, so she would start to wear baggy clothes. She just did not want the attention. And I said, it's funny because depending on where you grow up, that's what you're going to want to look like. She's in
school with more blacks and latinoz. So of course they want their hair to be looser, curls, They want to be a little bit more curvy. They don't want to be as tall. Isn't it crazy how you just want to be who we get accepted by who you're around. So if you're in a school with mostly Caucasian Indians, you want the characteristics they have. It's literally a process of this self discovery and knowing that you're beautiful in
any environment. That is like the want to repeat in the house, no matter what environment you're in, What are you gonna do change every single time you get into a different environment, or just be yourself? Yeah, you know. I want to ask you, ladies, how long have each of you been wearing your hair natural like this? Because I feel like we've gone in cycles. I feel like we went through a period in the sixties and seventies because I even went through it because I had long hair.
So my my journey was getting my hair relaxed as I got older. But I went through the stage of wearing it like my Angela Davis afro. Yeah, but it was a process for me to get that, Like I had to wash my hair and and roll it, section it off and put it in all these little tiny rollers all over my head to get my hair tightening off to form the afro. So even that was a process. But I just kind of feel like, like, one minute, it's acceptable. Now we've gone to this, We've even the
whole wee thing. I am struggling. I am struggling with it terribly. I know it's my own issue because I think that I put more on it than people actually, But in reality, gam I actually do think that all that you're putting on it is valid because the foundation of this issue is racism, just point blank white supremacy, capitalism, racism.
So these things, it's hard to clean up the one little mess in one little section of the factory that capitalism is creating, then to go to the head of it and turn off the machine, if that makes any sense, Because I feel like this, these insecurities and these cultural hurts and traumas are so deep, but they're also just
branches of bigger issues that need to be addressed. So if every black woman goes, we're not going to buy your products, We're not gonna wear your weaves, We're not gonna Now, there's so much money that these companies are losing because most of the people that are coming to buy this hair, that are coming to buy these products, that are coming to get the perms in the weaves are women of color, so it's a bigger I do think what you're putting on it is valid because it is.
That's the foundation of it is on it already. But but is it that or is it simply to a lot of women that aren't thinking about it that deeply? Is it just a hairstyle. I've been in both seats, so safety both of them. We're both hair stylus. I'm an educator primarily now, but like as far as like the new your hair journey, I think it we right into what you're talking about Willow natural hair journeys. I
mentioned before. My mother was hair Sotlarce. I was natural all the way, it's a ten, and then put a RELAXERU on my hair because I wanted to be more manageable. I wanted to fit in. And then at seventeen, I had this epiphany like I want my hair back because it was natural and long, and then I cut it
off and so then there's this whole self journey. I've been on both endo that though, where I wanted to wear weeds and long hair for the reasons I'm more desirable by society, and so I have guilty of buying the Malaysian hair. It's killing me. It's killing me dead. It's killing me dead. I just that idea, it is understandable. But the idea of buying someone else's hair to put
on my head, it's just absurd to me. And really, I don't I'm trying to talk about this without judgment, and I don't want to offend anybody, because at the end of the day, you need to do what makes you feel good at the end of the day. It's but just for me. For me, it was and even like I grew my hair out so that I could get braids at six or six, that's the first time in my life that I had ever had braids because it was going to require that I'm buying hair to
braid into my head. But I felt like it was okay because at least I was going to have an afro centric style. I wasn't buying hair to have it flowing down my back. That's the thing. I think, it's the psychology that we have to ask questions about, right, what is the person's intention for doing it, because like weaves and wings and all of that, even straight hair, all of that existence. So there were the Nubian wings that were more afro styled in Egypt, and you had
traight hair Wings two and he had braided hair. Because when you look at the hieroglyphs, there's a lot of bangs. Yes, there's a lot of straight hair. There's a lot of straight hair. So the question becomes like, why are we doing Is this because this is just me? This is an accessory. I just like doing this. This is protective or whatever? Or is it because like, deeply, I do not feel good about myself unless have this. And I
think that's where it's about. Because if we have people doing this because I can't my hair the way that I feel about me, I don't like it until I must do this, then we're doing something that we need to threads. But if it's I'm just doing this because it's a style, yeah, because I've been on both sides of that is that's a good point. JA what I'm hearing too. It's a level of resistance. It's this is
my stance. If you're making a bold statement too, when you say I'm not going to put this in my hair, I'm not going to add this. I'm this is not gonna make me pretty. This is not me. I'm you're taking a stand, so even your way, Gam, I feel like that is your statement of resistance. This is everything you stand for. To show your natural beauty, to accept your natural beauty. We all don't know, Gam, that's so stressful. It's so stressful trying to be trying to figure your
own ship out. Oh my god, you just don't know why you're doing what you're doing. Going back to the intention behind everything, Why am I doing this? Am I doing this for fun, for fashion, for style? Or am I truly unhappy deeply with what I look like? Tell you what I'm unhappy with, unhappy with the gray that I'm not gonna do. So Gam gonna keep dyeing her hair, now, that's that, because what I'm not gonna be is walking around here gray. I'm not gonna do that. I'm not ready.
The grays could be a little disrespectful. My started coming, and I have this one that decided by herself, just by herself. She could have brought her friends and leaves and made it a patch. Yeah. I think one day, Yam. I think one day you're gonna you're gonna have the all gray main and you're just gonna be It's gonna be a shaman. You're just gonna be I definitely could see that, because that's another level of taking a bold stance as well. No, I wake up and I just
don't need this anymore. What am I doing? This is too much work, This is too much, but just it. I just think it's it's a part of that that self discovery process as well. And that's a whole different conversation too, about what it means to stay beautiful. How is age perceived in in in media and society. I have this conversation with my mom all the time. It's
literally turned into a great debate every single time. Yeah, I think bottom line that as more and more black women choose to look at their hair differently and choose to consciously have that relationship with their hair, it's chipping away at a system that doesn't want that, that's trying to keep us suppressed. The more that we see more people like us on magazines, on TV, whatever it is, it chips away at the very fabric of the racism.
And obviously it's a huge iceberg. I'm not saying that, you know what I mean, It's gonna be a very arduous and long process. But the act of an individual woman of color saying I love my hair and I'm going to I'm going to treat myself and my hair like it's sacred. That is that heat for the iceberg of racism. That is like, Oh, we're just gonna keep blowing heat at this iceberg, like the whole the premise of supremacy. So I wrote this piece called white supremacy
is a fallacy. And I'm not saying that it's fake in the sense that people don't actually have dominance. That's not what I'm saying. But what I am saying is it requires a psychological agreement. And so as long as your people who believe and the idea of white power, white dominant, it exists. So what you're talking about, this idea that we decide no, actually, you're wrong. I'm beautiful the way that I am. It does this energetic shift and it challenges this system. So this whole system is
reliant on our belief. It is reliant on us agreeing to suppression. We have to agree to it. And that's a part of the conversation that we don't talk about as much. We do talk a lot about white dominance. It's real. I'm not saying it's not. I'm just saying there's another part of the conversation that we need to have that I think what you just brought up will it is really critical. We do have to start attacking
like this piece of self love and stuff. Yeah, it's like a lastional spiritual piece that says, wait a minute, the whole world wants to look like me. Why don't I want to look like me? What happens when I do? Stacy, you and I were talking just a second ago without the fact that as this natural hair movement started to bowl again, right, like we're seeing another bull another way. Right, those are hand in hand. You don't have one. We
have together. The more that we love ourselves and accept ourselves, the more that we recognize our value, the more that we see that we are born free, not becoming free. So when you realize that you are born free, you are already free, you will become indignant. You become our issues, and that shifts the gay and that is what people are afraid. This is the reason why cutting hair off and telling people that they're ugly and saying that insirable matters so much. If you don't believe that you act
differently in the fare that this suppression has created. And so long as we keep evolving in this way and loving ourselves in this way, this whole system falls that. While we're talking, that was that was really really important, Jay, Thanks for sharing that. I really appreciate that. The thing is, as we're talking, like my spirit is bubbling up a little bit because we accept it, and then we believe
a new truth about ourselves. But then there's the wall that we often hit when there's the rejection and when there's trauma, and when there's the punishment that I keep saying the punishment versus the reward. So what is it? Boys? Is another level of education that Okay, so someone told me that I'm not beautiful, but I believe I am. Someone told me that I'm not smart, but I believe I am. Someone told me that I would never make it, but I know I can. And then you get the
rejection from let's just say those three areas. What is that next step? Because most people will say, oh, didn't like it. It's not true. So and so didn't accept me, so it must be wrong. Thanks, I'm ugly, so it must be that. So what is that next step? You believe it right, because we're trying to dismantle this whole
feel like it's commune city. I was about to say, because you need to hook up with the other girl who said girl this and this and I know this, but we need to link up, and you both are like okay. So, and it's developing your support system, your own village and of like minded people and women who have the same struggles that you have and who are trying to overcome, who are trying to overcome them through compassion and through self acceptance, and that community when you
can step together, I feel like that's very important. That's powerful. So that's really where I wanted to go with it, like, all right, we believe it, we're dismantling it, but how can we keep it strong and keep their momentum going.
The girl found to that support and that community because that trauma is real and we know it, yes away so easily, Stacy, you have talked about it before you And as far as representation representation and companies represent representation and corporate world's representation on the magazine covers all of that.
We need to see ourselves as well, arm, arm and arm somebody in every single and even what we're doing right now, with all of us is away, going of us going, oh, we are armed in this concept and and we're going to tell the world what we think about this. We're gonna give them a little piece of our minds, and we're not talking down the story. Share is critical because I think the other thing is like, so many of our stories get lost that sometimes we
believe we're the only one. So not just in the moment, but this hair movement has gone on for it all. When you go back to people who were running away from slavery, the posters would often note that these people have gone wayward with their hair, and so people who are making statements even then about how they wanted to be seen and what freedom meant. So this is a long movement. There there are bones of courts. Wait, I'm sorry, I just I want to make sure that I heard
you correctly, because that blew my mind. So runaway slaves would be put on posters and they'd be like, if you see this black person with crazy hair, you need to bring them back to me. Yeah, So there's evidence of people who were running away making the choice. And as a matter of fact, there is a name I wanted to share. Hopefully I can find it in time of this woman, Francis Harper. Francis Harper, she's an author who wore core roles. This is eighteen six seven mh.
So like this movement and this Lee Tyson being one of the first to wear core roles on TV. So like there's the icons. The pop culture has a big part of this movement too, and I think it's important that we name those folks and share those stories. So because that's a part of the community to right, like we have to be able to see ourselves of course, and also share those stories over and over. You're not the only one. You're not the first. This is a long movement, and so when we say like it takes
a long time, I started pushing back on that. I was like, no, we're here, we're we're free, We're ready. It's time. We've been doing this, it's overdue. We are ready now naming that and naming those names and calling them forwards and celebrating them. Brandy, I need to call her app because like because when she was wearing braids. Remember I don't know if you'll remember when she did Cinderella, and that was a big deal because he's the first
las Cinderella on TV and she wore braids. And so if those things matter and we need to remember them and name them and call them out. Or you wore locks to the was it Brandy? Was it the Crimins? It was a big ward remember that? And it was likeeen ish or something like that. It was a bigger worship. It was huge. And so that those moments we have to remember them and name them because that is a part of building this community, of remembering the fact that
we have been doing this. We are here here, y'all just gotta accepted. Hello. Hello, that's perfect, all right. So I want to talk briefly about the Crown Act. And this is a law that prohibits the discrimination against someone for wearing their hair natural or in protective styles like locks, notts, twists, and braids. Listen the fact that there's still in effect. It just became law. It's this is recent. It just
became law. Was first introduced in California in January of nine and signed into law on July three, nineteen and so it's currently only illegal to discriminate against black people and or people of color in their hair in seven states, and those states being California, Washington, Colorado, New York, New Jersey, Virginia, and Maryland. So you can fire someone from wearing braids to work? Yes, how am I supposed to wear my head?
How much? If I can't wear it in the knots, if I can't wear it in braids, if I can't wear it in locks, then I should. Yeah, it's insane. It's insane that we have to get permission handle that. Because I'm speechless. This goes back to punishment and rewards, you know what I mean. So, no matter how much you try to go around it, you want to still be faced with it. It's not just in the workplace. It's in schools too, as far as their uniform as far as looking professional, as far as clean or kept.
Why is this an issue that I cannot be my myself? So it further feeds into that narrative of not being your authentic self or just having to do what you have to do to survive to fit in. I was telling I don't know if it was who I was was falling a jay. I was basically telling them about an experience that I had as an up and coming stylist. I wanted to be a celebrity, stylist honey, because my parents did not want me to do hair. So I'm just like, if I'm gonna do it, I need to
do whatever the highest thing is. Anyway, So I end up in this salon, this big New York City salon which I will not name, and I got hired. There was a big deal. It was predominantly Caucasian salon. When I got hired, I was one of two or three or maybe two. And I got hired. I wasn't even thinking about my skin color at that time. I just wanted to get this job. I wanted to get to fashion Week so bad. I just wanted to I just
wanted it for so bad. So anyway, I got the interview, I got hired, and they I went to the interview with straight here, a straight pixie cut. They loved it. They loved me. And on Monday, when I showed up for training, I had brains. Let me give you the story behind that. Quickly, I got the braids because I didn't want to mess up brain. For us, it's low maintenance. We can go to the gym on the vacation with whatever. So I got the braids as something to help me.
So I wouldn't be late and I didn't have to fuss about my hair child. I got to work on Monday. You would have thought they saw a casper to go. They told me I had to take it out if I wanted to work there because that was not a part of their address code. Back then, I didn't know any better. Again, bravo, my I want to get to fashion Week, I want to get backstage. I want to do these things. So it took me twelve more or more hours to get the braids in, and it took
me six hours to take them out. But the point is I took them out. I didn't have anybody or any reason in my mind to think it was wrong. It was just like, this is what you have to do. Back forward to with all of this media of coverage, we know that this is absurd, this isolation, This is a violation of your rights. I was violated. And when I said that story, so many people had similar situations where they had to change their hair for to get
a job, okay, to get a job interview. They would wear it like this, but two they had to wear you know, something that was more acceptable. I absolutely stand for the Crown Act. I've signed a petition. Yes, I signed a petition as well. The fact that is happening with kids. You remember the case of the wrestler. I can't remember what state it was, but the wrestler and the coach cut off his dreads during the match. I was like, what dress code? So they had a uniform
for the sport. They had to either have their hair pulled back or something like that in order to be a part of dress code and the uniform. And he was about to be disqualified. And they looked so hard as athletes to get to that point. Get it. It's just it's ridiculous, this four seeing us two once again assimilate into their standards of beauty. But the idea in that there has to be a law to prevent us from being fired. Everybody bearing our hair in its natural state,
everyone should sign. And I think we'll try to pose something like a link where you can go and sign the petition for supporting the Crown Act. That is extremely important. Honestly, I'm surprised. I'm surprised that black people haven't just been like, you know what, we're gonna We're just gonna go somewhere else. We're all of us, We're gonna we're all gonna, we're all gonna come together and we're just gonna go somewhere else because this no okay, we I hate to interrupt
the conversation, ladies. I want you to stay right there, but unfortunately will All has to leave. So I just want to ask you, Will Out, do you have any last words on this topic that you want to share before you make your exit? Yes? I just want to say, not just for black people and not just for black women, but when a human individual decides to accept themselves with no boundaries and no limits, that challenges every system, every system,
and probably many people around them. Yeah, it challenges everything that the modern way of looking at human life has created. And I'm ready for for the challenge. And I'm ready. I'm ready for the challenge to just keep growing and to keep going and for us to create something better and something different. That's amazing you. Okay. So I wanted to do our rapid fire questions with you. Okay, So the first one is really simple, what books are you
currently reading? So? I just finished the last book of the Clan of the Cave Bear series. There's six books. Okay, you've been telling me about that series Okay, I have such a love and such a fascination about prehistorical human dynamics. I don't know why. I think it's I think it's very interesting and amazing. And these six books changed my life forever. Gene m Owl, You'll always be in my heart. You're an amazing author. You're probably not listening to this
right now, but I love you so much. Okay. And what's one thing that you want to get off your chest about any topic? One thing you want to get off your chest? Oh, one thing I want to get off my chest. I have been feeling recently, specifically my generation, we spend so much time looking at what's happening externally in the world and the problems that are happening externally in the world that I feel like, solely but surely we're losing Remember when we were talking about that self study.
I feel like we're losing the ability but also the focus focus exactly, the focus to observe our inner world in such a way that confusion that we're always feeling about this uncertainty that we're getting from social media or we're getting from whatever it is, that inner foundation of self love and self knowledge that those emotions can sit on top of that and not weigh us down into this dark place that we feel like we can't get out of. That. I see a lot of my peers
getting into, especially during quarantine. Yeah that was long, but yeah, so maybe it's more about put down the phone and start doing something internal, internal work. Yeah, okay. And the last thing, what's a motto that you live by? Who model that I live by? Wow? The darkness and the light are equally beautiful m and accept them both with compassion. That's how I want to live my life. And may you have it. Words of wisdom from my baby girl. The whole made it to the earth. Oh, thank you
so much ladies for joining me. This was an excellent conversation. Thank you jay Less Shay, thank you Stacy sis Eran, Thank you Willow for joining us on this conversation. Tell us where people can find you on social media. I'll sart up. I say thank you for having me. This has been an on and a lot of fun. If anyone wants to continue um talking with me at any point, you can find me on my website Javid Shad dot com, where I continue with freedom activision of all sorts, perfect
and Stacy I would concur. Thank you so much for giving me the opportunity to use my voice, and if you want to continue the conversation with me, I'm offering education to hairstylists and everyday women about how to manage and maintain highly textured hair. You can find me at Stacey ciseron dot com. Thank you so much. Ladies, like Willow,
we all have our own hair story. It's our role to teach our children the history they won't learn in school, so they develop a sense of pride about themselves and their culture. We are there to support, guide and give them a safe place to land because the world is a harsh critic. Prayerfully, however they choose to rocket, our children will love themselves fully and unapologetically, including their hair. Tomorrow, I'll continue my discussion on hair, so check back for
part two. If you're listening on Apple Podcasts, be sure to rate and review. Follow me on my Instagram at Gammy Norris to share with me your thoughts on the episode. I'm here, I'm talking, and I'm listening. As always, stay great, We all positively. Gam is produced by Westbrook Audio Executive producers Adrian Banfield, Norris, Jada Pinkett Smith, Amanda Brown and Fallon Jethro Co executive producer sim Hoti, editor and mixer Calvin Bayliff. Positively gam is in partnership with Art Nineteens