A pressing issue for me - Part 1

There is an issue that has been very heavy on my mind for the past year or so. The issue is race. I myself am a 21 year old black woman living in the UK. I have had a roller coaster journey with this and still have not been able to come with a satisfactory conclusion about why things are the way they are today with the black society. It seems the deeper I get into it, the more complicated it all becomes and I have a changed perspective. The first time I became very racially aware was when I was 19 and got a job (an industrial placement at a fortune 500 company).


I got a job at the head office located in an almost all white town in the South East of England. It seemed like I was the only black girl in the town, I was definitely the only black girl in the whole office, and obviously in my house as well. Two weeks before I got the job, I did braid extensions – half braids (you know the one you start and stop almost immediately). I did it because I liked it, thought it suited me and figured if I looked good it would make me more confident as I was a very shy person when I started. After about a month/two when it was time to take them out, I had a relaxer and normally after a relaxer, I would wear my hair out or let it breathe before doing anything else to it, but as soon as I got the relaxer, I insisted on getting a weave the same hair length as my extensions which was about 12 inches. That was the beginning of my love for extensions – this time for s different reason. Before then, I wore extensions because I fancied it but now I felt I needed extensions to be normal ... to be accepted. I wore very long hair extensions for like 9 months and even my housemates I was very close to and spend half my days with were unaware that I did. It made me feel better everyone assuming it was mine and complementing me on my hair. I felt more beautiful.


Because I was the only black person all the time apart from when I went home to London, I was very aware of other black people about. And then I began to notice, a great majority of the time I saw a black person, he/she was doing a miniature job like sweeping the station. I remember a trip with my housemates to reading shopping. We parked in the car park and my eyes were drawn automatically to a group of black guys in uniform asking people to wash their cars. And then one of them came up to us and asked to wash our one and I felt my heart sink. I was embarrassed and tried to get carried away in the conversation and totally ignore them. As if that would have made people think I am not like them and not put me in the same category. I then became really aware and very sensitive to the state of some black people around me and on the television and in movies. For example, I noticed how mostly in American movies, the black people are always subtly negatively portrayed. I do not know any African Americans personally but do not believe they are all like what you see in the movies. An example of the top of my head is transformers. Everyone in the film was fairly normal except the black people. The black family looked mad, loud, and downright abnormal. And then take a look at the white families – perfectly normal. People might not notice directly, but it does make an impression on your subconscious. If in everything you watch, the comedy is always on the black man/people, in the real world, how could you ever take black people seriously, especially if you have not had any proper contact with one to make you think otherwise?


My first take on this issue was why do black people even act these roles? Why do they undertake these miniature roles? The world has moved on, there are opportunities out there, it isn’t the fault of the white man anymore it is now our own fault, and so on. I had a conversation with my father about it, all heated up and he spoke to me asking me to think of why they are in that situation in the first place. And also, I have always been blessed to be privileged. I have had a stable family, good education, and good opportunities but should never make the mistake of judging people by my situation or standards. Basically, the fact that I have been privileged to achieve everything I have does not give me the right or reason to judge anyone. He told me to try and see things from their point of view and their situation. I then discovered that my father who I look up to, has made a lot for himself and has made everything possible for me and my siblings, once used to clean toilets in London to pay his way through college and then got another little job to pay his way through university. He left Nigeria with not much money so did not have a choice but to. This made me think long and hard over my original theory but still maintained some parts of it.


During this period though, I got a bit sick of being fake, i.e. my weaves and did some hard research into black hair and why it doesn’t often grow as long as that of other races. I then discovered it can if you do the right things. I studied everything I came across and made a big decision to chuck the extensions and take care of my own hair and grow it long! J I did just that and it took a lot of trial and error but as I am writing this now, I am almost a month/ two away from bra strap length (from literally like chin length).
The issue of race has been very heavy on my heart for lots of reasons and when I read some things or blogs or articles, it made me think does God actually care about black people? Do we mean anything to him at all? It broke my heart to think these thoughts but when I think about everything we have gone through in the past, things we go through even today, it made me question God a little. I started looking for evidence in the bible about us in a negative way at least to justify the suffering, accept it, and then move on from it, but found nothing. One night, I was reading my bible and came across something about long hair being a woman’s glory and then I shut my bible and told God I simply couldn’t do it. Black women don’t really have long flowing hair. I felt excluded by the world and now the bible. I must note that I have not experienced direct racism before, so my racial sensitivity is really weird being as I have never been a victim of racism. The only person I ever met that made me feel uncomfortable and I just knew it was because of my race was American. I guess America still has a long way to go with race relations (sigh). Ok, so I did not read my bible for a few days because I felt rejected and could not bring myself to. During my bible strike days, I came across this article about evidence of black people in the bible. Amazing year’s worth of research, and then researched a little deeper into it and realized, we were mentioned in the bible and not below everyone else, on par with everyone else. I read a lot of interesting stuff and regret ever thinking what I thought. The bible has been portrayed to have all white characters in the movies and books but seeing evidence of black people in the bible had a greater effect than I thought it would. I felt excited and really really proud to be black. After this experience, my perspective changed again. ... I searched deeper into the black experience (I know mine has been a roller coaster) and obstacles. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rjy9q8VekmE )


My conclusion black people are special; we just do not know it ... only if we knew it we would not feel the way we do. There is still a strong barrier out there against us but we have to be patient, strong and determined. I do not want to keep rambling on so to be continued J. ...