"Not Today, Not The One": C. Breezy Strikes Again
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what I devote energy to and what Mark Manson describes as the “Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck”. Manson would encourage us to not even to try to not care because although swiftly floating around unbothered seems like the mature thing to do, it’s actually a sure way to run your self into the ground. So, instead of running amuck as an emotionless psychopath, Manson suggests one subtlety.
“Not giving a f*ck does not mean being indifferent; it means being comfortable with being different.”
If anyone is far too familiar with being different, it is black women and black women alone. I mean, I am a black woman and thus recognise the bias in that statement but hey, this is BlkGrlCulture – it is what it is. Not only is the sight of our varying skin tones so polarising that it is neglected by the gatekeepers of “universal beauty standards” but the structure of our build has been a spectacle for years, google Sara Baartman.
What we aren’t very familiar with? Loving every inch of ourselves despite what the world has to say about us (we’re getting there). In this case, the world is someone we keep letting back into our world, the culprit Christopher Maurice Brown.
This incident is by no means isolated from the countless times a rapper’s misogynoir has hit us in the face or from the last time Chris Brown has spoken out of the side of his neck. As always, for the purposes of this article and getting y’all up to speed here’s…
The Backstory:
On yet another project, entirely too long to listen [skip] through, Indigo, C. Breezy shares his sentiments on black women and our hair in the song, “Need a Stack”.
“only wanna f*ck the black b*tches with the nice hair.”
Oh, but there’s more. Following an Internet frenzy, which is what I think the singer is looking for at this point, Brown “clapped back”…
Now, I know what you “pick me’s” are thinking, “I mean at least he said black women this time around” because that is the pathetic level we expect from arguably the best thing r&b has seen since Usher. All I know is, Jacquees would never do us like this – but I digress and never say never.
At this point, I don’t know anyone who is going to bat for whatever Chris Brown says, we sort of all groove to his impeccable bops and passively nod our heads to one of the tons of songs he has in radio rotation that all sound the same. But we aren’t indifferent about what he spews into our spaces either because as Manson suggests, that would be the wrong way to go about “not giving a f*ck”. To master the art of not caring, we’ve got to be comfortable with ourselves and whatever makes us different.
I mean, undeniably comfortable so the next time someone makes an ignorant comment about our likeness we simply chant Amanda Seales’ anthem “n*iggas got me f*cked up” and keep it moving. Not hold our tongues to seem unbothered or to avoid steping on anyone’s toes. Both actions may seem the same from the outside looking in but deep down you know whether you feel a way or not. Mind you THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH FEELING A WAY – you’re human, and a black woman with…hair.
Let’s not act oblivious to the self-hate in Brown’s lyric, as he seems to be. “Nice hair” is a trope used to diminish textures of hair that aren’t comparable to whiteness. “N*gger naps” aren’t a compliment and Chris Rock didn’t make an entire documentary on hair because “all black hair is considered nice”. The very fact that Brown chose the term “nice” suggests there are indeed black hair textures that are collectively considered less than desirable. And, It’s no coincidence that darker skin tones are usually attached to hair textures that tend to defy gravity by exceptional degrees.
Some of us take a few minutes out of our day to defend our blackness, as it seems no one else will, and then get called “bitter and angry” for it. Delusion. Whether our blackness looks like the curliest of 3’s to the kinkiest of 4c’s, it is ALL nice – we’ve just got to believe it. Ari believes it, peep the back of her album cover.
“Don’t remove the kinks from your hair! Remove them from your brain!”
The mere thought of black women wearing our hair how it grows out of our heads is a revolutionary act. States continue to vote against natural hair in the workplace as it is deemed unprofessional and “unkept” Since we are doing the ground work, forget the dudes sitting on the sidelines passing judgment and creating life with phenotypes (like fine China) that evidently aren’t going to create any type of visible black hair.
I’m not advocating we cancel Chris Brown, because as the results have shown cancel culture clearly doesn’t hold much weight. I’m simply suggesting that we should not look to others who aren’t aware of all OUR magic to spit out fairy dust in their lyrics. Especially if they are rappers who can’t even differentiate between “preference” and self-hate.
And could someone please tell me what are skid row edges are?
