00:00My manager turns to me and says,
00:02well, don't you hide all of your smarts in your hair?
00:06Wow, wow, you look so put together.
00:08You should wear your hair like that more often.
00:10Comments about if I even shower,
00:12people saying I look like I just got electrocuted.
00:15You can't just be black
00:16because your hair is so nice and straight.
00:20This makes me feel like I'm not an individual
00:24when, in fact, I am an individual
00:26and I worked hard to be here.
00:30No one could have prepared me for the just, like,
00:45wild things that people would say to me about my hair.
00:49Unwarranted comments about how often you change your hair.
00:52Someone reintroducing themselves to you
00:55because they don't recognize you
00:57because you changed your hair.
00:59Someone told me that I,
01:03with my hair slicked back in a bun,
01:06looked more professional
01:08and didn't have kind of, you know,
01:09wild hair was the word that they used.
01:12Minus two big chops.
01:13I usually have very long, afro-y, lock-y hair.
01:17In terms of my principals
01:19who have not been people of color,
01:21I've definitely heard through the rumor mill
01:24my hair gave off ideas about, you know,
01:28who I am or what I stood for.
01:30I definitely had comments made about my hair.
01:34It happened three times.
01:36Twice was during interview settings,
01:38which was quite disturbing.
01:39I've had teachers ask me to sit in the back of the classroom
01:42because I'm taking up too much space
01:44or they don't want it to be distracting for other students.
01:48But, like, the white dude who answers every question
01:50with build that wall still gets to sit in the front.
01:58My manager turns to me and says,
02:00well, isn't your hair so big
02:03because all of your intelligence is in there?
02:07That's what I would imagine.
02:09And physically grabbed my hair.
02:12She vastly told me that my hair,
02:16that I was too extravagant.
02:17And when I asked her more details about that,
02:20she told me my hair was too big
02:22and that it was too big for me.
02:25She told me my hair was too big
02:27and that it was bringing attention to me too much
02:31and that I needed to be more discreet.
02:34I obviously felt very upset by this comment.
02:39It was mostly older men.
02:41They felt they could comment on a woman's appearance
02:44at the office or, you know, they just don't like curly hair.
02:47When you hear things like that,
02:48I think that it's really easy to kind of write them off.
02:52But I think after a while,
02:53when you're thinking about things in terms of job security,
02:57those things actually start to kind of take a toll on you
02:59and they start to, you know, hold more weight.
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