My perception of people is generally negative, positive, or neutral. Chris Rock was in neutral status, until he produced Good Hair. When I saw the trailer, I was extremely disappointed. It didn't address the politics of Black hair. On the contrary, Chris Rock decided to use the emotional confusion that Black women experience with our hair and capitalize on it. I have been intensely following this Good Hair since it was announced, and I have come to the conclusion that
Chris Rock does not respect black women nor is he trying to help black people with this film. He's just as caught up in the concept of good hair as all of us, and has no intention of tearing down Blacks' mental chains. This movie has no other purpose than to entertain whites.Chris Rock Does Not Respect Black WomenI'll start this from a quote from the man himself:
Barack Obama has a black wife. And I don't think a black woman can be first lady of the United States. Barack has a handicap the other candidates don't have: Barack Obama has a black wife. And I don't think a black woman can be first lady of the United States. Yeah, I said it! A black woman can be president, no problem. First lady? Can't do it. You know why? Because a black woman cannot play the background of a relationship. Just imagine telling your black wife that you'e president? "Honey, I did it! I won! I'm the president." "No, we the president! And I want my girlfriends in the Cabinet! I want Kiki to be secretary of state! She can fight!"
The comment pretty much speaks for itself. Here, Rock is making his sister, a woman who has more education than he will ever have, sound ignorant simply because she is a Black woman. Brava, Chris Rock.
Apparently, black women are stupid and self-absorbed, which is funny. So it makes sense to make a movie out of that. So hear we have a movie mocking black women spending so much time, effort, and
money making our hair texture look like someone else's. We're even buying someone else's hair and installing it into our own, and it's...hilarious? Really? According to Chris Rock, this is all a joke. He doesn't address that a whole race of women wouldn't do this for so many decades
for no reason. He does not discuss the "why." He does not about talk where this mentality comes from. (He avoids this topic completely because he doesn't want to make his white audience upset but rather amuse them.) There is obviously something seriously wrong if a whole race of people are ashamed of their hair texture. The A.V. Club made great points:
The film is filled with sadly telling moments, like a black beauty student telling Rock that she'd have a hard time taking a job applicant seriously if he had an afro, yet its tone is one of amusement rather than indignation. Rock is an entertainer, not a polemicist, and Good Hair will never be mistaken for a college course in African American Hair And Racial Identity, though it does stress the pain women will endure and the exorbitant prices they'll pay to keep up with follicular trends. To the film's subjects, paying thousands for a complicated, high-maintenance weave is less a luxury than a necessity, even for those low on the socio-economic scale.
In order for Chris Rock to make a movie mocking Black women's insecurities this way, he must have little respect for us. In addition, in order for him to think that it's hilarious that Blacks believe that wearing our natural hair is so unacceptable that we must change it, shows me that
he has little respect for his own people. I started to realize this even more after he was on the Oprah show. He could not get his fingers out of her hair, and was practically worshiping it on stage. He then said that Stedman was a lucky man. To make matters worse, he calls Oprah's natural hair "slave hair." And he wonders why his daughter was crying? Give me a break! I remember seeing him have a similar reaction when having an interview with a white woman. He didn't touch her hair, but he stated how he would love to run his hands through it and was practically drooling.
Chris Rock believes in "Good Hair" as much as any other Black person.
I also hate how he avoids the real issue behind this "good hair" sentiment among Blacks, and maintains this "It doesn't matter what hair style you have, as long as you like it " stance. If that is true, what was the point of laughing at all of these women for perming and weaving in this movie? The only thing that he did was state the obvious. Black people know what we do to our hair. This was only an eye-opener for the whites, and it was for their entertainment.
Of course, they thought it was hilarious how all of these Negroes are changing themselves to look like them. That's was the point of this film, to amuse the white man at the black woman's expense.
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