That of course was at the end of school.

[conuly]

Ana had worn her hair out, which for her means this great afro (does one capitalize that?) or, as she is inclined to call it, "poofy" hair.

As we were leaving the school, a (black) woman in a car talking to the security guard caught sight of Ana's hair... and proceeded to call out a long (long) list of comments starting with "Great hair!" and ending with "I'm so proud of you for wearing your hair like that, sweetie!"

Which I guess was well-intended, but a. Ana as a general rule doesn't like people complimenting her appearance and b. it was really every bit as creepy and intrusive as random people trying to touch her hair. Being as J. Q. Random Caller was herself black I at least would hope that she'd know better than to do that, but honestly, I'm not so certain.

Comments

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

Well, how rude, sheesh! Doesn't have anything to do with 'being black' - one would HOPE (probably in vain) that people in general knew better than to make personal remarks to strangers, particularly if they're children, AND knew to keep their hands to themselves - particularly with children!

Beautiful girls get sick of hearing about it at every turn, as if the luck of the genetic draw was the only thing about them worth noticing, and that goes double for beautiful girls who are also highly intelligent and/or talented. Almost all children loathe and resent being called 'pet names' by anyone but those they love, and some kids are even touchy about that. And who does this J.Q. Random Caller think she is, making a big public identity-politics 'thing' out of some passing child's hairstyle? How totally embarrassing is that?

Really, it almost makes one want to write to Dear Abby. I hope this doesn't discourage Ana from wearing her hair however she likes - the world's full of ignorant, possibly well-intentioned but definitely ill-mannered people who make all sorts of uncalled-for remarks; a person of sense just learns to ignore them.

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

'Afro' in the sense of a hairstyle is sometimes capitalized, but often is not - like 'pompadour', I suppose, which was once a proper noun, but is one no longer, at least in the context of hairstyles.

[pne.livejournal.com]

Beautiful girls get sick of hearing about it at every turn, as if the luck of the genetic draw was the only thing about them worth noticing, and that goes double for beautiful girls who are also highly intelligent and/or talented.

Is that so? Makes sense, I suppose.

Oops, then.

I’ll try to bear it in mind.