Tuesday, March 17, 2009

get too friendly with black people

"So, how long have you been growing...." a hand from a 50something man moves toward my hair.

I had plate in one hand, garden burger in another so as his hand reached, my body moved in tandem, with a kind of racial-aikido, away from his hand, keeping a distance enough so my hair remained out of his grasp.

"Ahh...ahh...rude." I muttered between garden burger chews. I was surprised at my present and very calm, yet clear reaction. It's taken decades to be this "in the moment" and I'm getting better at it. Probably because this response is strikingly similar to commands that I give when trying to train my dog away from bad or potentially dangerous behavior. "Nooo...nooo...no begging" is a common refrain around my house these days.

--damali ayo
@ Beautiful Vision of Joy


As I recently noted, a lot of white people have been reaching out to black people now that America has a black president. Sometimes though, they're reaching out too literally. White people often think they have some sort of right to touch black people, a right they don't seem to feel they have with others (unless they consider those others, such as children, somehow "below" themselves).

In the interests of helping to curtail some of this ostensibly friendly, but actually obnoxious behavior, I figured it was time to repost (below) something that I wrote back when I first started this blog, a post about the common white tendency to "pet" black people.

Is there a sudden, new rash of such presumptuous white behavior? I ask because I noticed that two African American bloggers, damali ayo and Brooke, just wrote about it, on the same day (that is, yesterday).

As Brooke writes,

I know this scenario all too well. It's happened to me several times. I braid my hair, some White person wants to touch it. A lot of times they just do it. I feel like I'm at the damn petting zoo or something. It's not until I slowly jerk my head away from them and give them a "you're about to draw back a nub" look that they get the hint.

Get a grip, white people! On yourselves, that is, and not on someone else.

As I said, in the interest of heightened civility and basic, common respect in this new era of white desire for racial love and such, here's that (slightly edited) repost, "pet black people"; the original appeared here.




This example of stuff white people do is something that only some white people do. The number of white people who pet black people is limited to those few willing to get close enough to black people to touch them. However, this annoying, condescending behavior happens often enough to merit comment.

George Bush, Jr. is one white person who exhibits this trait, particularly the peculiar habit of rubbing black people's heads:



Although Bush is a fake Texan who actually grew up and went to school in the Northeast, he may be adopting an old white Southern custom here, that of rubbing black heads for good luck, especially those of children.* And Bush is not the only politician who does so. The practice seems to have spread North, where aptly named President of the Ohio Senate, Doug White, has also been called out for it.

Being petted by white people doesn't only happen to black men or children. As Nichelle at Anovelista points out, it happens even more frequently to black women.

White women often admire the hair of Asian women, but there's something so fascinating about black women's hair that it sometimes makes white folks reach out and get personal. Too personal--notice, for instance, how hard it is for Brandy and Tanika Ray to keep their composure when Barbara Walters can't resist playing with their hair:



I think what's especially revealing here is that, like a lot of white people in these encounters, Barbara Walters doesn't even hesitate to play with black women's hair. But it's very likely something she would hesitate to do with another white woman's hair; chances are that she'd even ask for permission.

Where does this common behavior come from? Why do white people think they can do this to black people, when they would very likely not do it to other people, especially other white people?



*To be fair to Our Dearly Departed Leader, he seems to like touching not only black people; he has a more general bald-head fetish as well, and he has trouble keeping his hands off of people in other ways too. Also, he actually did spend a good deal of his early years in Texas (I still think he's a fake Texan, though).

UPDATE (9/2008): For a first-person account from an African American perspective, see "Can I Touch Your Hair? Black Women and The Petting Zoo," at Womanist Musings, where Renee writes,

As a black girl growing in a mostly Greek and Italian neighbourhood, my hair often became the subject of conversation. I was a curiosity. People would touch it, and ask questions about its care like my hair was some kind of pet dog. That they were being racist, or treating me like some kind of exotic creature, never once occurred to them.

52 comments:

  1. Macon! I was just thinking about how condescending my co-worker is when she always pats my back.

    She will be walking in one direction while I am standing somehwere. She'll backtrack, pat my back, and then continue on her way.

    I am hard of hearing and at first I figured she was just saying "hi" in an attention-getting way. But then I realized she would do this even if it's apparent that I see her in my line of vision.

    I purposefully allowed her to continue doing it so as to observe and see if she does it to someone else. SHE DOESN'T!

    I mean, wth?

    I am one of only two blacks on the whole floor and the only black person in my department.
    And now that I am seriously annoyed, I feel bad about saying something to her because she's been doing it for so long.

    I guess they have sufficiently quieted my outspokenness and banished me to my work-voice since there have been incidents where I was vocal about things I did not like and was labeled as being testy.

    I once complained to my supervisor that another co-worker was leaving decidedly black material on my desk for my personal perusal. Things like books full of pictures of black women or by black authors. I felt like he was saying, "Hey you're black. You may like this." He once left a book full of Afro-centric cross stitch patterns on my desk. I gave it back to him and said, "I don't cross stitch", hoping he'd get it.

    He didn't.

    Anyay, my supervisor downplayed it and then asked me how she should proceed. I mean, wtf? My supervisor asked me how to supervise the situation.

    In essence, she allowed him to continue with his racist crap. It only stopped when I had had enough and went off on him. I mean and it got to the point that we were shouting and everything. When he went and tattled to the same supervisor I had complained to, she couldn't really do anything because I had told her that I was annoyed and she did nothing.

    Okay, sorry I am rambling. I went off subject but, yeah. I am petted at work.

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  2. Try and tell someone that you don't want to be touched. They give you this hurt puppy look like how can you trample on my right to touch you whenever I want. I make it more than clear to people that my space is my space. I find it assaulting when friends and strangers alike think that they have the right to touch without asking. When I see the rejected reaction I don't feel the least bit sorry for them. The fact that they got upset in the first place means that they do not honor my right to protect my physical body.

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  3. >[...]when they would very likely not do it to other people, especially other white people?

    wrong, whites also do this towards whites they consider below them

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  4. i'm glad you reposted this. i am a person who does not like to be touched by a lot of people (being sexually harassed often does that to a person) and i can only imagine how extremely uncomfortable black people feel when white people suddenly feel too friendly.

    in my white interpretation, it seems like white people often touch because they feel they've some right too. touch is often used to assert some sort of dominance over another, and that white people do this to black people, and then get upset when they realize that it's not okay, it seems that their disbelief stems from it never occurring to them that it was not okay. i really don't think anyone likes to be touched by strangers, but we've already seen evidence that white people in general do not value black people, and thus think they've some right to black bodies.

    i think it somehow needs to be made clear that this is not acceptable. no one has right to touch another person--it's uncomfortable for that person, and especially unprofessional at work!

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  5. This is not a new (i.e., "Obama Age") phenomenon. It has happened to me for much of my life. It happens even with grown folks and my young daughters.

    A parallel situation is when I was pregnant. All sorts of folks I barely knew or did not know at all--male, female, old, young and any race--felt perfectly fine touching and even caressing my protruding middle.

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  6. I agree with the other posters with respect to the dominance thing.

    White people very rarely touch the hair of other white folks. When they do, they typically ask first. I have really thick, healthy, long hair and have received many compliments from white folks but they're never overcome with the desire to lay their hands on it. Only once has a white person touched my hair without my permission and I gave her the stink eye for it. She didn't get a "hurt puppy" look when I signaled my annoyance. She apologized for her rudeness and that was that. But, I'm a fellow whitey so obviously my personal space is was worth considering (/snark).

    I'm curious: In most of the hair touching stories described in the links, the offending white person is older. Is this typical? Or, are younger white folks equally clueless?

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  7. I wonder if this phenomenon isn't very much related to the post about white people trying too hard to make black friends. In other words, is this (sometimes) about white people trying to show just how "not racist" they are by actually making physical contact with a black person?

    I think it may also show how segregated the white people who do this are from black people. I suspect the urge to touch comes from curiosity, or voyeurism, particulary when it comes to touching hair, which is what I have witnessed most. I must admit my own curiosity when I was younger (growing up in a small, nearly all-white town in the Midwest), but I couldn't imagine violating a person's space like that. Hell, it's just common decency.

    That some white people feel they have the right to set the bounds of propriety smacks of white privilege and an remarkable lack of respect for their targets.

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  8. I've got 5 years of dreadlock growth that's been petted, pulled and prodded by more astounded white people than I can remember. Working in a bar certainly doesn't do anything to reduce those numbers either.

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  9. So as a white momma to a black dtr how do I set an example for my dtr? I would never touch someones hair unless asked to or in an intaminte moment. I was one that hated being pawed while pregnant and feel raped in a small way when touched without permission. And yes I have been raped so maybe its a trigger thing? I do set an example in life, my children get asked if they want a hug or snuggle, even from me their mom. How do I tell people to ask permission before touching my kids? Just like that I spose...

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  10. I have braids for years and in the time I've had them, I've had to perform gymnastics in order to avoid the intrusive hands of white women. And then there are those white folk who think it's ok to ask if it's my hair. It's none of their business. I don't walk up to strange women and ask if those are their real breasts. It's totally inappropriate!

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  11. This isn't an Obama thing - I've been bobbing and weaving to keep white people out of my hair for years. I have locs now, but it was much worse when I still wore an Afro.

    Anonymous, 9:23pm I've had people of all ages in my hair. Young people are more likely to tug on it (to see if it is real) while older people tend to pet.

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  12. Thanks for the comments everyone. postpostracial and Xay, I guess I misstated the Obama connection. I know it's been happening for a long, long time; I was just speculating that this kind of "reaching out" might be happening more than ever now, with more whites than ever anxious to be friendly toward blacks. My thinking is in line with Todd's, and I think more of this is probably happening these days:

    I wonder if this phenomenon isn't very much related to the post about white people trying too hard to make black friends. In other words, is this (sometimes) about white people trying to show just how "not racist" they are by actually making physical contact with a black person?

    jw wrote, "whites also do this towards whites they consider below them."

    I'm not sure what you mean here--examples, please? Why would they want to touch white people's hair in the first place? Or invasively touch them otherwise?

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  13. >jw wrote, "whites also do this towards whites they consider below them."
    I'm not sure what you mean here--examples, please? Why would they want to touch white people's hair in the first place? Or invasively touch them otherwise?


    you should finally start 'studying' your own people and culture. Only if you know who they truly are you will know who you are, your "white part", you know.
    But examples would be:
    - white men touch also white women they don't know without asking
    - White people touch/kiss white children they don't know, without asking

    etc, there would be many more examples where whites don't respect the individual space of somebody else

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  14. jw, you say I should get to know my "white part," and then describe white men touching white women, and white adults touching/kissing white children they don't know. It's true that white people do such things, but so do others--why are you implying that these common forms of touching are a result of their "white part"? How would "studying" my own (presumably) white people and culture help me see those as particularly white behaviors?

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  15. >why are you implying that these common forms of touching are a result of their "white part"? How would "studying" my own (presumably) white people and culture help me see those as particularly white behaviors?


    one can lead a horse to the water...

    you may downplay or ignore such realities, like of the one poster here who tried to tell you something about police brutality towards whites. You ignore realities within a system and therefore ignore the system because you only want to see what whites do towards PoC without asking for the reason.

    And what do you mean with '(presumably) white people'?

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  16. >How would "studying" my own (presumably) white people and culture help me see those as particularly white behaviors?


    In addition, not knowing European culture/behavior without the alleged 'other' leads you to wrong assumptions I think. You also claim, that whites lack empathy for PoC which implies, that such whites feel empathy for whites. Which is wrong.

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  17. jw, are you saying that the common forms of touching that you listed are things that white people do, and not things that other people do?

    Regarding this horse of which you speak, what exactly is the water that this horse would drink, assuming he was led to this water, but refused to drink?

    Are you saying that white people in general do not have more empathy for other white people than they do for non-white people? Or are you only talking about certain white people? If the latter, who are these certain white people?

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  18. >jw, are you saying that the common forms of touching that you listed are things that white people do, and not things that other people do?

    what are you talking? When you write that whites touch Black people out of disrespect and I write that for example white men also touch white women out of disrespect, how are "other people" (who are "other people") relevant in this context?

    I wrote this example because it is relevant how whites interact with people in general, how they also treat each other.

    >Regarding this horse of which you speak, what exactly is the water that this horse would drink, assuming he was led to this water, but refused to drink?

    European culture in its entity

    >Are you saying that white people in general do not have more empathy for other white people than they do for non-white people?

    Yes, European culture isn't an empathetic one or in which empathy would be valued or encouraged.

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  19. jw wrote: European culture isn't an empathetic one or in which empathy would be valued or encouraged.

    But wasn't my question about Euro-Americans' relative levels of empathy for white Americans versus non-white Americans? What do you think about African American Philosopher Janine Jones' thoughts, which seem to run counter to yours, on "The Impairment of Empathy in Goodwill Whites for African Americans"?

    jw wrote: European culture in its entity

    Do you mean "entirety"? If so, why do you think this horse has such a large capacity for water consumption? And since this is an American horse, shouldn't he be drinking American water?

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  20. yes, should be entirety

    >What do you think about African American Philosopher Janine Jones' thoughts, which seem to run counter to yours, on "The Impairment of Empathy in Goodwill Whites for African Americans"?

    quote the thoughts you would like to hear my opinion, I won't read x pages

    >If so, why do you think this horse has such a large capacity for water consumption?

    what? You think, learning is too difficult for you?

    >And since this is an American horse, shouldn't he be drinking American water?

    what do you want to say with that?

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  21. quote the thoughts you would like to hear my opinion, I won't read x pages

    what? You think, learning is too difficult for you?

    what do you want to say with that?

    Doesn't Euro/white-American culture different significantly from European culture (whatever that is)? Aren't racial formations and relations significantly different in the US from their European manifestations?

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  22. >Doesn't Euro/white-American culture different significantly from European culture (whatever that is)? Aren't racial formations and relations significantly different in the US from their European manifestations?

    and with that comment you disqualify yourself.
    White American culture IS European culture and when you even don't know European culture and the basics of it you are not qualified to write a blog about what WHITE people = Europeans do.
    Thank you for this confirmation of your small mind and inability to dig deeper and also thank you for displaying your ignorance of your own roots and history. You should know, where you come from: Europe. You (white Americans and "anti-racists in particular) should know what you took with you: Eurocentrism.

    You are probably also not aware of European history and the history of conquered nations and the racism/white supremacy of today in such nations as well as in Europe.

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  23. jw, why do you label those questions a comment?

    How could you know that I don't know something so obvious to any relatively well-educated white American as the basic roots of European culture? Believe you me, I know my Eurocentrism from ethnocentrism and Afrocentrism, and I am also aware of European history and the history of conquered nations and the racism/white supremacy of today in such nations as well as in Europe--wouldn't any relatively well-versed, fairminded reader of this blog see that such understandings lie, firmly ensconced, deep within the very underpinnings of the blog writer's heart? and mind? and soul?

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  24. >How could you know that I don't know something so obvious

    Knowledge doesn't lead to questions like this:

    >Doesn't Euro/white-American culture different significantly from European culture (whatever that is)? Aren't racial formations and relations significantly different in the US from their European manifestations?

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  25. Macon,
    JW just doesn't get it. He or she is obviously confusing European and American cultures. They are vastly different just like the Australian white culture is vastly different from European/American. African Americans and Caribbean American also have different cultures even though both spring from the same land.

    Some European peoples have an issue with personal space. American have felt it when Europeans ask for directions, I swear I was about to get robbed. But that's totally different because most white Americans value and vocalize their preference for personal space. So much so that "close talker" has become part of the lexicon, thank you Seinfeld.

    And BTW, it's not cultural if it only happens to black people. Just like when men feel that they can touch women whenever they want, normally it's usually the petite ones, it becomes sexist when this privilege doesn't extend to other men. It's racial when it doesn't extend to other peoples, GOT IT!

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  26. I'll second the observation that jw just doesn't get it. In her effort to pin something, ANYTHING on Macon, she doesn't see, or won't admit, (1) that he's well aware that White America has European and "Eurocentric" roots, and (2) that nevertheless, whiteness has become a significantly different monster, or maybe set of monsters, in AMerica from what it is in Europe. (whatever EUROPE is--surely whiteness isn't the same everywhere in Europe, like it's not the same all over America).

    As I've said before, Macon, your patience with trolls is amazing. Too much, I'd say.

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  27. @Moviegirl

    >He or she is obviously confusing European and American cultures. They are vastly different

    tell me the difference and let me know why these differences are more important than what all white/European cultures regardless where have in common.

    @Runawayfred

    >As I've said before, Macon, your patience with trolls is amazing. Too much, I'd say.

    Explain why you call me troll.

    >that nevertheless, whiteness has become a significantly different monster, or maybe set of monsters, in AMerica from what it is in Europe.

    Also you, explain the difference and how this difference is relevant when it comes to white supremacy. And why do you think that you have to defend Macon, what is so annoying in my writing?

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  28. Moviegirl and Runawayfred, why the silence now?

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  29. A little OT in the context of everything else that's been written, but I was wondering if we might be able to challenge the idea that white people won't touch the hair of other white people without permission. When I was a kid I had really long, blonde, curly, thick hair that everybody touched. Strangers, kids at school, their parents, teachers- I once had a teacher standing next to me while she lectured the class absentmindedly running her hands through my hair, even when I moved away and tried to get her to stop. People touched my hair all the time, and I hate being touched. It got to be so bad that I finally cut it all off at age 12 and never looked back. After i cut it off, you would have thought I'd killed a child, the way that everyone reacted (except my mother, she was glad that she didn't have to hear me complain about it anymore). I had to go to three different hair salons before I could find someone who would actually do it!

    I felt almost like my hair was considered public property, because it was exactly the kind of hair that lots of white girls and women in my community wanted. Maybe it was because I was younger, as some people suggested, so I occupied a rank below everyone else (I was also absolutely terrible at school and was often in trouble, academically or disciplinarily, and I awful social skills). But I really thought it was completely normal for white people to touch each other all the time until very recently when I've listened in on conversations like this that suggest it's wrong for them to do so. It actually made me feel really validated, because I had alwyas been told that I was being "over-sensitive" and that I should be happy for all the attention.

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  30. Hunter and jw, I gather that this is the sentence in question, which I've since edited in response to your comments. That sentence used to say this:

    White people often think they have some sort of right to touch black people, a right they don't seem to feel they have with others, especially other white people.

    You've both basically said, "Wait a minute, white people DO sometimes feel a right to touch other white people." I was tempted to reply with something like, "Yeah, that's true, but this is a post on white racism, on a blog about egregious stuff that white people do because they've been trained to be white, so let's get back on point, shall we?"

    But, in the interest of accuracy, I've edited the post, so that sentence now reads:

    White people often think they have some sort of right to touch black people, a right they don't seem to feel they have with others (unless they consider those others, such as children, somehow "below" themselves).

    Please let me know if this revision still doesn't sufficiently address your concerns on this topic.

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  31. >Please let me know if this revision still doesn't sufficiently address your concerns on this topic.

    It is not about my/our concerns but if you understand them. Do you?

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  32. jw, what I understand about your and Hunter's concerns on this matter are that they are mutual--a concern that the sentence as originally written did not acknowledge that sometimes white people actually do feel an unwarranted right to invasively touch other white people--it's not just a white/black thing. So, I revised the sentence so that it does acknowledge that.

    Does that understanding of the matter differ from or concur with your concerns?

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  33. it doesn't ask why whites do that. Why do whites disrespect the personal space of other people?

    But when I raise my 'concerns' I am called "troll" by one commenter, can read that American culture differs from European culture but I still wait that somebody of the two will answer my question. Without an answer I consider it as trolling, just throwing in a weak comment without basis.

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  34. Hey

    JW,I work and don't have the luxury of being on blog, all the time. I respond when I can. Does that help with your confusion???

    Also I get to go home eventually where the computer is not turned on!

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  35. Macon- I wasn't concerned/offended with anything (I really considered not saying anything at all) but I do think it's interesting that touching someone's hair/body is something that white people feel is their right in general. It's something that they do becasue they've been trained to be white, in your words. And up until recently, I hadn't connected my experience being touched in really uncomfortable ways by white authority figures with anybody else's experience. I just kind of wanted to get it out there that this seemed to be connected to issues of power in general, of which white privledge plays an enormous part. I was questioning whether or not white people do this weird thing only to people of color, but mostly I was excited to be able to fit it into a larger picture. Then I read back on the comments more thoroughly, and I was like, oh crap, that's going to come off as harsh, but that really wasn't my actual point...

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  36. When a white classmate of mine was pregnant, I congratulated her. She asked if I wanted to touch her stomach. She was surprised that a) I had no inclination to feel the “miracle” growing inside her and b) I hadn’t already reached out and poked her like she was family. I asked her if she'd like to touch my hair. We shared a moment.
    Also, by classmate I mean college not high school – keep it right, young ladies! And she was married . . . before the pregnancy.

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  37. I think it's a novelty thing. That white people are fascinated by braids and dreadlocks and natural soft kinky hair, that they revert to childhood and want to fully experience something by touching it.

    I am white and dyed my hair bright blue. Since then, everyone and their mother has felt perfectly free to reach out and touch it (even though the dye doesn't make it feel any different, just look shiny and blue).

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  38. Why is this a black thing?

    Two of my boys (we are white) have thick heads of unruly curls. Any time we are in public, there is a very good chance that their hair will be petted, stroked and commented on. Black women and white women both do this and feel the need to tell me about how wonderful their hair is. To my recollection no man has ever done so.

    My boys are good natured about it and I remind them that it only means it needs to be cut, which they protest vehemently. I don't think they mind -- as on some level, attention from women is never bad.

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  39. I am also inclined to say it's not exactly a black thing. I was bald (white woman) for a while and my head did arouse some curiosity and requests to pat it, especially when it was closely shaved. Granted, people didn't really go for it without asking, but I think that would have to do with the fact that the strangers were a tad bit scared of me. (And also I'm Finnish so people are very reserved to start with.)

    I do agree though, that being patted, stroked, massaged or what ever by people you're not that friendly with is uncomfortable and irritating... I recently moved to Australia, and people here are a lot more keen on entering your personal space than what I am accustomed to. I try to let it be as I know these people come from different backgrounds and allow them to be friendlier towards me than what my own mother usually is. I know the main motivation for that is their attempt to make me feel at home, even though the result is the complete opposite. :D

    I agree though that the reason in approaching black people in this manner is racist, but the motivation is not. I do think that they are just trying to make you feel welcome and overcompensate on the fact that they don't really know how to make you feel welcome. The less used to people are to other races and cultures, the more they tend to over-compensate. It reminds me of a drunken Finn who gets a rare chance of welcoming a foreigner into our country. They will be greeted with overwhelming and awkward friendliness that a Finn rarely directs to the fellow countrymen. But then, if they treated the foreigners as they treat each other, they would feel completely unwelcome.

    Sorry for rambling!

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  40. Moviegirl, Runawayfred, where are you? Still doing research about the 'vast differences'? You Moviegirl wanted to tell me that I just don't get it, confusing European and American cultures. When you can tell me that they are vastly different you should be able to tell me the differences. What is your problem?

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  41. i know this is pretty common among people with piercings and tattoos, too. Everybody always feels its their right to be able to touch your ears if they're stretched, or rub your tattoos or something. It isn't necessarily a race thing, although it could be partially.

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  42. Just stumbled upon this blog entry... and, I'm European. Like, born in Europe, grown up in Europe, living there all my life but for, like, three months in total.

    So, I'm that milky white blonde, now living in Italy. If I got a dollar for every time when someone points out that my hair... is, I'd be rich. It helps a bit to wear it in a bun but not so much. I've had moms telling the kids that the lady over there has pretty long blonde hair like a fairy-tale princess. I've had people - well, they were always women - ask me whether they can touch my hair. All of them white, although of the darker and curlier sort. As the blue-haired commenter pointed out, it may be rather a difference as such than something racist or condescending.

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  43. As a 50 something year old Black woman raised in the American south I remember a time when if a Black person touched a strange white person you were in deep trouble. Adult or child, it made no difference. To even verbally addressed one, even a white person employed in a store as a clerk or any other customer service job meant you as a Black person had over stepped your place in society. In short, white people were unapproachable by all blacks as well as most other minorities. I also remember as a child strange white people asking my mother and I where we were going when we would be shopping downtown. We couldn't ask them that. If we had, the police would have been called on us. All of this was unfair. I am familiar with strange whites wanting to feel or touch Black people's hair and I find it sickening and annoying given what I stated at the beginning of my post. People need to keep their hands to themselves because they wouldn't welcome the same thing being done to them.

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  44. I didn't realize that we whites did this. I agree with you. It is bullshit especial when older or professional folks do it. I'd never try to pet another human being or put my hands on somebody I didn't know. Now, if I was still young (under 25) and good friends with the black person, of course I might smack them playfully or give them a "knuckle burn" (i.e. get them in a head lock and vigorously rub their head with my knuckles - this is just part of what white folks do - and yes, we do it to each other). Sometimes young or immature white folks like to horse around in this fashion - no disrespect is meant - it means we like you honestly but we are trying to show dominance (it isn't racial, though - it is just one person trying to show a bit of dominance over another but they still like them - like an older and younger bother situation). Anyhow, if somebody tries petting you like you're some dog, do it back. It will freak them out and send the message that it isn't acceptable.

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  45. "Anyhow, if somebody tries petting you like you're some dog, do it back. It will freak them out and send the message that it isn't acceptable."

    Best comment in the whole blog yet.

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  46. White people like to touch black peoples hair because they are facinated by their hair. Its a completly differnt texture than white peoples hair.A lot of white people wonder how they get curls or how they put a weave in. Most white people dont spend a lot of time of their hair like black people do. I undestand why black people don't like their hair touched.

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  47. Hunter & Jim R are, of course, talking about white children. But somehow I just knew they were both talking about curly hair. I have long noticed a peculiar, particularly white, female-pop-culture fascination with Naturally Curly Hair™— especially if it's blonde. I now have a sister-in-law with blonde-and-curly hair, and while I've never seen anyone ask to touch it, she always gets compliments, usually in the vein of a vaguely amazed "it's so unusual!"
    (Hmm. Light bulb?)

    As far demographics, I've lived on both coasts and in Florida, and I've gotten it everywhere. Of course, there are lily-white enclaves everywhere, which is where I assume Hair Touchers are generated. I've only been petted in this way by Baby-Boomer to Gen-Y aged women. In other words, from my generation up to my parents'.

    A few white commenters have said "hey, I get repeated can-I-touch requests!" and seem to sum up by saying, "why connect it to race, they're just curious." From my own experience, yes, uninvited hair touchers are definitely motivated by curiosity. Often there will even be an oohing and ahhing (that is somehow dehumanizing*). But that's not what this post was about. The point is, they don't ask, they just do it. Sure, all they're aware of is their innocent, wide-eyed (read: clueless) curiosity, but the question is, why do they think they can act on it? Sometimes even when we pull away or admonish them? Why is that?



    *I have had a couple instances with not-quite-strangers where somehow the person asked and didn't coo and glaze over and treat me like some sort of... specimen, and it was totally not a big deal; I let them. So it is possible to pull it off. (But don't expect to. It is a bizarre request, after all.)

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  48. I can identify with this though, and i am white. I think that its a basic human thing to touch something you dont know the feel of (think back to when you were a baby and u touched everything to learn from it)

    I have a slightly punky hair style which has shaves parts in it as wells and long parts so its all over textured really. And when i go out, i spend ages gelling it, waxing it, straighten...blar...
    As soon as Im seen people want to touch it, all of it coz i've essentuated all the textures.-may i add, people of all races. in fact especially a couple of my black friends that (when i allow it) will literally sit and stoke the shaved parts because they find it relaxing.

    An yea! its annoying as hell when ive just spent an hour refining it.

    I dont think its just your races and ours, its just humans being humans.

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  49. You know what, tussusms? I really, really don't care if this happens to you too. This post isn't about other kinds of hair-touching/invasion of body space; it's about the common white tendency to think it's okay to do that to non-white people, especially black people.

    If I sound touchy or something, it's because I'm getting pretty tired of this very, very common white form of derailment/distraction/apparent inability to keep one's eyes on the ball.

    Here, take a look at this, PLEASE. And next time you decide to contribute a thought to a discussion of racism, you really should think about whether what you're about to say is a real contribution, or whether it's actually something that's all about your own racially narcissistic white self.

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  50. Ooh, this issue goes way beyond petting. My dear white mother has gotten it into her head that it is fully acceptable to gossip about any looks she deems as "weird." She spent much of my childhood chatting with complete strangers about my beautiful hair, my weird feet, and my weight problems, usually right in front of me. (Occasionally she'd take it a step further and actually include me in the conversation - by telling me to come in and put said attribute on display for her audience.) Now she prefers to talk to me about all the people she's seen who were ugly, overweight, badly-dressed, or otherwise not up to her standards of attractiveness, with the assumption that I'm going to sympathize with her for having to look at those horrible things. Never mind that neither of us are conventionally attractive.

    What's really sad here is the hypocrisy going on. There are white people all over the place who don't fit the White Attractiveness Standard, yet they still think it's acceptable to put down other people who don't fit - and will treat you as the enemy if you don't agree with their attitude. Obviously, selling out for white acceptance is a practice that isn't going out very soon.

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  51. Is this for real?! I am a white female. I have black friends and never, ever, ever, has it ever occurred to me to TOUCH ANYONE, ANYWHERE, regardless of their race, creed, sexual preference, etc., unless I ask politely, eg: "Oh, I love that bracelet! May I touch it?" If another White, Black, Asian, or whatever, person touched my hair without asking or was patting me all the time, I would politely, but earnestly, show them with my body language that I do NOT want them doing that! I don't even like STRANGERS petting my dog without asking! This should be a common courtesy issue, not a racial one!!

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