Dreams of a Disbeliever

So I attended the Civil Liberties and Public Policy (or CLPP) Women’s Right Conference this past weekend at Hampshire College in MA.

That has probably the most intense event I’ve attended so far. The conference centered around reproductive justice, but also included the topics of abortion, HIV/AIDS, doulas, gender roles, various injustices, and so much more. 

My workshops were about people of African descent in the Reproductive Rights Movement, prison doulas, the use of art as a method of unpacking oppression and finding liberation, gender roles shoved down our throats at a young age, and teen families and eliminating the negative stigma that is attached to the idea. 

There were just so many heavy topics, and I guess as much as there were things I could relate to and felt passionate about, there were so many things I was just learning or didn’t know how to react to. FOR EXAMPLE: My first ABORTION SPEAK OUT, where any woman could take the podium and tell of her experience with abortion.

There were so many brave woman who went up and shared their stories. One thing that really impacted me was no matter HOW RELIEVED these women were to have abortions, they all seemed to feel this great sense of responsibility, grief, and loss. It was so fucking interesting to hear about so many different situations, but it was so difficult to listen to such sad as shit too. One thing that resonated with me so powerfully was after one woman told her story, she ended by saying “Sometimes I forget it and don’t think about it at all, and some days…it’s ALL I think about…”

Overall it was a good learning experience, but honestly, I don’t think I felt particularly “empowered” at the end. Also, I was disappointed to not see that many people of color not only at the conference, but just on campus in general.

“According to personal finance experts and many colorful charts, attending college can significantly increase one’s lifetime earning potential. Unfortunately, if you’re poor and get yourself a fancy degree, you’ll be too highfalutin for your poor peers and smell too much of the servant caste to be accepted by your wealthy classmates. And you’ll never find love and die alone face down with your face in a New Yorker and your ringless hand in a bag of Flamin’ Hot Cheetos.

Research conducted at Cornell University reveals the awkward position Poors find themselves in after breaking ranks with their parents and cohorts by attending college. Researchers followed 3,200 subjects from youth into adulthood and tracked their marital fates. They found that while college attendance significantly increases wealthy people’s chances of getting married (wealthy men who attend college are 31% more likely to marry than wealthy men who don’t; wealthy women up their chances by 8%), lower income students who attend college actually decrease their chances of getting married. Women from an economically disadvantaged background who decide to attend college decrease their chances of marrying by 22%; for poorer men, their odds drop 31%. And the poorer you were as a kid, the more college attendance decreased the likelihood you’d marry.

So what gives? The Cornell brigade thinks that lower income students struggle to socially assimilate to their wealthier peers because they’re “caught between two worlds.” Their education differentiates them from people from similar socioeconomic backgrounds, but their socioeconomic background alienates them from their schoolmates. They don’t want to settle with someone from back home and “marry down,” but they aren’t able to “marry up.” They’re the matrimonial equivalent of a fish with legs who can’t swim anymore but can’t run around with the rodents and deer. Or Lafcadio, The Lion Who Shot Back. Or a jewel encrusted Carhart jacket…”

I’ve grown up hearing the terms “pelo malo” and “pelo bueno”. I mean for people who aren’t part of the Latino community, it just basically means “good hair” and “bad hair”. For those who don’t know what the terms mean: Bad hair would be anything considered coarse, rough, kinky, or nappy. Good hair is soft, straight or sometimes curly, and basically anything closest to the texture of White or Asian hair. 

My friends and my mom claim they no longer “believe” in these terms after I’ve explained and dissected the whole idea of bad hair as an oppressive term and a form of internalized and interpersonal oppression, BUT they continue to use the terms in their conversations like it’s okay. I get my hair relaxed, and I am not ashamed at all, but when I hear people close to me refer to hair textures similar to mine as something negative, how can I not be offended?

Whether my hair is relaxed or natural, I love it. It’s just another form of self-expression for me, but it’s difficult to not be upset when I listen to those within my culture feel some type of superiority because of their hair type. It’s 20-fucking-12, why are we continuing to exclude and demean people because of their physical attributes?

Also, I hate when some people have the audacity to be like “You have Black girls’ hair.” No. I have my hair. Dominicans have African descent so of course I have some African attributes. Do your fucking research. I don’t hate it because they point out to me that I’m similar to Black girls, I hate it because they say it like it’s a bad thing to be Black. 

When will people learn all these social constructs and socially acceptable things they follow so blindly and dearly were created by their very oppressors. The White Man.