Natural Hair Community Wrong For Hating Heat? Is Heat Really A Real Enemy?

Hello, everyone and welcome back to dynamic touch. I recently came across a video on youtube that showcased a traditional way to blow out kinky coily hair here is a snippet of the original video. Okay, as we saw in the clip just played the women in the video, were performing a traditional way of heat styling hair. This video really opened my eyes to something that relates to kinky coily, hair and its history. In many modern day resources, i'm speaking from a united states perspective and what is often pushed in our mainstream media. It is often, but not always showcased or implied that black women or black people only begin to straighten their hair due to colonialism slavery, assimilation or for survival. That is the most popular widespread point of view, which i can understand why, due to the united states, history of slavery, segregation and discrimination, but oftentimes in the united states, this history is used as a form of blanket history for all black people across all continents. A form of pseudo-history for people existing outside of the united states, devoid of nuances and depth and personal accounts, denying black people from across the world the right of expressing individualized history, reasoning and culture, thus having a lack of modern documentation of events, everyday life, traditional medicine, Traditional lifestyles, culture and hair care that are easily accessible so, like i stated before many people in the united states, speak from the perspective of the descendants of black people, who were once enslaved in the united states, which a lot of these accounts and views can be Found to have been told, inaccurately due to racism, racial biases and lack of proper documentation. So basically, what i mean is that if the story is told incorrectly most of the time, it is not the fault of black people. This point of view often states that before foreigners began to introduce their beauty standards to the various cultures across the continent, black people wore their hair in xyz, traditional hairstyles. That these styles did not include the use of heated tools. And although i do not know how the particular technique of hair straightening features in this video came about it made me wonder, have we been misled by demonizing the use of heat within our hair care journeys? Is the use of heat to straighten hair solely due to slavery? Segregation and assimilation has the western information surrounding kinky coily, hair care, misrepresented or stereotyped hair care practices solely expressed by the culture or experiences of one group of people unintentionally. Applying these experiences and reasoning to the vast groups of black people existing across the continents did the modern natural hair movement help to fuel a black hair care monolith. With all these questions in my head, i decided to go to the best sources of undocumented experiences. The experiences of aunties and elders, who grew up in various tribes across west africa, the continent of africa, is diverse. There are many different ethnic groups. Some ethnic groups can be found in many countries, while others only exist within one or two nations in the past. Some of these ethnic groups kept to themselves and traded among themselves due to the fact that they lived separately and further away from other ethnic groups, while other ethnic groups lived closer together and therefore traded and interacted with one another more often. Why is this important? This is important to note because it also reflects the nature of kinky coily, hair care. Each tribe, country or group of people across the continent of africa has a different way of hair care. Unfortunately, western media often paints them all with one brush. Thanks to platforms like youtube, many content creators from the african continent began to share their way of hair care. This can be shown in the rise of chebe powder, the explosion of shea butter, the popularity of ethiopian hair butter and the widespread love of moroccan argan oil. Also, here's a quick side note. If a group of people tribe or country was self-reliant, often their hair care was vastly different from other forms of hair care, while the more a group of people, a tribe or country interacted, the more the forms of hair care resembled. One another in one way or more, based on anecdotal evidence provided by the aunties or elders that i have spoken to from various tribes within west africa. Unfortunately, i couldn't find other people, so i referenced the people closest to me. I found something groundbreaking. Some tribes did use heat as a traditional way to stretch hair, so maybe the technique showcased in this video is not as uncommon as people in the west are sometimes made to believe. If we take a closer look at certain parts of africa and butters, these are methods used to keep hair in a healthy stretch state, and now we can add heated tools to the list as well. With all this being said, is it really such a bad thing to use heat in your hair care even regularly blow drying your hair with a heated tool can cut down the amount of single strand knots? A person has and can lead to length retention when done correctly and safely. This is also what i found with heat training. My hair slightly became looser, but still is shaped in an afro. I don't get breakage and my hair is thriving. Should we be embracing heat instead of running away from it, especially since modern heated tools give you more control of how to wield heat as well as the degrees in the distribution of heat? What if the use of heat and heated tools can lead a lot of black women to reach waist length hair? There are multiple ways to take care of hair, and i think that society should be more accepting of different forms of hair care. Even if you believe that it's not the right type of hair care for you, that includes making space for techniques or hair strategies that you may or may not agree with, with every form of hair care, it's something you can take away from. Just like the rice, water craze, it may not be the right hair care for you, but you can learn something from how these ladies took care of their hair. Let me know down below what you think about this topic. Do you agree with the points i made in this video or do you disagree? Let me know what you think down below and as always see you guys next time on dynamic touch. You