Dad's Love/Fight Their Daughters Hair - The Natural Way

I always write my own Posts and try to educate as many people across-the-board, but I am wanting to expand Killerstrands reach and point ourselves toward the Latino and African-American communities - both work here and it is simply not fair to not include them with specific Posts and Products designed for them, their hair and their problems.


Its an avenue I want to learn more about, as back in my Salon days I was known as the "QUEEN OF THE RELAXER" and I loved doing them, because when you perform the single hardest and most unique process -- SUCCESSFULLY - - you will never ever see a happier person. The first time they shower they simply do not believe their hair has remained straight afterwards.
  If you have been living under-a-rock and don't know what a Relaxer is, well it is a very strong/ incredibly long treatment that is used and has been used for many many years to chemically straighten (permanently) hair. It began in the Black community, but I used to do them on myself because of my wretched curly/frizzy red hair - so the range is vast. The problem with this procedure is, the person performing it better be a perfectionist because one wrong move and plop, the hair can be on the ground. I would never perform them on children or kids even though I was asked...Truly I love natural hair on everyone, but with my own being a nightmare I can certainly relate.

So a story from somewhere else that I cannot find ........popped up and I read it ........copy and pasted it and now cannot find it again..........but,I just thought it was the loveliest story, so I copy and pasted it here for you all to read. 

 

 

From Chance the Rapper to a zillion other boys the internet can't get enough of dads doing their daughter's hair. But these viral moments aren't just cute — they're an important moment for representation and encouraging positive paternal moments. That's part of the reason NFL wide receiver-turned-movie director Matthew Cherry, decided to create Hair Love, a Pixar-style animated short film about a Black father, Stephen, trying to do his daughter Zuri's hair.

Cherry, who has nearly 73,000 followers on Twitter, began dropping hints about the project on July 3 by sharing a black-and-white sketch of Zuri. On July 10, he launched his Kickstarter campaign to get the movie up and running. And today, he's already met $27,757 of his $75,000 goal (and counting). For what it's worth, Hair Love has some pretty impressive production credits. For example: Animator Frank Abney is currently working on Incredibles 2 and Peter Ramsey, who's an executive producer on the film, is the first Black director to direct a feature-length animated film, Rise of The Guardians.

Brag-able team aside, Cherry says that the significance of this film has a priceless takeaway. "I'm not a father yet, but I think you should respect women regardless of your connection to them," Cherry says. "So the importance of this is pretty obvious. Any time a father can be in his child's life, that's a beautiful thing."

Read on to fall in love with Hair Love even further.

Can you tell us what motivated you to create this film?
"I've had the idea for a couple of years now. It was sparked around the time that I saw Rihanna's movie Home. That was one of the first times, outside of characters in Princess and the Frog, that I saw a little Black girl as a main character in a 3D animated movie. I’ve always come across these videos — and maybe I have a little baby fever myself — because I'm always sharing cute videos of kids.

"This year, I really started seeing more people sharing videos of Black fathers doing stuff with their kids. I think a reason why all these Black father and daughter videos were hitting was because of what society has put out there. People think Black men aren't in their kids’ lives — so when people do see the videos, they look at these as an anomaly. On one hand, I'm happy seeing these videos, but on the other hand, it made me sad because I knew that a reason that these videos were going viral was because people didn't think that was normal. In the animation world, you don’t see a lot of representation of characters of color. They might fill a background role or sidekick, but you never really see a lot of lead characters of color.

"In the Black community, hair is a huge deal — it's a multi-billion dollar business and industry. I feel like there has been a huge natural hair movement that has taken off in the past few years, too. You want little girls to take pride in their natural hair, not feeling like they have to adhere to European standards of beauty. You have the lack of diversity in these animated films. Then there's the whole lack of representation of Black fathers. So it stems from those three different things."

Who’s the inspiration behind the natural hair vlogger in the film, Angela? Did you find yourself sucked into the world of vlogging while doing research?

"On my Tumblr page, I already followed lots of natural hair pages. Hair is something I've always been interested in. For men, back in the day, if you didn’t have waves, you were nappy. Now you see this whole new wave with sponge brushes — guys embracing their natural 'fro and growing their hair out more. In terms of the bloggers, I never really saw one depicted in the animated world before, so I thought it would be a cool thing to include.

"I also put myself in that position of a father. If I had to do my daughter's hair, what steps would I take? One of the first things I’d do is get into a YouTube tutorial and see what they do. The character Angela, being a natural hair vlogger, had to be as representative in the film as possible. I talked to [an] animator, and gave her some real specifics about the look. I wanted her hair to be big and a little darker, because I felt that was important."

Does Hair Love echo any of your own experiences? Or did you feel like you had to assimilate with a certain haircut at an early age?

"I think the hair situation hits everybody, both men and women. We all have hair journeys that we go through where people don't get it. They want to touch your 'fro and see if it's different. People are confused when you tell them that you cut your hair every couple weeks. There are a lot of microaggressions that tend to make a lot of people self-conscious. The coolest thing I've seen through this project is that people are able to relate to these images. They say, 'I remember when my dad did my hair and he messed it up,' or 'he did a really good job.' Most importantly, people are saying: 'Wow, I wish I had a character like this when I was growing up because it would have made me feel differently about my own hair.' You don't think about things like that, but when you're growing up and you don't see yourself represented — you think you're different."

Have you received any feedback from young fans?

"I've gotten several tweets from people saying that they've shown their kids pictures and images, and they're really excited and can't wait to see it. Even today, we're in the process of trying to collaborate with some of these Black girl doll companies, to see if we can get a character design. Her hair can be customized to where a little girl can play with it and style it, and have it be representative of what we really look like. We wanted to make sure that the hair was of various textures and very customizable. Dads and moms and kids can style it, and practice on it. I'm fairly confident that we’ll be able to get a doll made and include that in the Kickstarter, too."
 
Where do you hope this film will run?
"In a perfect world, I would love to treat it like an indie film and do the festival circuit. I would love if Disney, Pixar, or Sony animations saw it and would want to put it in one of their animated movies. Like maybe a short— that would be super ideal. If not, we'd still do the festival circuit, maybe Sundance in 2018. For me, the most important thing is that people see it. With short films, it's a little different than traditional movies."

 Have you received any feedback from young fans?
"I've gotten several tweets from people saying that they've shown their kids pictures and images, and they're really excited and can't wait to see it. Even today, we're in the process of trying to collaborate with some of these Black girl doll companies, to see if we can get a character design. Her hair can be customized to where a little girl can play with it and style it, and have it be representative of what we really look like. We wanted to make sure that the hair was of various textures and very customizable. Dads and moms and kids can style it, and practice on it. I'm fairly confident that we’ll be able to get a doll made and include that in the Kickstarter, too."

What message do you hope Hair Love will send?

"Even though the film features an African-American daughter and her dad, I think it's a universal story. Parents everywhere can relate to it in the same way. Kids of all ethnicity's  can see the humanity in this film. To me, it's an important story because representation matters.

"So many people have told me that they wish that they had a project like this when they were growing up, which could have helped them feel more confidence with their appearance and their natural hair.

"If you see something you can relate to with it, please support. That doesn't have to mean money. Even if you just share it, then someone else might donate, support, or share it. We're just excited about the project. I think the initial feedback has proven that we're ready to see more films that feature characters of color in the animation world."

Can you believe a football player who doesn't even have his own kids, is behind this, that in and of itself is remarkable  - he is one very centered human being!  Please donate on Kickstarter , even if it is only a little, every bit helps !