White Beauty Standards Are Putting Black Women in Danger

Racism kills, and a new study on the potentially harmful effects of chemical hair straighteners has shown the paradox many nonwhite people face when forced to conform to white beauty standards.

Late last week, the National Institutes of Health released findings from a study that suggested women who use chemical hair straighteners could have a higher risk of developing uterine cancer than those who do not use them.

As NBC News reported:

Women using chemical hair-straightening products are at a higher risk of uterine cancer than women who reported not using them, a new study by the National Institutes of Health found. Researchers noted that Black women may have a higher risk because they are more likely to use such products more frequently. A group of researchers with the NIH’s National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences looked at the hair care habits of more than 33,000 women and found that those who used chemical hair straightening products at least four times a year were more than twice as likely to develop uterine cancer.

Studies like this are precisely why activists and lawmakers have been demanding full passage of the Crown Act, a federal bill that would ban discrimination based on hair style and texture. {snip}

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