More of you have commented about my first Miss Jessie’s post than any other thing I’ve written. As of today, the original post has 75 comments since I first wrote it in August, and my recent review of the products has gotten 45 comments so far. Few other products have produced so much debate within the natural hair community.

There are those who swear by Miss Jessie’s, and those who swear AT Miss Jessie’s, because of the price, the product’s ingredients, or what people view as unnecessary hype. Ever since I started this site, I’ve wanted to get to the bottom of the Miss Jessie’s controversy and learn what the sister/owners themselves, Miko and Titi Branch, had to say about their wildly successful products.

I got lucky.

Following her fantastic interview with Organic Beauty Radio, I got in touch with Titi Branch. And we had a long conversation that was enlightening on many levels. I learned a LOT more about Miss Jessie’s, and more still about attitudes towards natural hair within the community itself. Titi was a real eye-opener and she willingly put herself on the line and did her best to answer the controversial questions as well as the softballs.

First things first, the price point. I was initially afraid to contact Titi, as I had no idea how she’d respond to my first criticism of Miss Jessie’s. I don’t want to generalize the natural hair community, but I’m a bella on a budget. $38 to $58 on a tub of hair product just isn’t reasonable for many afrobellas, particularly for those who have never tried Miss Jessie’s before. But Titi surprised me by agreeing with me completely. And now, Miss Jessie’s has just released some new, smaller sizes made for bellas like you and me!

“The products were 16 oz, professional size, really big tubs. And that’s where the product started, in the salon. I think a lot of people didn’t understand that. They need to know we give a LOT of product, and it was originally done that way because people with natural and curly hair use a lot of product. But these [smaller sizes] are for the people who have never tried our product and just wanna try it,” says Titi.

I predict that those 8 oz and 2 oz sizes are going to fly off the shelves. The hype around Miss Jessie’s ensures a steady flow of curious customers, wondering if they should go for the Baby Buttercream or the Curly Meringue. Titi broke it down for me.

“The Buttercream series isn’t really for definition, they’re for moisture. The Curly Pudding and Meringue are for definition, and they have a little bit of hold to them. They’re best applied to wet hair,” she explains.

Using Miss Jessie’s products calls for an interactive hairstyling experience. Users are encouraged to bend over when styling, and to scrunch or stretch the hair. The site offers step-by-step instructions on most of their in-salon methods, like fingerstyling and shingling. A typical Miss Jessie’s in-salon treatment can last two weeks if carefully maintained, and they’re expensive. But still, there’s a misconception by women like myself, who just want to purchase a product, slather it on, and like Tim Gunn from Project Runway would say, “make it work!” And that ain’t gonna necessarily happen with Miss Jessie’s.

“The product is effective for different hair types, all dependent on the technique. So what someone with curly hair would do with curly pudding might be different that someone with a kinkier texture. What you have to realize is, everyone can get a curly result. But different people have to do different things in order to get that result, all depending on their hair texture. Someone with kinky, kinky hair can get a curly result by using Curly Pudding in a twist-out. Whereas someone with a curlier texture can just wet their hair, put Curly Pudding or Meringue, air dry, and go. You’ve got to take texture into account. I think a lot of people go to our site and they see the before and after pictures. We give a lot of explanation to reveal what we had to do to get the hair to look a certain way. You have to read all of that information to get it. We’ve got a couple of methods that we do in the salon, and they’re in-salon methods. When I talk to hairstylists, they get it. But sometimes people… they want to just put the product in their hair and they have a very kinky texture and they want to look like Tracee Ross. You can achieve the curl that you want, but you may have to do something different. You may have to get a silkener if you want your curl to look that particular way. You need to consider what you want to achieve, and that will determine how you get there,” Titi explained patiently. And this brings us to an important discussion in the natural hair community.

What defines natural? Are you less natural if you choose to fingerstyle your fro into ringlets? Or elongate your curls with weighty moisturizing products? Or get highlights to emphasize the kinkiness of your lush hair? What if you wear a protective wig or braids during the cold weather months? If you’re a 3B does that make you less natural than someone who’s 4B? And who the heck am I to judge you and how you choose to wear your hair anyway?

Titi was very forthright about their processes, including the controversial silkener, results of which can be seen in the before and after photos.

“The silkener is a chemical process. We use sodium hydroxide, which is commonly known as lye, and we put it in typically natural hair in order to stretch it out. There has been a lot of controversy about silkeners and chemical processing in the natural hair community. But I think the reason it remains such a popular service is because it really helps people to get what they want, that curly hair sass,” Titi explained.

I’ll be real honest with y’all. When Titi said the word “lye,” I could practically hear a menacing “dun dun dunnnnnnnn” in my head. If there’s any chemical that is universally loathed in the natural hair community, it’s lye. Just the way it rolls off the tongue. Ick. I was surprised at her admission, but I really appreciated her honesty. And Titi’s revelation made me consider some gentle criticism that’s been leveled against me by some of my readers that I’ll take this opportunity to address.

This site is called “Afrobella” for a reason. I want to highlight that natural, afro hair is beautiful. Black beauty is beautiful. I don’t think enough of us believe that. And so, I will always strive to primarily uphold the beauty of natural women, because I still believe that there’s a disparity in how we are viewed by society, and within our own community. There are many women out there who struggle to embrace their natural beauty, and my mission is to encourage that as much as possible. But at the same time, I don’t want to be a “nappy nazi.” I don’t need to put down someone else’s beauty to celebrate my own, I see too much of that as it is. I think there’s too much divisiveness among us already, and I don’t want to be part of that kind of pointless negativity.

So I might not always have product advice for your chosen hairstyle, but if using chemicals and/or wearing a weave makes you feel beautiful and looks right on you, then more power to you. But if your hair is unhealthy and thin because of the processes you’re doing to it, or you’re relaxing for the wrong reasons and you feel conflicted, I’m here with transitioning tips for ya. Either way, it’s all love, bellas. I want this to be a site about sisterhood, solidarity, and strength without judgment.

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She was born into a turbulent Detroit household, with an abusive father who was murdered when she was 18. Her mother encouraged her to become a nurse. A relative once described her as being “a very weird child, even from birth, living in a wonderland, a dream.” Donyale Luna created her own dream. She made up a story to hide her painful upbringing, denied the reality revealed on her birth certificate and claimed that her biological father’s last name was Luna, and her mother was Mexican. Her grandmother became an Irishwoman who married a black interior decorator. And so the stage was set for this extraordinarily beautiful and troubled woman, whose created identity helped to bring her fame and fortune and all of the trappings that come with those things.

She was discovered by photographer David McCabe, and left Detroit behind for the lights of New York City. From all accounts, her rise was meteoric. A sketch of her appeared on the cover of Harper’s Bazaar in 1965, and Richard Avedon signed an exclusive contract to photograph her.

Time Magazine published an article about her, titled The Luna Year. The article already reveals the trouble she was already beginning to encounter: “A month after hitting New York, she married a young actor, divorced him after ten months, and now will not even give his name. “I love New York,” she says. “But there were bad things. People were on drugs or hung up on pot. There was homosexuality and lesbianism and people who liked to hurt.” Unhappy with that world but unwilling to give it all up and head back to Detroit, she fled to London and Paris last December.”

In 1966, she became the first African American model to appear on the cover of Vogue magazine, a photograph in which she covered her whole face with her hand, except for her boldly outlined eye. Reportedly, that shot was chosen so as to not offend the magazine’s regular readership.

Donyale Luna saw her heritage as a thorn in her side. She was known to wear blond wigs and obvious green contact lenses. The journalist Judy Stone wrote a profile for the New York Times in 1968, titled “Luna, Who Dreamed of Being Snow White,” and described her as “secretive, mysterious, contradictory, evasive, mercurial, and insistent upon her multiracial lineage — exotic, chameleon strands of Mexican, American Indian, Chinese, Irish, and, last but least escapable, Negro.”

When pressed about her African American identity and influence, Luna bristled. When interviewed about her groundbreaking roles in popular films, including the Rolling Stones Rock and Roll Circus, Fellini’s Satyricon, and Andy Warhol’s Camp, and asked about the fact that she was breaking down doors for her sisters to follow, Luna retorted, “If it brings about more jobs for Mexicans, Chinese, Indians, Negroes, groovy. It could be good, it could be bad. I couldn’t care less.“

By the swinging sixties, she was living it up in London and hanging with the Rolling Stones. She expressed her love for LSD, saying “I think it’s great. I learned that I like to live, I like to make love, I really do love somebody, I love flowers, I love the sky, I like bright colors, I like animals. [LSD] also showed me unhappy things — that I was stubborn, selfish, unreasonable, mean, that I hurt other people.” Unprofessional behavior proved to unravel her illustrious career. In a New York Times interview, Beverly Johnson complained about Luna’s wacked-out mannerisms, saying “[she] doesn’t wear shoes winter or summer. Ask her where she’s from — Mars? She went up and down the runways on her hands and knees. She didn’t show up for bookings. She didn’t have a hard time, she made it hard for herself.”

She appeared nude in Playboy in April 1975, as photographed by her lover Luigi Cazzaniga. Today, Luna is survived by a daughter, Dream Cazzaniga, who works as a professional dancer in Italy. I was able to find only this photo. She is just as beautiful as her mother.

Hopefully more people will learn about her when Jennifer Poe’s documentary about Luna and Pat Hartley, the only black women to be part of Andy Warhol’s Factory, is finally released. For now, if you want to learn more about the mysterious and tragic beauty, visit this amazing website, which was my source for these beautiful photos. Also, there’s a teeshirt of her Warhol screen test on sale for $43.99 at Rock Rebel.

Donyale Luna died in 1979, of an accidental pill overdose in Rome. She was just 33 years old. Despite her tremendous fame in the Sixties and Seventies, today, Donyale Luna’s groundbreaking legacy is primarily remembered by the African American community, the very community she sought to distance herself from her whole life.

I bet you didn’t even know you were waiting for a product review, did you? Well it seems many of my readers have been!

Since I went natural, the drumbeats have slowly been building. When I started Afrobella back in August, they almost became deafening. Must. Try. Miss. Jessie’s. Curly. Pudding! And I wanted to so, so much. But like I said then, playing with my money is like playing with my emotions. $58 is a LOT to shell out for a hair product. Even if it’s one that’s got the Oprah seal of approval.

Miss Jessie’s has become the holy grail of curly hair products for many a well-to-do afrobella, and I’ll admit, I was skeptical. But the drumbeats kept going strong. Of all of the 234 posts I’ve written so far, my one little Miss Jessie’s post has gotten the most reader feedback. Months after I’ve written it, they keep coming. 73 comments and counting, from bellas who have tried it and liked it, hated it, want to dish dirt about the salon, or came out transformed by the experience. I didn’t know WHAT to make of the disparity of comments. But recently, I was lucky enough to get my hands on all four Miss Jessie’s products. Now that I know the score for myself, I’m gonna break them down for you as raw and honest as you’ve come to expect.

Finally I understand why these items are so darn expensive — you’re paying for a full, heavy 16 oz of product. That’s a pound of hair goop! They’re salon size, with detailed instructions included. I use a LOT of hair product, so usually I go through jars of moisturizer very quickly. But my experience so far with Miss Jessie’s definitely proves that less is more when it comes to this stuff. And having started to use them, I think I’m gonna have enough to last me till 2008.

The first product I tried was the Baby Buttercreme, which costs $58. I will definitely be passing this jar along to my niece Dominique when she comes to visit in May! I think it’s exactly what her mom’s been looking for — a super hydrating hair product that leaves hair soft, moisturized, satisfied, and manageable. The scent is my favorite of the four, it’s like mild vanilla frosting. I like the baby buttercreme, but my mistake may have been in using too much at once; it left my curls limp and heavy, albeit very moisturized. But just a dab when my hair’s still wet from the shower is all I need for a day of moist, well behaved, deliciously scented hair. It’s perfect for parents who need something to make their little afrobellas’ hair behave before you pack them off to school.

I can’t decide which is my favorite Miss Jessie’s product — Curly Buttercreme, or Curly Meringue. I love the results from both! The meringue is a heavier product, and smells like lemon creme. The Buttercreme is a thick, mint-scented moisturizing cream that slathers on thick and leaves my curls super-moist and heavy. It has a strong scent that eventually fades, and it also has a refreshing minty tingle on the scalp. But both products really worked to bring out the existing curl pattern in my hair.

Each tub of Miss Jessie’s comes covered in teeny text that gives directions for their best styling methods. Seriously, my friend Jessica spent like 15 minutes just reading the jar!

Buttercreme is perfect for two-strand twists, puffs, and wash and go styles, and it’s definitely more of a moisturizing hairdress.

Meringue is a styling product that comes with detailed fingerstyling and shingling instructions, which I definitely plan to try when I have the time. Those processes could take ages with the amount of hair I have! Just to comb out my hair takes a while, then to part it all, liberally apply product, Stretch it, position it, THEN sit under a table top dryer and completely dry it? Oh, man. That’s more than a three hour tour.

How I’ve been using this stuff is a shortened method that I just tried because I was in kind of a hurry — combed my hair out in the shower, then when my hair was still very damp, I applied Curly Meringue and stretched out my curls as best I could. Then I was gonna be late for work so I had to go! But I left my windows partially down on my commute, so my hair dried. Sort of. These products REALLY keep your hair moist, to the point that that I touched my hair mid-day, and it still felt kind of cold and more moist than I expected. But I couldn’t be happier with the curl results.

My hair texture tends to be very dry, and my hair usually tends to frizz out, leaving my defined curls with lots of loose halo hairs emerging. But both the Curly Buttercreme and the Meringue made my curls behave, and the weight of the product made for guaranteed curlage and touchability. Which is what makes me not love Curly Pudding as much as I thought I would.

As arguably the most well-known product in the line, I waited last to try the pudding. I expected to fall in love the hardest with this lilac colored, minty hairdress. But surprisingly, no.

Don’t get me wrong, Curly Pudding defines my curls better than almost anything else I’ve tried so far. But it makes my hair really crunchy. My curls dried into perfect spirals, and if you’re going somewhere fancy, styling your hair for a night out on the town or for a wedding or some special event — you can’t go wrong with curly pudding. But I don’t use gel or mousse for this very reason — I like my hair to be touchable AND defined. Curly Pudding made it picture perfect, but I won’t use it on the daily.

And the bottom line is, Miss Jessie’s is a really good line of hair products, and if your hair is dry and unruly, you definitely should check them out. BUT, and this is a big but… it’s not a miracle worker. If your hair doesn’t already have naturally defined ringlets, slapping on some Miss Jessie’s won’t transform kinks into curls.

Those before and after photos you’ve been admiring all are after hours of styling processes, some of which involve chemicals. So if you’re planning to purchase and you have very kinky, very thick hair, don’t expect your hair to look like Rachel True’s after using Miss Jessie’s. Your hair will be nourished and sated, but unless you take the time to shingle, finger curl, and dry your hair, the results won’t be as dramatic as the befores and afters.

Everyone’s big beef with Miss Jessie’s is the PRICE. Few of us can afford to drop a minimum of $38 on a product that isn’t guaranteed to work. Well, there’s good news in that department. Miss Jessie’s will soon be unveiling 2 oz travel sizes that range from $7 to $9! So that’s a GREAT way for curious afrobellas to give the products a try and decide which one works best for them.

Stay tuned to find out when they hit the shelves, and to hear about some NEW Miss Jessie’s products set to debut soon. And keep reading for a big interview with the one and only Titi Branch!

I’ve gotten so sick of being disappointed by magazines. I buy a lot of monthly mags, and there’s a familiar feeling of emptiness that I get after realizing yup, I read this whole thing cover to cover and got not-a-damn-thing out of the experience. I’m not gonna name names because I have lofty freelancing goals (holla at your girl at bella@afrobella.com)! But I will say this — if I’m shelling out four bucks for some shiny paper, I want to feel educated, enlightened, and definitely amused by what I’ve read. And more and more these days, I’m finding that stimulation online.

Yesterday’s “Thinking Blogger” post reminded me — there are some new, very cool sites for afrobellas that I’ve been exploring these days. Allow me to share some of them with you. And thanks to some of my favorite commenters for reminding me about some of these sites!

Whenever I need visual stimulation, I turn to Fly. The site is all about design and beauty, and the writer has a very unique and distinctive aesthetic. I LOVE her appreciation of color and pattern. On Fly, you can learn about anything from art to adorable printed shoes, to beyond gorgeous jewelry, all laid out prettier than some glossy mags. And you can always find inspiring images. For example, I love her collage of lipglosses. This is the kind of thing I’d print and put on my inspiration board.

Clutch Magazine is all about cool photos, fashion, and videos. In addition to the pretty-to-look-at stuff, this month’s issue offers in-depth articles about Aron Ranen’s black hair documentary, being young, black, and single, fashion with June Ambrose, and ever helpful tips on blush. It’s a guaranteed good read.

I’ve raved on and on till the break of dawn about the Smoking Section, and the site’s steadily improved. Now it’s about music AND great writing about a variety of topics. As an aside — seriously, thanks for just sharing Questlove’s harrowing police encounter, Gotty. That, coupled with today’s Pat Tillman/Jessica Lynch hearings left me filled with frustrated anger and a heavy heart. But the primary reason I visit TSS is for the music, and the good reads. In my opinion, Lavish Magazine is the female equivalent. Fashion, politics, and music! Peep their Brooklyn Summer mix, and revel in it. Love Lavish.

Mollygood is one of my absolute favorite daily-read gossip sites, and although I sometimes don’t know who they’re snarking about on Manhattan-based blog Jossip, I always enjoy the writing. So when I discovered that Jossip was launching an urban blog, Stereohyped, I came in with high expectations. And so far, I’ve been delighted. The editor is Lauren Williams, an afrobella with jaw dropping gorgeous curls, and sister of Shake Your Beauty blogger and beauty editor extraordinare, Tia Williams. I like the range of Stereohyped’s vision — they cover everything from celebrity gossip to fashion to beauty reviews — peep their glowing review of Iman’s foundation. I personally prefer the stick, but agree with the review. Iman’s products really work!

And oh, Iman just ages like wine. I just love her and David as a couple. Listen to me, Iman and David. They’re my friends-in-the-head.

I started to kind of get burned out on MySpace. Between everyone and their mother trying to post ginormous flyers in my comments, and the webcam girlz trying to holla at me, I found myself drifting further and further away from Tom and friends. If you’re seeking the new hotness in friend network sites, and hoping to find a community of likeminded afrobellas, check out Nappy Star. The site’s creator, Gee Star, is bringing nappy back.

“If there’s any group of people that deserve a networking site that’s fully dedicated to them, it’s nappy stars because we’re often seen as the most undesirable and it shows. It’s a sad situation when a natural-haired black woman walks into a room of twenty other black women who all have their hair relaxed. What makes it even worse is when a black woman with a relaxer laughs at you for having “nappy” hair. That’s like me bleaching my skin ten times lighter than its natural shade and laughing at another girl for having dark skin,” she explained. Gee and I talked about nappyness back in March, long before the Don Imus controversy. But she addressed the meaning of nappy in such a fitting way, I need to share.

“Say that afros were the new trend and there were a group of eight white girls who teased their hair into afros. A straight-haired white girl, who’s happy with the way she is naturally, walks in. One of the white girls with an afro walks up to her and says “Your hair is straight! You need to tease it!” How silly does that sound? Well, that’s no different than someone who chemically altered their naturally-kinky hair telling another girl that her hair is nappy… I see nappystar.com as a movement all in itself. Hopefully, on top of everything else, we can help the word ‘nappy’ become more of a positive word and show others who are “lost” that nappy isn’t a bad thing. The word should be seen as a compliment because nappy is beautiful. This needs to be done in order to de-program the many black women who were brainwashed into thinking that there’s something wrong with their genetics and to prevent our little ones, into thinking that there’s something wrong with them. And if society sees us accepting ourselves more, maybe they can learn to accept us more. (Goodness knows that there’s natural-haired women out there who are sick of hot-combing their hair just to get or keep a job.)” Ain’t that the truth.
I’m just happy to hear someone recognize that nappy is beautiful, and to be part of a community that feels that way, and also understands the roots, meaning, and power of the word. So sign up and add me as your friend, why don’tcha?

Didja miss me? My weekend got hijacked by one of my best friends, who came to visit all the way from Modesto, California! She’s on a plane back as I type this, and I miss her already. So instead of spending my Sunday plugged into the computer, I was dragged away from the screen and forced to have fun and get together with old friends. We had a fabulous weekend, and it’ll probably take me all week to recover. Now back to your regularly scheduled Afrobella.

Last week I was extremely honored to recieve a Thinking Blogger Award, bestowed unto me by Ebony Mommy. This came in a week when I was feeling particularly ambivalent about the balance of my blog, and struggling to fit Afrobella time into my real life. Her words really touched me. Thanks, Ebony Mommy! Now I will give the Thinking Blogger Award to five blogs that stimulate the intellect and inspire me. Here they are, in no particular order.

1. Racialicious. Written by Carmen Van Kerckhove, the site examines the cross section between race and pop culture with skill and sass. I admire Racialicious because it successfully bridges the gap between irreverent and intelligent, and I always feel like I’m learning something new. I read it every day.

2. The Manicou Report. I’m coming up on a decade of living abroad, and I’m surrounded by Americans pretty much 24/7. There are days when I feel completely disconnected from my Trinidadian culture. Whenever I want to reconnect, I either call Mama Bella, or I check out The Manicou Report. Mani’s posts are erudite, often funny, and always interesting. I love when he posts Trinidad at a Glance, an infrequent overview of everything happening at home that I can’t read in the newspaper. Mani helps to keep me in touch with my roots, and I really appreciate his site.

3. Four Fingers and a Thumb and The Modest Goddess. I’m bucking the rules a bit here and giving the award to two of my favorite bloggers. Why? Because both of them are busy, smart women who don’t blog on the daily, and they both produce the kind of writing that I truly admire. So I wanted to pay respect to both of them. Sue me!

Four Fingers and a Thumb is written by Trinidadian activist and journalist Attilah Springer. I’ve got a lot of respect for Attilah, and not just because we went to the same high school. Her blog helps to keep me aware of Trinidad’s environmental and racial issues, and shows me what a truly conscious activist can achieve when it comes to railing against social issues in Trinidad. The Modest Goddess is written by a brilliant Trini writer who goes by the online name Hottie Hottie. Her blog is often funny, sometimes personal, and always smart. She often writes in Trinidadian dialect, and usually writes about Trinidadian issues from a global perspective. Click here to read her wise words about the Akon issue. So happy you’re back in the blogosphere, Hottie!

4. Clay Cane. I always learn something new when I read Clay Cane’s site. Clay is a very successful freelance writer who blogs about pop culture, music, politics… whatever he feels like! Clay is a brave writer with bold opinions, and he isn’t afraid to share them. Most of my favorite posts of his are about the ballroom scene in New York, which I find absolutely fascinating. Clay is also working on a novel about the scene, and I’m sure it’ll be great. He’s a very engaging writer, and I love his site.

5. 55 Secret Street and Anovelista.com. – I’m not cheating here, because these two blogs are written by the same brilliant writer! There are many beauty blogs, but very few that successfully blend wit, good writing, and fresh beauty information. That’s why I love 55 Secret Street. Nichelle tackles beauty and fashion in a truly fresh manner, loading her blog with lush and desirable images and succinct text. Anovelista is where she reveals her deep thoughts and her writing is just beyond exquisite. I have mad respect for Nichelle, and I always look forward to her long-form writing posts. She’s a pro at dropping knowledge and still making her thoughts accessible to the everyday reader. Love it!

Do you have any blogs that you are particularly inspired by, bellas? Let me know! I’m always looking for new reading material!

Heavy sigh. Here we go again…

Oh Akon.

I was so happy and proud when you incorporated Trinidadian rhythms into your video for “Don’t Matter.” So you can imagine how disappointed and disgusted I was to see this article in the Trinidad Express. And then the video of you practically mauling a fourteen year old girl before a cheering crowd at a Trinidadian nightclub made the rounds of the blogosphere. And then the comments began. Let me backtrack for a second here.

I was already mulling over a post about blog comments, partly fueled by the casual racism I’ve noticed on celebrity blogs. The truly offensive Jennifer Hudson chicken post on That Other Blog has now been edited to remove the tastelessly captioned photo, but it is forever comemmorated here at one of my fave new blogs, The World Around Us. Said site also made the unnecessary and stereotypical joke about e mail fraud when posting about Nigeria’s Next Top Model. But I was pleasantly surprised that the commenters to the site were rightfully outraged by their use of negative stereotypes.

Not so much the readers of Perez Hilton, who left me open-mouthed at the racist statements made on his post about the same show. Seriously, scroll down and read the comments if you want to be depressed about the state of racism in America today.

So then this Akon thing happens, and I can’t look away from the comments pages. And I find the same ignorant beliefs being spouted again and again. “This is a part of Caribbean culture, get over it.” “That’s how they dance in Trini.” “Those Caribbean girls get down like that.” And all of the old school disses delivered to dark skinned people that you might expect. Allusions to African jungle beasts and all sorts of phrases and images you’d be more likely to expect in ancient documents from an English plantation owner, than you would from the people you sit across from in your office cubicles today.

As a Trinidadian blogger, I feel obligated to respond.

Yes, suggestive dancing (better known as wining) is a part of Trinidadian culture. Yes, at Caribbean fetes and at Carnival, you will find legions of men and women grinding sexily on each other. Yes, scandalous dancing is celebrated throughout the Caribbean, all you need to do is do a You Tube search for “dutty wine” or “dancehall queen” to find an array of NSFW videos of women getting down on all fours to degrade themselves. But Akon took it to a whole ‘nother level.

First of all, that girl is 14. In all my years as a proud Trini, I have never seen anything like that, and I say with confidence — that kind of behavior is NOT representative of my culture. Regardless of age, Akon’s treatment of that girl was shocking and reprehensible. Perhaps I shouldn’t have expected much from the guy who sang these songs.

I have dismissed the brief thought I’d entertained of going to see Gwen Stefani in Miami, seeing as Akon will be one of her opening acts. But I have a strong feeling that Akon keeps the blatant, unrepentant misogyny and adults-only antics to international performances and urban nightclub acts. He wouldn’t dare bring shame to Ms. Stefani’s Sweet Escape Tour, would he?

The women who participated in Akon’s dance contest are culpable in the sense that they sought his attention. They clamored to get on stage, to prove their sexual prowess by dancing for a screaming crowd. If you’re the kind of lady who takes it off for beads at Mardi Gras, is an expert booty clapper, or thinks nothing of dropping it like it’s hot, then you might understand where they were coming from. I personally do not. But to say “she looked for that” as some of the commenters have said, is completely wrong. And now her preacher father has come forth to defend his 14 year old daughter’s sullied honor.

Akon’s behavior was shocking, abhorrent, and completely unacceptable. No wonder his record label is desperately trying to remove this video from You Tube, and limit the downward media spiral of their blossoming star. Not that I ever bought his CDs before, but having seen this video, I can no longer support anything that Akon does. He’s been officially banished from my playlist, along with R. Kelly. If you want to learn more and read other intelligent (and differing) perspectives from Caribbean bloggers, please visit Karel McIntosh’s Caribbean PR blog, What Crazy Looks Like, The Mad Bull’s Blog, The Manicou Report, Attilah’s Four Fingers and a Thumb, and Elspeth Duncan’s Now is Wow.

Go Shorty, It’s Your Earth Day!

This weekend, there’s bound to be an Earth Day event near you. I’m gonna try to make it out to Earth Fest 2007, here in Key Biscayne. But if you can’t make it, then you can support Earth Day and environmentally friendly initaitives by — you guessed it — buying beauty products!

CARGO PlantLove lipstick has hit store shelves just in time for the green celebration. The lipstick case is made from a polymer derived from corn, and it’s biodegradable. $2 from your $20 purchase goes to St. Jude’s, and best of all, if you plant the outer casing into the ground, it grows wild flowers! LOVE that. Click here to check out the variety of shades, some of which were designed by celebs. Of the celeb-designed shades, Mariska Hargitay’s my favorite. I’ll do a big post about environmentally friendly makeup next week. For now, if you want a big tease for next week’s product reviews and interviews… click here. All of your questions will be answered!

Disco was Made for Afrobellas

So Lauren, one of my bestest BFFs is in town for a gigantic birthday weekend! She’ll be crashing at Casa Afrobella this weekend, but last night we did it up on South Beach with dinner at Cafeteria and a jaunt down a typically overcrowded Ocean Drive (Ugh, I hate driving on Ocean Drive). And I noticed an undeniable theme — disco is BACK. Did it ever go away?

But seriously, at the restaurant it was non-stop disco, and all along Ocean Drive it was like a disco classics CD was on. Wet Willie’s. The Clevelander. All of the usual sidewalk cafe suspects were blaring bubblicious beats and female singers, not Latin music or hip hop as I usually expect. But then, this was late on a Thursday night. I’m sure the weekend will find us back at Crime Mob and Trick Daddy.

But all that disco fabulousness got me thinking about that era, when it was all about the afrobellas in spangly clothes, under strobe lights. I’ll be writing a lot more about forgotten afrobellas from the Seventies in weeks to come, but for now, I’m ending the week on an up note with one of my favorite disco jams.

We gonna boogie oogie oogie till we just can’t boogie no more!

What’s your favorite disco song, and who’s your favorite disco era afrobella? Happy weekend to you all!