In The Community
In Latino communities, the phrase “pelo malo,” or "bad hair," has echoed through generations, shaping beauty standards and self-esteem in ways that are hard to ignore. Whether whispered at family gatherings or thrown around casually in salons, it carries weight, and it reveals how deeply internalized racism and colorism run within Latino culture.
But let’s be clear: there’s no such thing as bad hair. The real issue lies in the colonial beauty ideals that are pervasive in Latino culture to this day.
The Origins of "Pelo Malo"
The idea of pelo malo is rooted in Latin America’s colonial past, where European standards of beauty were forced upon indigenous and African populations. Straight, silky hair was seen as a symbol of status and respectability, while curls, kinks, and coils were deemed unkempt and undesirable. Tia Williams, a beauty expert, explains it best: "From birth, Latina and Black women are taught that the closer you are to white, the easier it is to succeed in life. The lighter, the better. The straighter, the better." That mindset didn't disappear; it just evolved.
Growing up, many of us were taught to “tame” our curls instead of embracing them. Relaxers, blowouts, and flat irons became a rite of passage, and conversations around hair often revolved around how to make it look "better,” which is code for straighter. The result? A cycle of shame and insecurity that starts in childhood and lasts well into adulthood. Oh, and it often leads to badly damaged hair.
The impact of pelo malo isn’t just about aesthetics; it’s also about identity. When you’re constantly told your natural hair is a problem that needs fixing, it chips away at your confidence. Instead of being taught how to keep hair healthy and managed by personal preference, curly hair types deemed “difficult” or “bad” are instead “fixed” rather than managed. There’s a clear, underlying message that gets internalized: our hair, and by extension, our heritage, is something to be ashamed of.
Colorism and Hair Politics in the Latino Community
Colorism ends up being a manifestation of internalized racism. The issue of pelo malo is deeply tied to skin tone, with lighter-skinned Latinos often enjoying more privilege and acceptance than their darker-skinned counterparts. A 2022 survey from the Pew Research Center shows that 41% of darker-skinned Latinos report experiencing discrimination from other Latinos, compared to 25% of lighter-skinned Latinos.
This disparity reveals how deeply ingrained Eurocentric beauty standards are within Latino culture. As a result, internalized racism leads many Latinos to hold negative stereotypes about their own communities, particularly through colorism. This phenomenon can be traced back to the Spanish conquest, colonization, and slavery, which established a racial hierarchy favoring white individuals and discriminating against Black and Indigenous people.
And it’s not just about beauty; it’s also about opportunity. The belief that straighter hair equals professionalism and respectability has real-world consequences, from job opportunities to social acceptance. Many Afro-Latinos feel pressure to conform to Eurocentric beauty standards just to be taken seriously.
A Shift in Perspective
In recent years, the natural hair movement has gained momentum, with more Latinas embracing their curls and coils unapologetically and even as a form of cultural resistance. Social media has played a part in enabling this shift, with influencers and activists challenging the idea of pelo malo and replacing it with affirmations like “pelo bello,” translating to “beautiful hair,” as a way to reclaim the narrative and celebrate natural textures.
More and more women are sharing their hair journeys online, offering tips, support, and encouragement to others learning to love their natural hair. This movement has contributed to a gradual shift in beauty standards within Latino communities, with more individuals embracing their natural hair as a form of cultural pride and self-acceptance.
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The increased demand for natural hair products has also led to greater availability of specialized hair care items and information, making it easier for people to care for their curls and coils.
Shifting the Narrative
Breaking free from the pelo malo mentality takes time and effort. It starts with unlearning biases and having honest conversations within families and communities. It means teaching the next generation to love their hair from the start and showing them that beauty comes in all textures and styles.
The truth is, pelo malo isn't real, but the damage it’s caused is. By embracing natural hair and rejecting harmful beauty standards, the next time someone mentions pelo malo they can be reminded that bad hair doesn’t exist, only misinformed mindsets do.
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I am always shocked when I hear someone say they’re not a feminist or even say that the feminist movement is this crazy new world ideology. It isn't a "trend" or something that is done to be "edgy."
The feminist movement is fighting for human lives and for the rights that we should all have when we’re born.
Events like the overturning of Roe v. Wade are more than enough proof of that. If a human being losing autonomy over their own body doesn't alarm you, I don't know what will.
In simple terms, feminism advocates for equality between men and women in all aspects of life. The concept has gotten lost for many that choose to not educate themselves on the subject and not only believe, but also spread the false notion that feminism is fighting for the superiority of one gender.
The feminist movement is not an attack on men, far from it. Feminism views all people as human beings deserving of a quality life as it fights against social injustices prevalent in our society.
There's nothing out of this world about the feminist movement; after all, one would think that there’s no reason for one gender to be lesser than the other in our society when we are all humans. But our world was built upon patriarchy, and men have been the ones in positions of power for far too long.
And yes, the movement is flawed, mainly where it concerns women of color and non-cisgender women. Women of color, queer, and trans women fight for more than just gender equality, and we can't be truly equal if we solve one issue but not the others.
The effect of poverty, racism, systematic oppression, and homophobia on women of color is also why the concept of intersectionality in feminism was introduced. Coined in 1989 by Kimberlé Crenshaw, she introduces the concept as "a prism for seeing the way in which various forms of inequality often operate together and exacerbate each other." When different forms of discrimination overlap, we can't just ignore one for the other, because if we do no equality has been achieved.
The feedoms and struggles of women in the U.S. look different for women in other countries. We need feminism because young girls and women are still fighting for fundamental human rights in many parts of the world.
In most countries in Latin America, for example, abortion is still heavily penalized, and reproductive rights for women are practically nonexistent. With some of the highest poverty rates in the world, access to contraception and sex education is not a given.
Femicide prevails across the world. About 66,000 women and girls are violently killed annually, accounting for approximately 17 percent of all victims of intentional homicides. A report published in 2016 by the Small Arms Survey, showed that "among 25 countries with the highest rates of femicide in the world, 14 are from Latin America and the Caribbean."
El Salvador and Honduras stand out with rates of more than ten female homicides per 100,000 women. The level of violence affecting women in El Salvador and Honduras exceeds the combined rate of male and female homicides in some of the 40 countries with the highest murder rates in the world, such as Ecuador, Nicaragua, and Tanzania.
Body autonomy and violence are just a few of the issues in the fight for equality. Phrases like, "I'm not one of those crazy feminists" or "women aren't oppressed," need to be used as teachable moments rather than just brushed off casually as just another knock on women. The more we destigmatize the word, the more we can actually achieve understanding from those who are willing to listen and learn.
Originally published in The Latino Newsletter–reprinted with permission.
Opinion for The Latino Newsletter.
The Republican Party campaigned for power by threatening to rip the lives of 20 million people from the fabric of this country. As horrifying a premise as it is, this act of political depravity has happened before.
Beginning in the 1930s, an estimated 1 million people —Mexican Americans and Mexican nationals— were expelled from this country. Following the Great Depression, Mexicans were targeted and scapegoated for taking jobs from “real” Americans and exploiting social welfare resources. The Hoover administration, scrambling to stay in power, gave cities and states authority as to how they would rid themselves of these “undesirables.” The smears used against this demographic have embedded themselves into the historic and now daily discourse of immigration.
In Los Angeles and the state of California, individuals, including families with children, were raided and rounded up through door-to-door knocking, threats, intimidation, withdrawal of social welfare benefits, and collusion with the Mexican government. A conservative estimate suggests that 600,000 of those people were U.S. citizens. That is right, 600,000 people who had the legal right to live in this country were thrown out or “expatriated.”
- YouTubeyoutu.be
The incoming Trump administration and its nativist allies clearly got their ideas from our little-known, forgotten history. There were few if any, concrete repercussions to Hoover’s action or that of the following FDR administration. There has been no federal acknowledgment and certainly no reparations. Only the devastation of families and communities.
To this very day, we as a nation remain troubled and confused by who is a “real” American. From the inception of our country, we’ve created and sustained outrageous “immigration policies.” Indigenous Native Americans were labeled “domestic foreigners” and didn’t have the right to vote until 100 years ago. In 1923, the Supreme Court ruled that “the intention of the Founding Fathers was to ‘confer the privilege of citizenship upon the class of persons they knew as white.’”
Citizenship and whiteness are still closely linked in the minds of many, which is precisely why there’s a fence on the southern border and not the northern border. Nobody tends to be worried about a “mass invasion” from the north.
This is all about skin color.
At California State University, Long Beach (CSULB), I teach this history, along with other hidden histories, to future elementary teachers. We reflect on how often K-12 education has omitted the United States-led crimes of the past. I teach these topics not because I am unpatriotic but precisely because I want to build a better country through the teaching of difficult truths.
The only way to plan for a better country in the future is to acknowledge our past, not the fairy tale creation myth, not the white-washed propaganda, but our actual history, with all its blood and sinew.
It is challenging to imagine the catastrophic damage to the lives of people who were removed and those who remained. How can we recognize what is not there? What does it take to notice the missing, the invisible, and the irretrievable?
And how dare we consider doing this again?
In 2018, after years of teaching about expatriation, I began writing Dispossessed, a novel about the 1930s mass expulsion of Mexican Americans and Mexican nationals.
Months after I started the book, the U.S. government began separating families at the border.Our unvarnished history forces us to confront the present. Slander and scapegoating persist, fueled by white racial identity politics and nativism. Project 2025 threatens to denaturalize U.S. citizens.
My novel traces the life of one boy separated from his family during the 1930s expulsion. The Republican Party seeks to return us to an era where Brown U.S. citizens were abandoned by their own country.
The connection is chilling, real, and undeniable.
- Immigrating to Forced Assimilation: At What Cost? ›
- Expat If You’re an American in Latin America, Immigrant If You’re a Latino in the U.S. ›
