Anything We Love Can Be Saved

by Alice Walker

  May I suggest that if you, dear reader, should ever come across an ad that makes you wonder about the person being presented, do exactly what my friend’s friend did: bring it to the attention of the person involved. This is important. Because I don’t read magazines regularly, I had no way of knowing about the Ford ad unless someone told me about it. It is true that you may find writers who actually do endorse Ford and other corporations, but my guess is that the writers you assume would not do so, don’t. Address the writer in care of his or her publisher, clip the offending article or ad, and send it along. I fear we are in for another long period of disinformation in the United States, and some of it will probably be extremely subtle. (For example, when I showed one friend the ad, he couldn’t see why I was so upset, since everything said in it was complimentary.) As women and people of color and white activist men, we will have to keep our faith in one another strong. Question everything that seems strange or wrong to you concerning the mainstream presentation of your allies. It is better to annoy a writer by alerting her or him to erroneous “news” than to let it percolate unrefuted in the community, to the detriment of the writer and the community.

  I am not saying that everyone has the time, energy, or finances to refute every lie or distortion that appears, but perhaps from time to time we can, individually or collectively, communicate a general indication of where we stand.

  UPDATE: New Woman and Ford apologized. New Woman agreed to publish a statement in a future issue admitting it ran the ad without my knowledge or permission. Ford offered a monetary settlement, which was donated to two of my favorite activist organizations: The Color Purple Education Foundation of Eatonton, Georgia (the money to be used to teach children to swim), and The Ms. Foundation for Women of New York, to assist feminist publishing.

  * In fairness to Ford, some of their small contemporary trucks I like very much.

  Letter to the International

  Indian Treaty Council

  Sacred “Moons”

  San Francisco, California

  November 29, 1989

  Dear Friends:

  I am writing to let you know that I believe your custom of segregating menstruating women from others during religious (and other) ceremonies is wrong, hurtful to solidarity, and historically unsound.

  The very first societies, cultures, and civilizations, all over the world, were founded by women. Because men and women alike were known to be created out of women’s blood, menstrual blood itself was sacred. These matristic (mother-centered) societies were violently overthrown by men, who then instituted societies dominated by men.

  My partner, Robert Allen, and I came to Alcatraz because we wanted to acknowledge the true meaning of Thanksgiving.* To recognize the near-miraculous survival, against incredible odds, of native peoples all over the earth, and to take our stand, as human beings, against any form of man-made separation, segregation, and apartheid.

  We chose to sit with the menstruating women to express our solidarity with the first people of all cultures oppressed because of physical difference—women.

  The male-instigated and -imposed “tradition” of excluding women from religious services is the same in the overwhelming majority of patriarchal cultures in the world. Native Americans, like African Americans and African AmerIndians, are not exempt from this poisonous divisiveness that has weakened our tribes and made all our judgments psychologically lopsided because they represent male views only. It is well known that menstruating women express their true feelings more honestly during their “moons” than at any other time. It is because of this, I believe, that men originally banished them. To exclude menstruating women from ceremonies and councils is one way of silencing woman’s voice, and losing the benefit of her judgment. And where has this led us? To a world run by men whose highest expression of emotion regularly culminates in violence and destruction. Whereas archaeologists have now proven that matristic societies were universally characterized by their peacefulness, over thousands of years.

  I hope you will consider what I am saying very carefully. We are in for times of unusual toughness, when our wholehearted solidarity with one another as oppressed people will be crucial. I know that as a woman, I reserve the right to decide when and whether I will participate in events to which, after all, I have been invited. To ask me to do otherwise is not to honor me as a woman, or as a person.

  In struggle,

  Alice Walker

  * Alcatraz Island in San Francisco Bay was formerly the site of a federal prison. After the prison was closed in 1963, Native Americans “reclaimed” the island. Each year on Thanksgiving Day a ceremony commemorating Native American culture and Native American resistance to European American domination is held—an “un-Thanksgiving.”

  Letter to People for the

  Ethical Treatment of Animals

  Dear Friends:

  I am pleased to submit the following statement on horses and the Premarin* issue:

  Horses are some of the most beautiful creatures Nature has devised. They are a symbol to us of all that is graceful, fluid, and free. Our Souls need them.

  To imprison pregnant mares in order to use their urine to make Premarin, an estrogen-replacement drug for menopausal women, is an outrage against nature and beauty that will inevitably be felt by the women to whom this drug is administered.

  We are not spiritually unconnected from the drugs we take, nor from the pain and suffering that goes into their making.

  One’s life cannot ultimately be improved because a mother mare must give up her child to a dog-food company, while she herself must stand for seven months in a stall too small to turn around in.

  Menopausal women of the world unite! There is always an alternative to cruelty.

  For there to be a future at all, grandmothers must show the way. Be strong in the face of natural transitions. Remember that the horse grows large and strong by eating plants. Menopausal women can get all the estrogen they need from the same source.

  Sincerely,

  Alice Walker

  * The name Premarin is derived from “pregnant mares’ urine.” Horses are artificially impregnated, their urine is collected, and estrogen is extracted from it. The mares are forced to be pregnant most of their lives. Their offspring are taken away at birth.

  Follow Me Home

  Written and directed by Peter Bratt

  Few American films, past or present, are as important and powerful as Follow Me Home, Native American Peter Bratt’s debut film, whose central meditation is how we relate to our ancestral and present-day selves; and how, consciously accepting the experience and wisdom of those who’ve gone before, we relate to each other. It is a work that explores issues of societal and planetary survival: the meaning of integrity, the uses of memory, the courage required by love, and the necessity of respect.

  The film opens on a discussion among four male friends: Tudee and Abel, Chicano cousins; Kaz, an African American; and Freddy, a Native American, as they, together, paint a large, colorful mural on the side of an urban building. It soon becomes clear that they are planning a journey: to drive across the country, from East Los Angeles to Washington, D.C., and to paint a mural on the White House. There is much hope in their quite funny dialogue about the trip. There is trepidation too.

  For, as Tudee says: “Cause you know, brothers, This ain’t gonna be no Sunday stroll. After all, we’re talking about going to Washington, D.C., and painting the White House. Putting our colors and our images on the walls of La Casa Blanca.”

  Each of the men understands the symbolic power of such an event, aware that it is only when we can paint our own vivid dreams on the white blankness of the nation’s canvas that we have a chance of bringing them, and ourselves, to life. The White House, in particular, has been a symbol of oppression to subjugated peoples of color since it was constructed during the colonial period; transforming it into a colorful expression of the presence of American people of color as we approach the next century (perhaps leavi
ng one side of it white, as an example of fair representation) is a cheerful ambition in itself.

  All is not smooth sailing, however, even within the group. On a stop before leaving L.A. and el barrio, Abel, the most hardened of the men, picks up a gun from a local bodega clerk in exchange for a few rocks of crack. From this point in the film, we understand that the long ride to Washington, D.C., is destined to be a bumpy one. That “the man” they expect to encounter in the White House does not represent the only problem.

  As the van, owned by Freddy, rattles along the back roads of middle America, we learn of other demons harassing the minds and spirits of the passengers. Freddy is in recovery from a drinking problem; Tudee is planning to sell, as solely his own work, paintings that are the product of the group. Abel can’t read, and can express himself only through vile language and violent behavior; Kaz is struggling to define himself outside the narrow stereotype of “black dude” in which society, and even Abel, attempt to encage him.

  In one of the most startling scenes in the film, the four men encounter Evey, an African-American woman traveling alone. She carries a mysterious package and seems to be in a state of shock. Evey is played with intense vulnerability and realness by Alfre Woodard. Because of a bizarre accident on the road, in which a white man dressed as an Indian is killed, Evey joins the men in the van, her amazing and painful story connecting with theirs.

  This is a journey, we discover, primarily toward our own selves. A journey to discover who we still are, after all these years of the most devastating humiliation, subjugation, enslavement, and eradication. Who and what are the Spirits still caring about us? How do we as artists continue to make ourselves worthy of the ancestors’ trust? How do we as human beings make ourselves whole enough to deserve the respect and love of each other, especially when there is so much bad history, so much fear?

  Art unfailingly reflects its creator’s heart. Art that comes from a heart open to all the possible paths there might be to a healthier tomorrow cannot help but be medicine for the tribe. In Follow Me Home we see ourselves in our shame and our joy. We see that self-love is the medicine we have most often left on the shelf. We see that this need not continue to be so. We see that we can move toward each other, and not run away in terror. We have ancestors in common who have already done this: run toward, and embraced, each other. We see, in fact, that the spirits we have honored and loved, both in our histories and in ourselves, have not yet deserted us.

  Letter to the Editor of Essence

  Second submittal, December 5, 1990

  Being Kin to Seaweed,

  Bushy Plants, and Trees

  Dear Editor:

  Two fairly recent comments about dreadlocks in your magazine have stayed on my mind: one, that beginning dreadlocks must not be washed for three months(!), in an article about how one acquires locks; the other, that “dreadlocks smell,” quoted from the book of a black woman who had obviously been sniffing the unwashed dreadlocks aforementioned. Though I have written at some length about my own experience of wearing dreadlocks—in an essay called “Oppressed Hair Puts a Ceiling on the Brain,” in Living by the Word—I’ve felt compelled to offer these further comments.

  Though some people may start their dreadlocks by not washing their hair for three months, this is by no means the only way. My daughter has dreadlocks, my best friends, male and female, have dreadlocks, and none of us has ever gone more than a week or so between hairwashings. I find it hard to imagine anyone going for such a long time with unwashed hair, though I’ve met one woman who said she used a kind of cleaning oil instead of water. I regret that the writer of your article was unaware that one of the main reasons people dread is because they can wash their hair frequently, since worrying about losing one’s hairstyle or having one’s hair “go back” (if one uses hot combs or perms) becomes a thing of the past. Undoubtedly there will be readers of your magazine who feel that three months of heavy, dirty hair is too high a price to pay for any kind of eventual freedom, and who can blame them? However, to give up the possibility of dreading is, I think, to miss one of the primary liberating experiences of one’s life as a black person. Permitting one’s hair to grow as long and as wildly as it likes in its natural state is an unexcelled spiritual and political expression and a sweetly self-loving and rebelliously gentle pleasure.

  Generally speaking, dreadlocks that are washed smell great. Many people with dreadlocks live, or try to live, a clean and natural lifestyle. Their hair is washed with soap or shampoo that has only natural ingredients. There seems to be a fondness for coconut oil shampoo, sweet almond conditioner, or other cleansers made of herbs and flowers. There is never a smell of lye or peroxide or of any of the dangerous carcinogenic chemicals found in hair straighteners: chemicals that are just as bad for the environment, since they eventually find their way into our rivers and reservoirs and drinking water, as they are, psychologically, for our spirits, as we admit, each time we face the mirror, that the persons who control our hair ultimately control our image, and to a large extent, therefore, control us.

  It is truly enlightening, in this regard, to view the contentment and calm self-respect exhibited by children whose parents have lovingly allowed them to wear their natural hair, and to contrast this with the behavior of those who have the oppressed demeanor of little people who’ve never known what they look like. And who are therefore always rearranging themselves, futilely, in an attempt to look like somebody else.

  Some people start their locks by simply not combing their hair. Some people tie off sections with strings. Some people braid their hair, let it grow out, then snip off the braided ends (which I did). Some people simply twist their hair into curls until the curls “lock.” (This is what my daughter and our friends did.) The “locking,” by the way, is what happens when the kinks in our hair knit. This happens naturally, and it is one reason why, when people ask me, “What do you have to do to have dreadlocks?” my response is “Have at least one African ancestor.” But the washing of the hair continues, throughout.

  It is also erroneous to think dreadlocks are the same hair forever. Although the hair seems to grow faster and longer than it would in any other style, there is a lot of shedding of old hair. It simply comes off, occasionally, in one’s hand. Or, every six months or so, while sitting around listening to music with dreaded friends, someone will offer to snip off a couple of inches. The only problem I’ve ever noted with dreadlocks is their tendency to hold lint, but this can be dealt with simply by bending from the waist, sweeping one’s locks over one’s head, and giving them a vigorous batting with one’s hands. Angela Davis, who has the most splendid locks imaginable, once showed me that this is also a good method for speedy drying, as well as excellent exercise for the waist, upper arms, hands, and neck.

  I am aware that many people dislike the name “dreadlocks” because they assume “dread” itself is a negative word. Not to mention the word “locks.” I like, even enjoy, the word “dreadlocks” because whenever I use it I find myself in bemused dialogue with African ancestors on several continents—those of our people who grew to dislike their own hair because its uniqueness was unappreciated by the flat-haired people who conquered them and who decreed their own physical characteristics the norm. Glancing in a dictionary created by these conquerors, one finds, indeed: “dread 1. to fear greatly; be in extreme apprehension of: to dread death; 2. to be reluctant to do, meet, experience: I dread going to big parties.” However, it is the archaic description, “3. to hold in respectful awe,” that comes closest to the way I personally feel about black people’s hair, because it really is such an amazing expression. Not unlike certain kinds of seaweed, bushy plants, or trees. As for “locks,” Webster’s defines it: “1. a tress or portion of hair; 2. locks, the hair of the head; 3. a flock or small portion of wool, cotton, flax, etc.” (all of which our natural hair resembles). Related to the Dutch word “lok,” meaning “curl.”

  My one concern in writing this is that readers will assume I
am proselytizing. I am not. Like everything else, dreading is not for everyone. My only interest is that such a healthful, natural experience be given justice, and that the truth be told about it, to the extent that this is possible. My daughter and I have noticed some interesting things, though, about people who dread. For instance, when one’s naturally generous flow of energy is blocked by anger, hatred, or self-condemnation, locks will not grow. All the more reason, it is clear to us, that each head must make its own decision about how it will appear. Not for nothing does every person’s hair lie so close to the brain.

  Alice Walker

  Northern California

  POSTSCRIPT: This letter was not printed by Essence. A year or so later, without my knowledge or permission, parts of it appeared in the magazine in another writer’s article about hair and the variety of ways to wear it, including fried.

  African Cinema

  Taking My Little-Girl Self Back to the Movies

  I recall with sadness my first experiences of cinema. Nowhere were there characters who reminded me of myself; nowhere reflections of the beloved or puzzling faces of family or community members. Only extremely pale white people—committing robberies, murders, marriage, and mayhem—dashed or struggled across the screen; and, in fact, they did not often resemble the whites of my small Southern town either. Everyone in the theater, whites in their section downstairs, blacks in the gallery upstairs, enjoyed Westerns; enjoyed scenes depicting the destruction of the Indian nations and the triumph of “civilization” over nature. They also enjoyed films that depicted the cowardice and lack of intelligence of Africans, shown innumerable times in mumbling, knee-knocking, head-scratching subservience to whatever white male actor was playing Tarzan at the time. How it hurts, today, to acknowledge the amount of poison that was being poured into my little girl’s brain.