I’ve definitely been flagged because of my hair pins/ braid. I have long hair and often wear it in a braid to fly because that way I don’t have to wash my hair on the first day in the hotel after a long flight. That being said, I’m white and my hair is fine textured so they usually just glance at me and wave me through because there’s obviously no real way to fit anything in my thin stringy blonde braid. It’s hard enough for me to hide bobby pins in it. That kind of flexibility though is just like an open invitation for assholes, I’m sure people who for whatever reason appear more “threatening” to the agents are subject to increasingly anxious inspection without anyone ever wondering why some people with a braid look more “scary” to them without doing or saying anything. It may also be accumulation. Almost nobody in my life has ever been even a little suspicious about my hair, but from what I understand from others is that people being suspicious, controlling, and generally weird about your hair is just par for the course for people of color here. So for them it may just be the crowing glory of bullshit to have their hair inspected like a terrorist’s gym-bag. And honestly, I can see that.
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