Confusion, circa 2018: A YouTube star who says he is a woman and identifies as Mexican-Asian is being attacked for appropriating black culture for wearing a pink wig.
As CNS News reported, Nikita Dragun, who is transgender and has 2.3 million Instagram followers and 1.2 million YouTube subscribers, posed wearing a pink wig in an Instagram photo.
That did it; Allure magazine reports:
Her latest Instagram photo is recalling those allegations of racial insensitivity after the wig Dragun is wearing prompted some commenters to accuse her of cultural appropriation. In the photo, Dragun is seen posing in Harajuku, wearing a wig in a cotton-candy-pink shade — an appropriate aesthetic choice since she’s holding a huge cloud of candyfloss. What’s not appropriate, some commenters are saying, is the style of the wig: long twists that many viewers felt too closely resembled locs.
One commenter wrote, “Really cute, but your hairstyle is definitely appropriation,” then responded to someone asking what Dragun was appropriating, “Appropriation of black culture. Unless she is mixed with black then that’s my own bad for not knowing. But if she isn’t black at all, that hairstyle isn’t actually for her.”
Other comments: “Ur just fully appropriating,” “Nikita I love you but I hate the dreads! Not cool,” “That’s what cultural appropriation looks like.”
Allure points out that this is not the first time Dragun has been vilified for appropriating black culture: “Some commenters spoke up when she posted a photo wearing a look that resembled cornrows; she also sparked arguments in the comments when she posted a photo of herself wearing a multicolored wig that many insisted are locs and, thus, appropriation.”