FINA, the international federation that makes the rules for competitive swimming, was recently given the chance to approve a swim cap specifically designed for natural Black hair. It’s a move that would have shown the organization wants to demonstrate that the sport—long-standing bastion of whiteness and racial exclusion—was making an effort to be more hospitable and welcoming to Black swimmers. Unfortunately and unsurprisingly, FINA turned down that opportunity. Instead, the federation denied an application submitted by Soul Cap, a company that manufactures caps for swimmers who have “thick, curly, and voluminous hair,” to have its gear officially approved for Black competitive swimmers at every level. In its rejection, the governing body declared the caps do not “follow the natural form of the head.”
The phrenology vibes in FINA’s phrasing are unintentionally fitting for a statement that, make no mistake, not only bans a swimming cap tailored to fit nonwhite hair, but dismisses every Black athlete who might finally make use of a cap that helps them best compete. Just weeks ago, Simone Manuel, the first Black woman to win an individual gold medal for the U.S. for swimming, again outshone competitors to nail a spot at the Tokyo Olympics, and FINA itself announced that Alice Dearing will be the first Black woman swimmer to represent Great Britain at the upcoming games.
With its rejection of a swim cap that provides no advantage to its wearer, FINA admits its lack of interest in racial inclusion and attempts to reassert the normalcy of the white form—and seems hellbent on erasing these elite Black athletes while deeming their existence in an historically white “prestige sport” as somehow unnatural. It’s a perfect demonstration of how racism renders Black folks—especially those “firsts” who are already targeted with various forms of racist retribution for invading spaces they’ve been locked out of by pervasive anti-Blackness—both invisible and hypervisible at once. There’s no racism in how we do things here or I would’ve seen it, is precisely the thing racist white people defensively claim while fighting against changes that threaten to mitigate the racism that has always kept Black folks out.
There’s plenty of precedent for the racist and, quite often, misogynoir underpinnings of swimming’s current controversy. Black hair, especially in its natural state, has always been attacked, its “unruliness” and “difficulty” contrasted with white hair as a stand-in for pathologized and othered blackness itself. Multiple studies have shown that hairstyles primarily worn by Black women with natural hair—such as afros, braids and twists—are penalized under white beauty standards; last year, researchers found “Black women with natural hairstyles were perceived to be less professional, less competent, and less likely to be recommended for a job interview than Black women with straightened hairstyles.”
Recent American history has seen a Black morning news anchor fired for refusing to straighten her hair, another Black woman’s job offer rescinded for wearing locs, Black students in multiple districts suspended for wearing natural hairstyles, and a Black high-school athlete’s bodily autonomy violated by a white referee who cut his locs before allowing the student to wrestle. A smattering of states have passed laws against hair texture discrimination and the “women of the Congressional Black Caucus” had to intervene to overturn the military’s anti-Black hair policies. (The Army just allowed locs in February, by the way.) All this because Black women have been increasingly shaking off oppressive white supremacist notions of what defines beauty.
Swimming’s historic whiteness is the result of white American racism in multiple institutional forms: the existence of a permanent Black economic and social underclass that has limited Black folks’ access to public and private pools, Jim Crow laws that outlawed integrated swimming in waterways, ongoing massive racist resistance to Black folks taking a swim in waters inevitably raced as white. (Recall that the year 2018 was a banner year for self-deputized white people calling armed police officers on Black people in pools.) Because white racist history is perpetually obscured in the interest of perpetuating anti-Black myths, the practice of white enslavers preventing Black folks from swimming for fear of their escape has been erased from our national memory, only to be replaced with the racist idea of Black folks’ inherent inability to swim. (Written accounts of Europeans dubbing West Africans “the most expert swimmers in the world” abound and date to the 15th century, interestingly.)
The consequences of all that misinformation, according to USA Swimming, is literally lethal. Roughly 70 percent of Black Americans can’t swim, and among young Black people between the ages of 5 and 19, pool drownings occur at a rate 5.5 times that of their white peers. Those numbers are particularly high when considered by gender, because the pressure on Black women to keep their hair from getting wet, which makes relaxed Black hair return to kinky form, and delicate natural Black hair in need of more upkeep.
This all comes at a time when it feels like Black women in sports are under attack more broadly. In early June, tennis star Naomi Osaka was forced to withdraw from the French Open for prioritizing her mental health above headlines. Christine Mboma and Beatrice Masilingi have been withdrawn from competing in Tokyo for having natural testosterone levels beyond a randomly affixed World Athletics-decide maximum, the same ruling that disqualified Caster Semenya, Francine Niyonsaba and Margaret Wambui; Sha’Carri Richardson has been suspended from the Olympic team for an outdated rule about THC use that conflicts with laws in multiple states. And Gwen Berry is being pilloried for using her platform to stand against racism and social injustice.
I feel almost certain that this FINA swimming cap rejection of Black hair will become one of those moments when white people will accuse Black folks of making racist mountains out of microaggressive molehills, even as they themselves politicize and problematize Blackness. But Olympic stars have already spoken about the issues that converge at the intersection of Black hair, swimming and society that demands assimilation with whiteness, regardless of the suffering it causes.
Manuel reportedly bolstered a message from Afroswimmers that requested USA Swimming and other groups “approve and support the use of larger swim caps for swimmers” with natural hair and locs, and has participated in related Black-hair-and-swimming Q&As. Dearing has said she “fully understand[s] why someone would quit over their hair,” acknowledging how “damaging to your self-image and confidence” the drying effects of chlorine can be “for girls with thicker hair, which the majority of Black girls have”—she even partnered with Soul Cap back in May to promote its use for Black swimmers. FINA can pretend not to hear their voices, or recognize their needs as it continues to ignore the existence of Black swimmers. But the tide of Black swimmers is rising, and it’s time they were acknowledged.
