Racism and MMA In The Nail Industry

What I have witnessed today has rendered me speechless for pretty much most of the day. Those that know me or have met me will know, this is serious!

I am so shocked that, in this day and age, things like this still exist and I am also thankful that, in my house and within the circles I mix with, this is not even a topic for discussion. However, it is a subject that comes up on a daily basis within the Nail Industry and, quite frankly, I am tired of the lack of acceptance.

I am talking about the link made between Vietnamese Nail Technicians and the use of MMA in salons.

I wanted to use this platform to point a few things out.

I know that, in the US, the use of MMA in Nail Salons is prohibited and I fully agree with this. I have personally seen some awful results of using this product for nails which caused great distress to clients and also myself when I have to treat these poor women. Do I immediately ASSUME that the technician that did these nails was Vietnamese? No, I do not. The truth is, you cannot tell "by a visual" of any products chemical composition any more than you could visually describe the technician behind those nails. It is extremely ignorant to assume that you can and even more ignorant to put that down to a technician of Vietnamese origin. I have witnessed MANY terrible sets of nails done by English speaking techs that just makes me wanna call them up and say "Hey, do you wanna meet up for a Nail chat?". There are so many techs that cry "MMA" and I fear that some use this as a bit of a bargaining tool and an easy way to gain trust with their clients.
I hear all sorts of myths of how to spot a salon that uses MMA and some of them are just ridiculous but, to name a few

• They wear masks
• The cost of your nail service is cheap
• They use efiles
• Their product is in unmarked containers to fool you
• There is normally only one person that speaks English
• You are in and out again in 30 minutes
• You can tell by looking 

None of the points above are unequivocal sure ways to tell if a salon is using MMA. The only ways you will know for sure is to ask to see the original container if you suspect that something isn't quite right or, when you come to soak them off, you will encounter issues as it turns to a glue-like substance that is difficult to remove.

How many techs these days wear masks?

How many of you have an e-file?

How many techs are there that are starting out and charging peanuts to gain experience and cut their time down?

Personally, I have an old metal Monomer container that I decant my liquid into, it doesn't mean that my liquid contains MMA!

And now onto the racism! There will be some of you that claim that this is not racism but guess what, blaming someone and using their nationality as a description as to why, that is racism right there!

I have seen some absolutely amazing work done by Asian techs that has completely blown my mind. Sean Phan, the Odyssey Educator, is one who just has me in awe at his work. Maybe it is fear or envy that makes people automatically claim that all poorly applied nails are the work of Asian techs because they are worried they lose clients more artistic techs? Or has this information been drummed into us from trusted industry sources that we completely forgot to use our common sense. Maybe, the wrong terminology is being used? It is completely plausible that these finger pointers are meaning to identify these salons as Non Standard Salons (NSS) but are getting it confused with a whole other conspiracy theory. Even so, not all NSS are filled with Vietnamese.

Can we all start to identify these salons in the correct way? Why can't we accept that there are all varying degrees of capabilities in our industry and that it has absolutely nothing to do with where you came from.

Here's to everlasting equality