“America’s first mental health barbershop movement,” The Confess Project is committed to building a culture of mental health for boys, men of color, and their families through capacity building, advocacy, organizing, and movement building. They believe in a world without barriers to stigma and shame.
"As a barber, people listen to our advice a lot, and the training just brought that out more," said Antonio Wiggins, who cuts hair and teaches at the Trendsetters Barber College in Jackson, Mississippi. "I didn’t even realize I was helping people mentally and how important that was." In June, Wiggins was one of 20 who participated in the latest round of training by The Confess Project, an Arkansas-based group that has taught Black barbers across the South how to fold emotional support into that "shop talk" and de-stigmatize those conversations in predominantly male waiting areas.
Overall, the South persistently appears in the bottom 10 states for mental health care access nationwide, according to the annual Mental Health in America report, including Texas, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Florida, South Carolina, and Tennessee. The Confess Project has worked with barbers in each of those states. After seven years, they have reached 52 cities in 29 states across the United States, training nearly 3,000 barbers.
“Ever been told to ‘man up’ when all you wanted to do is cry? Wished there was someone to talk to who understood where you were coming from? Had a moment when all the -isms in life were too much to bear? We’ve been there,” says Confess Project founder Lorenzo Lewis. “We want people to think of it like CPR: a necessary and effective intervention when someone’s in a crisis. The Black community in the US is largely disconnected from what a mental health emergency looks like and how their mental health can impact those around them. That’s because it’s still stigmatized.”
On the micro level we’re working to build stronger, healthier relationships," Lewis said. "On the macro level, we see that poverty may be decreased. Men who come in the shops have better employment outcomes and better mental health." Tiffany Haynes, an associate professor at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, studied the barriers to mental health care for Black people who live in rural areas. In a 2017 study, she found that high costs and lack of insurance were primary factors as well as a shortage of healthcare providers in the region. Haynes also found that within the Black community, a clear need for mental health care often clashed with a lack of access to mental health literacy and deeply-rooted stigmas against seeking therapy.
Shanalie Wijesinghe reports that, "The Confess Project is built on a foundation of access, advocacy, research, and innovation that goes far beyond barbershops. The program begins with training Black barbers and stylists to become mental health advocates and confidantes for clients who feel like they can’t talk about these issues anywhere else. This is only a first step; these advocates, along with The Confess Project, also work to increase access to clinicians and mental health professionals, only 4% of whom are people of color."
Source:
Andrew J. Yawn, Mississippi barbers get mental health training to aid Black communities, The Clarion-Ledger, July, 28, 2020
Shanalie Wijesinghe, Empowering Barbers and Stylists: The Confess Project's Mental Health Advocacy, Boulevard, August 2, 2023
Ashoka, Meet The Barbers Starting A Conversation About Mental Health, Forbes, Nov 21, 2022