Lena Waithe holds a special place in all of our hearts. From her many roles and professional accomplishments to her epic style and heartwarming relationship, there’s no way one can’t love her. The 36-year-old actress, producer, screenwriter and fashion icon has made serious waves in the industry for both herself as well as up and coming black writers and actors.

While Waithe has been on many headlines recently because of her fresh new do’, we thought we’d share some more reasons why we’re obsessing over Lena Waithe:

Of course, her haircut

Lena was known for her beautifully kept, long locs — so it took us all by surprise (a very good one) when she debuted a freshly shaved head. The Emmy-award winning star shared an image of herself on her Instagram crediting @barberdolltheslayer for her new cut.

"I felt like I was holding onto a piece of femininity that would make the world feel comfortable with who I am," Waithe said, according to a video of her on shared on Variety’s twitter account. "I think I thought for a long time, 'Oh, if I cut my hair, I’ll be a stud, I’ll be —in the gay world, there’s a lot of categories — I’ll be a stud or I’ll be a butch,' and I’ve always thought, 'Well, no, I’m not that, I’m still soft,' and I said, 'Oh, I gotta put that down ’cause that’s something that’s outside of me.'"

Despite the feelings of ambivalence concerning her hair, Waithe admits to feeling "so free and so happy and so joyful," about her new look.

The rainbow cape

The Met Gala is known for their extravagant themes and even more esh-travagant outfits. This year’s Met Gala theme was "Heavenly Bodies: Fashion and the Catholic Imagination," to which Lena Waithe wore a rainbow pride-cape. If that’s not an elegant middle finger to the institution that condemns LGBTQ+ for being themselves, we’re not sure what is. Waithe completed the look with her dreadlocks perfectly twisted and a more natural makeup look with a subtle sunset eye and glossy lips.

The best Thanksgiving episode

As a writer for Netflix’s original series Master of None, Waithe displayed her writing talent through various episodes in which she also starred. The witty, comedic writer won an Emmy for her outstanding job writing the Thanksgiving episode for the show's season two. The episode took place through various important years of her life, which resulted in a 'coming out' episode filled with laughs, great memories and the great @nipplesandtoes23.

SUPPORTING OTHER PEOPLE OF COLOR AND QUEER ARTISTS

For Lena Waithe’s Vanity Fair cover story, she shared that her success has allowed her to bring up other black writers and queer artists in the industry.

"How has the Emmy changed me? It got me all these meetings that I go in and say I’m too busy to work with you — you should have hollered at me. You can take my call when I call you about this black queer writer over here who’s got a dope pilot, or this person over here who’s got really cool ideas, or this actress who’s really amazing but nobody’s seen her," shared Lena.

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Queer writers