Oh my fellow Women of Color

nudiemuse:

Hi, 

First of all I love a lot of you. So let’s not pretend I’m trying to be shady because I’m not.

But can we talk?

Can we stop with the unnecessary cruelness towards each other?

Can we stop upholding whiteness and pushing Colorism?

Can we not default to transphobic, sizephobic bullshit if we don’t like each other?

Why does it have to be so ugly?

You think you’re hotter than me?

Great.

Do we have to be in some invisible competition?

Do we have to perpetuate patriarchal shit that harms each and every one of us?

Can we stop talking shit about each others hair?

Can we show a modicum of respect for each other before we demand it from Men of Color and white people?

It’s 20 fucking 13.

We are living in the future.

If you don’t like how I dress, the shape of my body, my hair, my face, my style, my swag, my Queerness, etc etc that’s okay.

It’s more than okay it’s great because believe it or not, we are a vast diverse universe of women.

What’s not great is turning dislike or disinterest into a reason to be an asshole.

Can we stop pretending it’s cute?

Can we not default to beefing with each other if we don’t agree?

Can we do better than mainstream feminism and say, hey you identify as a woman, you’re a woman.

Can we stop supporting a racist system that is trying to kill us by only upholding those of us with the best weaves, the most perfect skin, the least “ethnic”noses, the flattest butts, the most ratchet hood booty shorts, the most lovers, the longest held virginity, the non Christian spritulity, those of us twerking towards freedom or two stepping to glory, those of us who walk with a switch, the sluts, the lesbians, the fat studs, the wifeys holding it down with the 2.5 kids and picket fences, the upwardly mobile, the hood for life, the hookers, the strippers, the cam girls, the creators, the shy, the as yet still controlled by ideals of Whiteness, the natural haired, the relaxed heads, single Moms, Mama’s without their babies, welfare recipients, college students, drop outs, trans* folks, genderqueers, heterosexuals; I could go on forever.

I’m talking to you dark women, you light women, you fat women, you skinny women, you demure women, you bold women, you women who are hustling and struggling and succeeding.

Shit I’m talking to myself.

We break my heart.

In this world that wants nothing more than to let us fight it out and cut each other down, can we not?

Even if we hate each other, even if there is nothing we can philosophically or morally agree upon can we stop cutting each other?

We all bleed.

Can we stop bleeding for the shits and giggles of a world that disrespects us?

Can we not.

Please.

What can we do?

We can respect each other in our differences. It’s not that hard.

We can not save the worst of our venom for each other.

We can stop just being mean to be mean because we don’t like what we’re wearing or listening to or how we’re dancing on the internet etc etc.

We can not.

We can.

I know it’s not all rainbows and puppies and hugs.

But it doesn’t have to be all competition and stepping on each other to get ahead.

Love,

Shannon

Why aren’t little brown girls praised as much as little white girls?

thegoddamazon:

karnythia:

anedumacationisnomore:

So I just watched that documentary on shadeism that I reblogged from espirit-follet, and my head hurts and my heart aches.

Watching that little girl look at her own beautiful skin and hearing her talk about how ugly it was… pointing at the white models and not the black ones, talking about her aunt’s lighter skin and how different it is to her own…

You know, I never once thought of myself as a pretty child. Pretty was my white friends, my black friends and me, we were just there. Not very feminine, not like the white girls. Not desirable, not particularly popular with the boys the way the white girls were. I remember the time my friend Julia told me that she thought I was the prettiest girl she knew, and it floored me. First time anyone had ever told me I was pretty. I was eleven.

I look back on pictures, and I think to myself, why? I was a gorgeous kid. I had these big lovely brown eyes, black hair, golden skin, I was smart as a button, and very, very funny. And I look at the pictures of my white friends, and I don’t see much of a difference, other than our races. So why did they receive praise, and why didn’t I? I vivdly remember one incident at a slumber party: my best friend, a blonde white girl, told me that she was naturally beautiful, that she knew this, and that some people weren’t as lucky as her. And I remember thinking, how does she know that? Where does someone obtain that kind of knowledge? How is she so confident and secure in that knowledge? Someone must have told her. And she believed it? Because by the time I was eleven, I was so used to thinking of myself as the dirty, runty little brown kid, I refused to believe someone when they did praise me. 

The other black and brown girls I knew as a child — many of them learned to think of themselves as beautiful later on in life. And yes, I know that this is a universal experience, every girl goes through some kind of ugly duckling stage or another, hopefully emerging in late adolescence with a sudden reserve self-confidence — but no white girl goes through that journey the way we went through it. Because we have to come to terms with our race, not just our awkward bodies. We have to combat what other people can and will say about what certain features of our bodies. Our hair texture, the shape of our eyes, our dark or light skin, the multitude of shades that are painted on our bodies, our hairiness or lack of hair, our size, our breasts, our hips, our lips, our butts. 

Its a battle white girls don’t have to go through. There are all sorts of pressures on every woman in our society, but we have many, many more. Childhood and adolescence and womanhood are battlefields for us, and it can be a struggle to continue to think of ourselves as desirable, as female, as pretty. 

No wonder so many of us don’t make it. 

I wrote a post a while about becoming pretty (and man some of the comments it got were real damned doozies) & I find myself wondering now how much of that backlash was about me as a WOC describing myself as attractive & not being apologetic about it. I still get all weird when other people compliment me (I’m working on being able to respond without getting all twitchy), but I refuse to let people tell me that my skin or hair = ugly because it’s not part of a white beauty aesthetic. I also keep thinking about how often our mental health isn’t considered in these discussions because really how many young girls of color are growing up with body dysmorphia disorders that are race specific & yet never discussed or treated?

I’ve written several posts on this regarding a journey of dark skin being considered beautiful.

I didn’t get any backlash, but then again…

Well I also talked about street harassment & that always sets people into some kind of tizzy since women saying they have a right to bodily autonomy is like a Bat Signal for fuckery.

Why aren’t little brown girls praised as much as little white girls?

anedumacationisnomore:

So I just watched that documentary on shadeism that I reblogged from espirit-follet, and my head hurts and my heart aches.

Watching that little girl look at her own beautiful skin and hearing her talk about how ugly it was… pointing at the white models and not the black ones, talking about her aunt’s lighter skin and how different it is to her own…

You know, I never once thought of myself as a pretty child. Pretty was my white friends, my black friends and me, we were just there. Not very feminine, not like the white girls. Not desirable, not particularly popular with the boys the way the white girls were. I remember the time my friend Julia told me that she thought I was the prettiest girl she knew, and it floored me. First time anyone had ever told me I was pretty. I was eleven.

I look back on pictures, and I think to myself, why? I was a gorgeous kid. I had these big lovely brown eyes, black hair, golden skin, I was smart as a button, and very, very funny. And I look at the pictures of my white friends, and I don’t see much of a difference, other than our races. So why did they receive praise, and why didn’t I? I vivdly remember one incident at a slumber party: my best friend, a blonde white girl, told me that she was naturally beautiful, that she knew this, and that some people weren’t as lucky as her. And I remember thinking, how does she know that? Where does someone obtain that kind of knowledge? How is she so confident and secure in that knowledge? Someone must have told her. And she believed it? Because by the time I was eleven, I was so used to thinking of myself as the dirty, runty little brown kid, I refused to believe someone when they did praise me. 

The other black and brown girls I knew as a child — many of them learned to think of themselves as beautiful later on in life. And yes, I know that this is a universal experience, every girl goes through some kind of ugly duckling stage or another, hopefully emerging in late adolescence with a sudden reserve self-confidence — but no white girl goes through that journey the way we went through it. Because we have to come to terms with our race, not just our awkward bodies. We have to combat what other people can and will say about what certain features of our bodies. Our hair texture, the shape of our eyes, our dark or light skin, the multitude of shades that are painted on our bodies, our hairiness or lack of hair, our size, our breasts, our hips, our lips, our butts. 

Its a battle white girls don’t have to go through. There are all sorts of pressures on every woman in our society, but we have many, many more. Childhood and adolescence and womanhood are battlefields for us, and it can be a struggle to continue to think of ourselves as desirable, as female, as pretty. 

No wonder so many of us don’t make it. 

I wrote a post a while about becoming pretty (and man some of the comments it got were real damned doozies) & I find myself wondering now how much of that backlash was about me as a WOC describing myself as attractive & not being apologetic about it. I still get all weird when other people compliment me (I’m working on being able to respond without getting all twitchy), but I refuse to let people tell me that my skin or hair = ugly because it’s not part of a white beauty aesthetic. I also keep thinking about how often our mental health isn’t considered in these discussions because really how many young girls of color are growing up with body dysmorphia disorders that are race specific & yet never discussed or treated?

witchsistah:

beautifulhikari:

I’m sorry I was born light skinned.
.
.
.
.
.
No, I’m not sorry I was born lighter than most. I will not apologize for something I had no control over. Im just so sick and tired of darker skinned PoC trying to make me feel bad for something I HAD NO CONTROL OVER. I didn’t ask to be born light skinned.

I’m also tired of darker skinned PoC trying to make ALL lighter skinned PoC the bad guys. I’m fucking tired of people assuming I think I’m better than you because my skin is lighter. I don’t think I’m better than anyone. Hell, I wish we could all be treated equally.

I’ll admit, lighter skinned PoC do have it way easier than most darker skinned PoC. I say most because not all dark skinned PoC have lived a hard life.

I don’t wish to be brown skinned or dark skinned because I love my skin color. However, I fucking love brown skin & dark skin. There’s just something sooooooo sexy about darker skin. Lol, I still have love for the light bright boys tho.

Another thing before I end this little rant… Can we please learn the difference between brown skin and dark skin -_- most of the who claim they’re dark are actually brown.

My black is beautiful and so is yours and his and hers :-* black is ALWAYS beautiful no matter the shade.

Chile, this sounds like it came from the Derailing for Dummies playbook.  If White folks said this shit to PoC to get us to quit complaining about racism, we’d be so far up their asses they may actually get rhythm and learn how to twerk!

Light-skin folk won’t hesitate to use the same tools against dark folk that they complain that Whites use against them.

elledy:

darkjez:

viroblog:

darkjez:

Viroblog: sailorpedazitos: howlinglynx: I go to cosmetology school and a woman…

sailorpedazitos:

howlinglynx:

I go to cosmetology school and a woman of color turned me down as their stylist just because i am white. right in front of my face she explained she did not what a white person doing her hair and requested a person of color. the school asked her to leave…

It is not incumbent upon black women to allow ignorant white students who attend cosmetology schools with a white supremacist curricula to use our hair as guinea pigs you ignorant fuck. Why don’t you actually read the testimonials of those of us who’ve tried that shit & see how poorly it turned out for us.

If you’re going to allow students to style your hair you should realize that to a certain extent, regardless of your race, you are a guinea pig. You should also realize that regardless of your type of hair there is a chance it will come out poorly because they are students. 

You’re also assuming that black cosmetologists know how to style all types of hair, which isn’t true. I’ve seen (and know) a lot of girls with naturally straight hair who don’t know how to style coily or spirally hair and even fuck it up.

If you don’t want there to be “ignorant white students who attend cosmetology school”, you should offer assistance and education. You shouldn’t be flinging around racist comments or defending those who do. That doesn’t solve anything. That just makes you look like a pretentious asshole. 

People do not just wake up and know how to style every type of hair under the fucking sun. It doesn’t fucking work like that. For someone to know how to style hair they actually have to come in fucking contact with it. They (gasp) have to make mistakes and learn from them.

Calling white students ignorant while offering no input or education (a simple: “this product works great”, “this x might offer more information”, “this iron goes great with x type of hair”), like so many people do all the time on this website, does little to nothing to solve the fucking problem. 

I can tell you straight up that licensed black cosmetologists sure as fuck know how to do white folks hair because that’s exactly what beauty school teaches. 

When white folk decide that they want to make learning how to do black hair enough of a priority that they will incorporate black folks’ knowledge into formal curricula—and pay us for the privilege—we can talk. Until then? You can shut the fuck up with blaming black folk for living in a white supremacist society.

- yaps on about equality and human rights on their blog

- tells black people they should be content with being treated like guinea pigs as if that isn’t some of the most othering shit ever (ie. “you aren’t the default so of course we gotta learn from experimenting on you like an animal”)

typical white girl bullshit