Recently I made a video ’50 Shades of Colorism’ and now thanks to wonderful YouTube commenters
perhaps including you, dear viewer, no longer do you just have to take from a pale white
lady and her statistics that colorism absolutely exists in many cultures all around the world.
I don’t know why I’m smiling about it.
Cecilia Castle said, ‘I have two sisters both who are lighter than men and people would
say I was the ugly one because of my skin tone.’ PurpleCanary said, ‘When I moved
to Tanzania and updated my FaceBook home town information the first thing FaceBook ads targeted
toward me was skin-lightening beauty products.’ Diana Gonzalez said, ‘I’m Mexican and
my family is all kinds of different shades from dark brown to really light with blue
eyes. I’m darker compared to some of my family members but was never made to feel
less pretty or inferior to my lighter cousins. Later in life is when I became more aware
of colorist within my own culture and community and it was kind of a shock. The latest was
when my step daughter who’s five years old expressed her disappointment about being “chocolate”
and not “vanilla” like her mom and older brother. Broke my heart.’ EMB said, ‘I’m
from Mexico and it’s amazing how much this happens here. It changes widely from state
to state and even from town to town, but in general most rich families tend to appear
whiter and/or be closer to their Spanish or European heritage. In ads, they usually use
white models or the lightest skinned Mexicans they can find, not to mention the media that
comes from the USA in the first place that’s filled with light skinned people.’ Hooriya
A said, Yes yes yes, I live in Pakistan and experience this a lot.’ Iwakeupat6 said,
‘In Japan and from what I’ve heard also in China and South Korea, skin-lightening
products are popular and lighter skin is seen as more attractive but not because it’s
associated with white people. It might be affected from the belief from older times
when people of higher class would have lighter skin compared to those in the lower class
who would get tanned, sunburned ect. from working outdoors.’ Twimadhouse777 says,
‘I feel like here in the United States, at least in my experience, lighter is not
always better. I think our society operates with the beauty standard that perfectly tan
or bronzed skin is more desirable than both ends of the spectrum. I’m a very pale person
and people often comment on my skin tone saying that I should get more sun or that I’m just
so white, even my family makes fun of how pale I am.’ Evangeline01 says, ‘I’m
on the lighter end of the Mestizos because my father was white. I can remember mothers
would tell their daughters to marry white men so that their children are lighter skinned.
Or don’t stay in the sun to get darker.’ Madhupramod says, ‘Even in India our history
is being viewed through colorism. The recent movie ‘Indus Valley Civilization’, all
the actors are light-skinned and the lead actor even has blue eyes.’ Jerrelle T-Finch
says, ‘A great example is Storm in the X-Men movies. The only mainstream black dark-skinned
female superhero but both of her live action portrayals have been by mixed ethnicity i.e.
light-skinned women.’ Lynn Davis said, ‘It’s also evident in tv shows starring black families.
Just look at the wife and/or pretty daughter and you’ll see they are several shades lighter
than the rest of the family. Because light=pretty.’ Caden Kennedy says, ‘As a black teenager,
I have always felt that people outside of those closest to me expect less of me because
of my skin color.’ Jerica D said, ‘Growing up all of the African-American women that
I saw in the media appeared to have lighter skin. Lighter skin, light eyes, and even looser
curl patterns were always the ideal standard of beauty. When Lupita Wyong’o, a dark-skinned
woman with short natural hair, was chosen by People magazine as the most beautiful woman
of that year, it spoke volumes to me. I think the key to feeling beautiful whether your
light or dark is confidence and realizing that there’s many different types of beauty.’
Fatima Sharmin says, ‘My siblings and I all vary in skin tones My older brother and
sister are 3 to 4 shades darker than me and my youngest sister is fairly light. She always
get comments from older people within the family about how she’s getting too dark
and need to stay the way she is. Whenever I hear someone say something like that anymore
I always question them and get riled up which leads my parents to think I’m too argumentative.’
Jai Chenelle says, ‘Yes, yes, yes, colorism is another looming topic that needs to be
addressed not just within POC communities.’ And I also commented on that video asking
whether I should do a mini-series diving more deeply into the elements of colorism because
I barely scratched the surface in ’50 Shades of Colorism’ and people said yes please
so keep an eye out for that soon and thank you so much as always for your comments because
they are helpful for us building a community and also building my brain.