[Video] Rise Dark Girls!
I absolutely bawled watching this. Seeing and hearing the pain I feel being a “dark girl” in the eyes and voices of these women is soul shattering. Constantly being told you’re not pretty, you’re not as good, to be seen as exotic and only worthy of someone’s company in secret…it shapes your very existence. It’s taken me years to undo that damage…and yet I still have SO far to go.
Countless times I’ve been told I was “pretty…for a dark skinned girl” or more recently since cutting my hair that I’m “exotic”. Both those comments sting like having alcohol poured in an open wound. A wound that has been there for almost as long as I can remember and no matter how hard I try, no matter how many times I look at myself in mirror and say ‘You’re beautiful’, not matter how many verses of India Arie’s Brown Skin I memorize…the wound just won’t heal!
That wound makes you feel broken. It makes you feel dirty. Infected. Unworthy. Who wants to love someone who’s diseased? And since no one else loves me, why should I love myself? Why should I love the skin that makes me ugly? You accept it, you believe it. There’s no way all of these people are lying to you. GET OVER IT…YOU’RE UGLY!
I hated myself for a long time, and sadly, it was only once I started to replace that self-hate with hate for the people who had what I wanted–light skin (specifically women)–did I begin to feel better. Or so I thought.
I thought, “If I hate them back, it won’t hurt as bad.” “If I tell them THEY’RE ugly, maybe they’ll feel the pain I feel.” and “I’ll be damned if I date one of them [men]. Their men don’t want us so why should I give them the satisfaction of me wanting them.”
Us vs. Them?
When you take the time to take the pain and hurt from these statements, it seems utterly ridiculous that a person could feel this way. Especially considering how much I hate racism. If a white person said these comments to me [about black people], I would be furious and would waste no time informing them of their ignorance. But for whatever reason…perhaps my own ignorance…it felt right to feel this way about “them”. “They” deserved it. “They” were doing it to me…I should do it back.
But that hate was just a front. It did nothing to alleviate the pain I felt. Any time I was amongst a group of light skinned girls, my presence would shrink. I wished that I was invisible, because I felt that no one was looking at me anyways. I hated that all they had to do was simply exist and men would sell their souls just to sniff these girls wasted carbon dioxide. While I on the other hand, I had better have something to offer if I wanted to be worth their time. No long hair? Forget it. No sex? Why are you still here!
When you want people to want you sooo bad, it’s easy to let people use you. It’s taken a lot of tears–and a lot of therapy–to work through those feelings of wanting to be wanted and wanting to feel worthy. I’m not superwoman, and thus I still feel pain. And although I no longer wish that I were light skinned, I do still wish people thought I was equally as beautiful. However, the difference now is that I think I’m beautiful. I’ve learned that I validate me. NO ONE ELSE! I love the skin I’m in…and learning to love it more with each passing day.
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Blake Von D June 2, 2011 at 8:49 am
I totally agree with you. We don’t all hate ourselves. I never want to speak for all ‘dark girls’. I am simply sharing my experience. I think it’s important that children have parents, grandparents, teachers, etc. who help them develop positive images of self. When you grow up with a mother, father, grandmother or Sunday School teacher who says, “You’re beautiful”, the hateful words of ‘non-factors’ hold less power. We all have different experiences and thus different outcomes. I don’t think the documentary is intended to give the message that we all hate ourselves so much as shed light on the societal stigmas that have for so long been dismissed as being SOLELY about physical aesthetics (i.e. She’s just prettier than you.) So many people treat it like every woman is being judged independently of the whole and in “that particular matchup” the darkskin girl just didn’t win. However, I think the documentary is showing that many women are being lumped into this basket of ‘unattractiveness’ simply because of the color of her skin, regardless of what she actually looks like. I’m actually really looking forward to seeing it. Hope I don’t cry through the whole thing though. Lol.
GangStarr Girl June 2, 2011 at 8:35 am
I’m a chocolate woman as well who has heard the same negative things that you did but I actually didn’t grow up hating myself (I wrote about this doc on my blog). However, I know what you mean about being the only brown skin girl in a group of light skin girls and seeing how men would totally break their necks for these girls simply because they were there and light. It’s really sad. But on the same token, I’m tired of docs like this making it look like every darkskin woman hates herself. This was just a preview so hopefully the movie will prove otherwise. But I do identify with the pain you felt and I’m glad that you are choosing to work through it.
kim j June 1, 2011 at 7:34 pm
I saw you at Essence online. You have such great style and are so pretty. I too am a ‘chocolate’ girl who is still trying to learn to love herself. I remember being as young as ten years old and being told that I was “pretty to be dark skinned’ and knowing even at that age that it was not a compliment. Thanks for the inspirational post!!!!
Rachel J May 28, 2011 at 7:25 pm
I am a light skinned woman, but that doesn’t mean I am without struggle. I too have prayed that my daughter would not look like me. My fear was that she would inherit the void I carried so long. You see, both of my parents are black (my father is light and my mother is brown) so I could never be light enough for the white people, but I was never dark enough for my own. I try not to recall the number of times i was told i wasnt black. Literally denounced by my race for the color of my skin. You may have always been “pretty… for a dark skinned girl” but I was never more than a “redbone” which I guess is supposed to fill me with some sort of pride or imply an attraction but it’s just a box. Six sides of isolation making it hard to fit in places. Bottom line is neither of us got the feedback we wanted from the world so we had to find the beauty in ourselves.