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The Eddiy-torial's avatar

Colorism AND the disrespect of the Arts? I'm sat!

Colorism really needs to be talked about outside of a romantic lens. Colorism even affects employment opportunities. I remember being in a school group and there was a girl looking for ushers to help at an event and she went out of her way to state that it'd be preferable if the applicants were light skin. I had to call her out.

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Tendai's avatar

Saying it out loud is crazy business

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Sasha Masole's avatar

As a dark skinned & humanities student, I feel so extremely SEEN & HEARD

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Tendai's avatar

Oooh I’m honoured that this resonated with you

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midnight moon's avatar

I went to boarding school for high school, and my skin would be darker by break. My mom would make negative comments on this and praise me after my skin lightened during the holidays. I'm very glad I don't subscribe to that mindset anymore.

On your bit on majors: I'm a reformed "intelligent" science student, who is currently switching into humanities and social sciences. The sciences' superiority is definitely one of the biggest problems we face as a continent because it bleeds into everything else.

on both of these points, I hope more of us continue to see the light.

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Tendai's avatar

It’s really heart breaking when mothers are the source of some of our insecurities. And to the last part your intelligence doesn’t fade away when you transition to humanities. You’re an intelligent humanities student now.

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midnight moon's avatar

yeah, mothers are a lot. (I'm fat too so you can imagine😭)

I do think I grew up with a very narrow mindset of what intelligence can be and felt pressured to live up to the archetype of an intelligent person. so I do end up kind of separating myself from the identity as my world view evolves.

the piece was great btw.

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sabbies's avatar

this hit so hard! im a really pale filo girl and i developed such a weird relationship with my complexion ever since i was a kid. i'd have adults compare their skintone to mine and be dismissed of my proud exclamations that i'd actually tanned. doesn't help that im not skinny and im pretty short - which leads to this weird "oh but your skin is already so light, youll be even prettier when thin" rhetoric. there's so much societal pressure on us women specifically to perform that even our literal SKINTONES are treated as a tool to draw in male attention. and as if misogyny isn't enough, being POC also means you have to feed into colonialist mindsets. awesome piece, as always! we need to keep talking about these issues and bringing them the shame they deserve.

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Tendai's avatar

Thank you for sharing and reading . The adults never chose to unlearn that, I’m grateful for the internet for spreading awareness on this. Colonisation really did a number on the world

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