Do I really even have to say anything?
Just Please write your thoughts!
"Let's be honest, the only reason why u all are sayin "Jared" is hot or attractive is because he's "light skin." It's funny how we as A.A.'s don't like to talk about it, but we all know that in our community that "light skin" is seen as attractive."
RJF
I wonder how deep this Light skin-Dark skin thing goes? Lets Dig!
I gotta say that this is about the whole hair and skin thing. I have a love for Light Skinned men, I married one, and that is because he was close to white. I grew up in a white neighborhood and that was all I could choose from. Then I came to america and saw my first Boriqua, I fell in love. Then along came Debarges and that was it. I wanted a light skinned man if it killed me. Now I dated many other men, fell in love with a few, but my "Ideal" was a light man. A light skin man party, you would have had to chain me to the floor to keep me away back in the day. This party is no different in my opinion than any other "preference" themed dance. You know you're sexy Jared, don't front. The fact that you are not conceited is the bomb. It gives the dark skinned men a chance with you (the sister's wouldn't mind a shot either!)
Oh, I forgot to add that I learned to be "Black" when I came to the U.S. This didn't matter in Canada when I was 8.
I almost didn't catch it. I read what is in the yellow, explosion-type bubble and thought that it was for this young lady in the picture. Didn't see anything wrong with that, she is light skinned and possibly a Libra so cool. But then I read the bottom that says "Light Skinned Women and All Libra's free entry all night." Now, I'm appalled.
"Let's be honest, the only reason why u all are sayin "Jared" is hot or attractive is because he's "light skin." It's funny how we as A.A.'s don't like to talk about it, but we all know that in our community that "light skin" is seen as attractive."
RJF
Yes!!!!! for telling me off. This is an old comment from theANDshow BTW
Sigh... :) Here we go again... light skinned men and women are more attractive. Jared, in as much as you are attractive as a light skin brother, you would still pass if you were shades darker. This mind set that all African people and A.A. people have has to find a way of ending itself one day... and I am speaking on behalf of those chocolate brown or dark cooking chocolate brown coloured brothers and sisters in the world :))
I happen to think this is a most awful shit I have ever seen. I am the only light skin person in my family, a side from my father whom I have never met. I didn't realize till I was 8 that I was light. My Mother and I where at a department store, and a older black women asked who's "lovely child" was she baby sitting. I remember my Mother being so Angry. It hurt me that she was hurt. Not that I was different, but I was made to feel different from my Mother, when in fact that was all I knew.
Things of this matter appall me!
I normally get questioned about my "Blackness" because of my skin. With the last name of Shuler not helping in that case. I want to converse about this subject as a whole, see where it leads us.
Fine is Fine. Shamar Moore is ulgly to me, his eyes are too small. But Jared, well his smile is Da Bomb, he has great eyes, his nose is far from a KRS One thing, and let's not forget the lips. He is fine as a light man. Dark men with great features are fine. I love Brad Pitt and Benjamin Bratt is sexy as hell. Not enough sexy dark men on tv, so if I failed to mention one, someone enlighten a sister.
We as a people (African Americans) are so full of self-hate; it’s a damn shame. During a conversation on dating a friend said to me that it’s hard to meet guys right now because “light skin people” are not in style…since when did my complexion become a trend? In 2007 we are still dealing with the “ house nigger syndrome” this is crazy! We have come a long way in educating others to appreciate our own unique beauty (i.e. Djimon Hounsou in the new Calvin Klein underwear ads) but we still have a lot of work to do on our own internal issues.
Djimon Hounsou, How could I forget. He is sexy as hell also. When did prefering a light black man become self hate? He may be light but he ain't white. Black is all kinds of shades now. I do have a problem with Black women with straight long blonde hair weaves, but they even contend that it is a peference thing. Personally, my hair is nappy as it comes and I am neither Dark or light. My husband is light and he is far from a house nigger, shoot his ass would have been hung back in those days because he would have been leading the revolt. Light skin is no longer in and Media made it a trend, not us. Chubby women was a trend once also. The trend only extends past your tv screen. My husband always said that out of all his friends, he was the one that had the problems meeting women. I always thought all light people were conceited or I was intimidated by them. But I was also intimidated by Fine men altogether. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, so if you are not beholding the light liking eye then there is no problem.
You like what you like. It’s not the preference that you like light, med, or dark skin; it’s the inference that one is better than the other that’s the problem. It’s when your preference becomes dismissive of the other in lies the self-hatred. As to the orignal party flyer... did the doorman use the brown paper bag test to charge admission? Just a question.
Self hatered is when you go outside your race. To dismiss a dark man for a light man is not self hatered, afterall he is STILL a black man. So what if they want a Light Skin party, there are people out there having sex with children.
Saying that you hate black people because you date a light one is "in my opinion" preposterous. If you choose to date only light they are still black, the person that started the whole self hatred rhetoric regarding this issue must either be jelious of light skin or hate themselves for being light.
Black is Black Is Black is Black. If someone wanted to make a point about this party, all they would have to do is show up and start trouble or just dismiss it as stupid and stay home.
@ lady j
Using what you're saying, one could say choosing to date outside their race is just as much a "preference" as choosing to date only light skinned black folk.
The fact of the matter is that self-hatred when it comes to dating has less to do with the action and more to do with the intent.
The problem is not believing a particular shade of black is beautiful. The problem is believing that another shade of black is not.
The minute you start believing in that and begin reflecting that belief in the choices you make, you become the poster child for self-hatred.
Saying Joseph is more attractive than Hakeem because Joseph is light is just as bad as saying Bill is more attractive than Joseph because Bill is white. Why? Because within Hakeem and Joseph are reflections of yourself. And through that ideology, your negative perception of your own skin color (and the skin color of the blacks around you) is realized.
When it comes to black folk, a preference is so much more than what it is. Typically because that preference is the result of the principles, doctrines, and fucked up ideologies about life and love that society (a la White Folk) have deemed acceptable and established as conventional.
I happen to love all shades of black. I love our skin tones. I love the fact that we can be put in a room, all look different, come from different parts of the world, and still be able to relate to one another. I love being able to go into a store and talk to the cashier about absolutely nothing and everything and be able to relate to her on a level a white woman can't.
I remember times going to the store with my mom and her being about to talk to the black cashier as if they had known one another their entire lives:
"Hey, how you doin'?"
"Long day."
"I hear you, I'm just tryin' to get finish up this line. My shift is almost over."
"Well girl, how long you been workin'?"
"Honey, I been here since 8AM this mornin'."
"Girl, they workin' you."
"I know that's right. What you all dressed up for?"
"Sistah, I'm going to that Isley Brothers concert."
"You lyin'! Girl, I'll be in there. I love me some Isley's. I got my shoes and hoochie skirt all ready. You workin' that outfit, though."
"Girl, you ain't never lied. Thank you Sistah, I'll be lookin' for you girl."
"You know it. Have a good day."
"You too."
I've noticed black people relate to one another on a level that other ethnicities don't.
We won't know each other from a can of paint and still be able to have a complete conversation with one another. And the barriers that prevent that dialog when it comes to other races (gender, age, dress, style), don't seem to bother us black folk. That's beautiful.
Lets start loving one another more.
And in that, start loving ourselves.
Jimmy,
I guess understanding what self hatred is will be relative to where you come from.
"The problem is not believing a particular shade of black is beautiful. The problem is believing that another shade of black is not.The minute you start believing in that and begin reflecting that belief in the choices you make, you become the poster child for self-hatred."
I guess if I believe that a skinny man is better than a fat man, is self hatred?
My mother, HATES black men. If he is not light he is no good. If he is African, then he is DIRTY. In my opinion, that is self hatred.
'Ethnic self-hatred' is the extreme dislike of one's ethnic group, not "complextion". If one is Dark skinned and they hate dark skinned people, then self hatred is evident. But a ligt choosing a light because they don't find Dark attractive, how is that self hatred?
I guess there is no true poster child of self hatred, so my bad Tiger, I guess you just perfer not to call yourself a black man.
By the way, "the blacker the berry the sweeter the juice" is an overstated cliche of self hatred, if I took it in your context.
@ lady j
"I guess if I believe that a skinny man is better than a fat man, is self hatred?"
No, because the analogy within itself doesn't work. Obesity doesn't carry the same weight (no pun intended) as ethnicity and complexion. They aren't in the same ballpark. The negative connotation associated with being black (and various shades of black) is more than that of obesity. The history isn't the same (from house slave and field hands to the brown paper bag test).
And within a fat man doesn't reside a skinny man. In contrast, regardless if you're light, dark, or brown--in the eyes of White America, you're black.
Self-hatred is not just believing negatively against your entire race. It can be broken down.
An old black woman who grows up believing light is better because dark is bad is embracing self-hatred regardless of her own skin-tone. Why? Because within that belief of color and identity, she's reflecting her negative perception of her own race and of her own people.
As I said, it's not the action, it is the intent. It's not bad believing light is beautiful because that is your preference.
What's bad is believing light is beautiful because dark is bad.
"An old black woman who grows up believing light is better because dark is bad is embracing self-hatred regardless of her own skin-tone. Why? Because within that belief of color and identity, she's reflecting her negative perception of her own race and of her own people."
This Person is mis-educated such as the youth of white supremacist.She is being taught to hate the complexion, not her race. My mother was tormented by family because she was black and shiny. My mom is gorgeous, long hair and everything, but this impacted her in a way that made her HATE dark skinned people.
The term self-hatred can refer to either a strong dislike for oneself, one's actions, or a strong dislike or hatred of one's own race, gender, or sexual orientation. When used in the latter context it is generally defined as hatred of one's identity based on the demographic in question, as well as a desire to distance oneself from this identity.
Having a light skinned party is about preference, Tiger Woods is about self hatred.
We can debate this forever, such as it has been, but when self hatred is defined, it is about someone hating themselves which comes out to hating others that are the same. Obesity is shadowed by self hatred, especially when it'someone who just thinks they are fat. Anorexia is a self hatred disease that goes to the point of affliction. Micheal Jackson disfigured himself due to his self hatred, brought on by the tormenting of his father.
Because we have a different understanding of the term Self Hatred I guess we have to agree to disagree.
LOL!! This has become a lady j and jimmy conversation... :))
I would love to her the opiions of others, just jump in.
Speaking honestly, my mother is the only lighter-skinned black person in my immediate family. She admits to not only receiving preferential treatment her entire life as a result, but also says that her darker-skinned siblings were mistreated because of the color of their skin.
I, myself, grew up thinking that I was ugly because of my darker complexion. I always wanted to be lighter--and I realize that those feelings actually started when I was exposed to media: all the white people on tv lived wonderful lives and all the black people lived deprived ones. It was also indicative of my familial situation: so many men wanted to date my mother and my other aunts had such difficulty with men. It was a subconscious attack on my self-esteem and my conscious mind.
As a result, when I got older, I sought romantic relationships with white men, latino men and lighter-skinned black men. Of course, those situations ended dreadfully--mainly because I was entering the relationships on the wrong pretenses, for increidbly superficial reasons. On the other end, I've actually run into a few light-skinned black men who believe, simply by virtue of the color of their skin, they are superior to darker-skinned men.
During my undergraduate career, I learned that the whole ligh skin/dark skin phenomena is a psychological manifestation of a larger psychosis: racism. That is to say, we are conditioned to believe that the closer you are to possessing white characteristics, the "better" your position in the society. And it's not just skin color: it's also slender noses vs. wide noses; thin lips vs. thick lips; straight hair vs. "nappy" hair--and we internalize this hatred in various ways: just TRY to take a black woman's hot comb or relaxer from her.
These internalized biases are things I had to unlearn; and I began the process by asking myself, "Why do I feel this way? Why do I hate who I am and how I am? Why do I find X attractive over Y?" And once I started that work, the work of looking deep no matter how difficult it was, I started to discover things about myself that I could make better, that I could heal.
And while there's always work to be done, I am so much better, so much more self-loving and self-accepting than I have been in the past. And most importantly, I find such wonderful, incredibly beauty in the various shades of black. And I needed to finally be at that place.
Wonderfully Stated Mr. Robert Jones! Thank You.
"I see why..." he said to me pointing to his arm. The light-skinned son of an inter-racial Canadian couple starting high school in the Caribbean in my class. I don't remember if I understood what he meant the first time he said it but it was/became glaringly obvious that he felt discriminated against because of the colour of his skin due to experiences he must have had in the past. The truth is I told him no because i had already promised some other guys in the class a ride home and there just wasn't room left for him that day. (Oddly enough, had it not been an all boy's school, he would have been doubly attractive for being light and an import.)
For my part Jared, the fact that you are light-skinned is not the reason I find you gorgeous especially since I am more attracted to darker skin tones like my own.
Yes intra-racial discrimination exists but not every situation is racially charged. I've come to realise that once people have had negative experiences they tend to make very hasty associations between past and current situations. (we're all familiar with the "i am not your abusive ex" situation right?)
In my opinion, the backlash from this is just a case of (apparently) scorned women kicking up a fuss over nothing really. If this had been a "Blacker the Berry" or "Black is Beautiful" party, it would have gone off without a hitch because the light skinned sistas would not have felt slighted. Did any of these people notice that Libras are also getting in free? Where are the Virgos kicking up a fuss because they are not getting in free? Did anyone realise that some DARK sistas would also be getting in free by virtue of being Libras?
This is not a case of discrimination, it's just a party gimmick. GET OVER IT!!
However, if for example ONLY light-skinned people were being ALLOWED to enter then I would have to agree with the people who are calling the concept appalling.
Yes there are a lot of issues surrounding skin shades within the black (not AA since i am neither American nor African) community, this particular incident is not something to get worked up about. The promoter never said light was better than dark and more importantly the people who are against this need to realise that light IS black too and there is no reason not to celebrate the light sistas.
@Daryn
Hear, hear!!!!!!! :)