How can she be your mom
Laura
Clarksville, MD
Being Black we come in all shades. My mom is extremely fair-skin; my dad was very dark. I look like my dad. Blacks and whites do a double take when my mom and I are together and I call her mom.
Black mom. Blonde daughter. She yours?
Amber Duke,
New Albany, IN.
My bi-racial daughter has her father’s blond hair and fair skin. Soon after she was born, I was shocked when people would randomly ask, “Is she yours?” Once, in an airport, when I responded yes, a woman challenged me saying, “…but she has blond hair.”
Due to a new upgrade at our doctor’s office, I learned that she’s been categorized as white in their system since her birth. As she grows older, I’m concerned about how these types of comments and missteps will make her feel about her racial identity.
Don’t call me gringa; Soy Colombiana.
Eugenia Kristina Draper,
Scottsdale, AZ
I am 100% Colombian and grew up in a fully Spanish speaking family with both parents having immgigrated to the United States from Colombia . Spanish is my first language. My maiden name is Garcia. Yet, here in the states people are surprised that I am Hispanic / Latin. They stereotype me based on my fair skin and blue eyes and blonde hair and are shocked when I turn to speak Spanish to my mother or family. The irony is that this happens in reverse in Colombia; where I don’t look like everyone else and despite speaking the language fluently, am assumed to not belong and called gringa.
Black women will not become extinct
Sonja Williams,
Bellwood, IL
As a black woman I continue to see the not so subtle messaging in media and advertising often portraying black women as the fair skin, curly or wavy hair image on the arm of a black man or any other man for that matter.
Black male images are often seen on the arms of any woman other than a “sista”. Unless of course his preference is not women.
America continues to struggle with the confident, educated brown or chocolate woman and are far more comfortable with what is deemed as “easier on the eyes”
Black women have much to contribute and should not be ignored by media in their efforts to reduce the black family to a false narrative of comfort for white america. We desire to be loved as well by a confident, respectful, enlightened black man
Never Been Asked: “What Are You?”
Ella Harris,
Columbia, MD
I always felt disconnected from my African American identity. With my blonde hair, light green eyes, and fair skin, the world that I live in is fundamentally different. I am never asked where I am from, or if I am mixed. I am never asked the notorious, “What are you?” And rather than facing the discrimination that most African Americans face, my dilemma is that I must prove my blackness, and thus my biracial identity, in a society that views me as white.
For a long time I equated my own adversity to the discrimination that most African Americans face, but in reality, I possess a unique power: If I so choose, I can live my life as white without contradiction. This was a privilege I refused to acknowledge for years until I watched the death of George Floyd.
A few days later, dehydrated and aching from holding a sign for hours at my first protest, I somehow felt energized — I wanted to do more. I could no longer wait for someone else to present me with an opportunity to take action. I had to forge my own path to advocacy. I ultimately created an entire website, https://blacklives2020.weebly.com, to present what I had found.
Creating and sharing this website has empowered me to develop my voice and stand firm in my beliefs. I have the privilege of being white-passing and the responsibility to tell the narrative of my African American ancestors.
Becoming an activist has also forced me to be vulnerable with people I have known all my life and people I have never met. I revealed my insecurities about my conscious and unconscious privileges as white-passing. I came to terms with my outsider status in both the white and African American communities, while also accepting that even though my narrative is different, it is still valid.
George Floyd’s murder fundamentally changed how I perceive myself and my role in society. I am black, living under the guise of a white person — a juxtaposition I hated for so long — but now I see the power I possess. It is this power that drives me to continue my journey.
Fair-skinned Indian, should be lucky
Kalpana,
Singapore
Indians come in different languages, shapes, sizes and colours. We can look so different from each other and still be brothers and sisters. Dark skinned Indians are looked down at even by their very own people. Somehow being fair skinned is look at highly and thus makes lives much easier as they are thought as upper caste. Colour of the skin decides the caste and the person’s purity. Very sadly, by the nation’s very own people. It just shows how naive people are and how consumed they are by whitism even in a land full of different colours.
Hated sunburns, wished I was black.
Donna Cook,
Roseville, MN.
I have very fair skin, Fitzpatrick Scale I, and growing up in Los Angeles meant lots of unintended, fairly serious, and wretchedly painful sunburns. I was also a bit of a tomboy wild child who would refuse to let my mother brush my hair, hair she intentionally left long as a final girly rebuke. One day, my father happened to be watching “Conan the Barbarian” when I got home from school. During that mesmerizing 90mins, Grace Jones became my childhood hero. Not only could she kick ass, she was beautifully dark brown AND had short hair! I asked why *she* was allowed to have short hair, and my father vaguely replied that very short hair was normal and acceptable for black women (and *not* for little white girls!). For the next several years I wished (and even prayed) to be like Grace Jones, willowy yet strong, tall and handsome, and wonderfully brown with fabulous, tangle-and-mean-hairbrush free short hair!
Speak Spanish? You don’t look “Mexican.”
Kristiane Valenza,
Vicksburg, MS.
After moving to rural Mississippi from New York to teach Spanish at the high school level, I’m frequently met with confusion as to how I have an “ethnic” name and can teach Spanish, but I have fair skin and European features. When people ask me, “Are you from Vicksburg?” they really mean to say, “I know you’re definitely not from here because you don’t sound like us, but I don’t know where you’re from because you’re too white to teach Spanish, but are not white enough by my imaginary standards, so I have to ask because none of this makes any sense to me.”
You don’t look like a Mexican.
Edmundo de la Garza
Seattle, WA
I was born in Chicago to fair skinned parents, one with green eyes and the other with hazel eyes. Mexico, especially in the larger urban areas, is quite cosmopolitan; although it was controled by several European empires, peoples from many countries emmigrated to Mexico for economic opportunities, and these rich ethnic varieties can still be clearly seen. Mexicans come in many colors, and their ancestors’ cultures have become a part of Mexico and of what it means to be Mexican.
