When I first watched Bola Agbaje’s play ‘Gone Too Far’ at
the Royal Court theatre in 2007, I turned in my seat and said to my friend, ‘I
want to slap that Armani girl’. Yes, I realised Armani was merely a character
and I didn’t want to slap the actress portraying her (Zawe Ashton) but the
character genuinely inspired real anger in me, with her bling, comb in her hair
and superiority issues because of her light complexion.
To be able to play a character that had moved me so
emotionally a few years later, in the film adaptation of Gone Too Far, was a
blessing as an actor. I’ve been booed and heckled in Q&A’s so it’s fair to
say I’ve inspired the same kind of rage in audiences. The film is a comedy but
it does look at issues of cultural identity for a group of young people growing
up on an estate in Peckham, South London and there is a scene where Armani
accuses best friend Paris of being jealous of her because of her lighter
complexion, claiming dark skinned girls are always hating on her. Let me be
clear. Bola wrote the character Armani because she is important to the plot and
she brings about discussion and debate among people in our communities, where
colourism is a very real issue.
The scene inspired Flavour magazine guest editor Aria Alagha
to ask writer Vanessa Carby, ‘Do men prefer light skinned girls?’ If I’m being
completely honest, even the title of the piece was uncomfortable for me, and no
disrespect to the writer or her experiences, but some of the content didn’t sit
well with me at all.
“Could men prefer light skinned women due to their 50/50 mix of
ethnicity? Could one be so brazen to suggest that men are getting the best of
both worlds? A woman that is somehow petite but has accentuated curves in the
right places? Big lips with light eyes, Caucasian features mixed with black
ones, a super breed of body parts?”
I’m just gonna be blunt. Some light skinned girls are ugly.
It’s true! A lighter complexion is no guarantee of beauty, but stereotyping and
a consistent favouring of one type of beauty has led to this myth. I’m all for
personal preference, but this kind of lauding of light skinned females is
nothing new, in fact it is a by –product of colonialism. We all know about the
mixing of races during slavery and how that went down. The media is also at
fault; lighter complexions, straight hair, closer to a European standard of
beauty are routinely the type of Black beauty we are told is acceptable in
mainstream films, television and music. Even stars as big as Beyonce have been
accused of lightening their skin and that’s before we even start on the
bleaching phenomenon and the dreaded cake soap.
Being constantly fed the story that light skinned is better
has negative effects on the Black community. Armani was being a cow to Paris in
the film, but what she says has a grain of truth. I have been accused in the
past of thinking I was ‘too nice’ or being stuck up because of my complexion and
hair, products of my mixed heritage. This is just as damaging.
We need to stop supporting theories that deepen the divides
between Black and mixed race people based on complexion. Vanessa Carby uses the
word ‘lightie’ several times, even in reference to herself and says:
“…a small minority of my mixed friends have an air of confidence, if a
small dose of arrogance. Could it be that because these women carry themselves
with such viciousness that men stand up and take notice?”
Perpetuating these negative stereotypes of light skinned
women being arrogant and stuck up is not helpful. Laughing and liking
light-skinned memes on Instagram seems harmless and funny but again, it is
buying into the stereotype. Those #teamlightskinned hash tags make me sick as they
literally pit us against each other, as two separate ‘teams’.
We need to stop seeing it in this way, as two separate teams
instead of one united and beautiful race. Educating people is the key; you can be
sure I’ll be slapping my younger brother or sister if they ever try drop some
‘team lightskin’ rubbish around me (they’re my siblings so I’m allowed!) The
media are making small strides; after the initial fetishisation of Lupita
Nyong’o, it is now just accepted that she is a beautiful, talented, dark skinned
woman who kills the red carpet and deserves Lancome campaigns, Kerry Washington
is the lead of a huge US programme, Scandal.
Slowly, slowly, people are seeing that Black is beautiful no matter the
shade…but we should already know
this.
You can read the original article + my response over on the Flavour Magazine site
