Damn, You Sho' is Ugly

Lil Wayne's lyrics repeatedly reject the 
beauty of his own daughter.

This is a line from the Color Purple that sums up every little dark skin girl's existence. Having dark skin is the epitome of ugly. So much so that if you are dark and deemed attractive, compliments come with a qualifier, "You are pretty for a dark skin girl." Not only are dark skin women ugly, we are frequently reminded of our struggle in the area of comeliness. In the 3rd and 4th grade at Berwick Elementary School, I was told every day by the boys in my classroom how ugly I was. I was too dark; my lips were too big; and my hair was too nappy. It seemed they took great joy in assuring me daily that I was worthless. If beauty was the qualifier for being female, I didn't quite measure up. That was a long time ago, but case I forget, there are always boys masquerading as men excited to remind me; researchers who take great pains to study, quantify, and deliberate on the indisputable science of black women being the most unattractive females of the human race; rappers who have no qualms with telling their mother and their daughter that they bet those bitches would look better red (slang for light skin); and the overall lack of representation in the media - one at a time please.



I live in a world where my very existence is regarded as an imposition. Pharrell explains; there is a black woman on the cover; it is your fault that you cannot discern which one is passing for not passing. Can't we all just be new black?

Pharrell's representation of what it looks like to be a girl.

So what, displays Eddie Murphy, every movie I make the light skin woman is the good person, desirable one, star; and the dark skin woman is the hoe, bitch, lesser character from Coming to America to Boomerang to Norbit. It's not intentional no dark skin women were in the video with 20+ models; none tried out per Babyface. No, hell no, you cannot walk in my show or be on the cover of my magazine or star in my movie. We eat it, drink it, breathe it until we become believers.

Leader of the Free World could not be brainwashed.

Men of color are brainwashed to believe that their mothers, sisters, and daughters are unattractive. Basically where they come from, who they grow side by side with, and what they create is ugly, bad, worthless. This is crucial to maintaining a slave/master mentality ad infinitum. If black people understood and celebrated the strength, value and utter beauty of black women, black men would be the leaders of the free world. But due to thought control, men of African descent, easily reject women who look too African, without thought or reflection, and lift up other - Asian, European, Hispanic, at least be mixed, light skin, have "good hair", something. So, dark hued women around the world from India to South America to Africa bleach their skin in order to be accepted, liked, pretty. We relax, glue and sew in hair to have tresses opposite of what God bestowed upon us.

Lupita Nyongo

We too are brainwashed; but for black women it aint that easy. Light skin women think they are better than dark skin women and then we wake up and remember, we are sisters; dark skin women dislike light skin women and then we wake up and remember, we are sisters; black women decide once and for all to give up on black men and then we wake up and remember, we are sisters; black women believe that other - Asian, European, Hispanic, mixed, light skin, "good hair" is better, and then we wake up and remember, we are sisters. Our mothers are beauty, our sisters are beauty, our daughters are beauty. We sway our hips to the beat of the sun that warms up the depths in our tone; we lick our lips to partake in the succulents of nectar's ripe; and we rock naps and afros and kinky coils cause there aint another chic on the face of the earth who can. God reminds us that we are the original sisters chosen to birth all. Thank you, mother Africa, it don't get no prettier.