Prejudice and Racism - Color or Character? Essay

As stated above, African-American women have been subjected to measure themselves against white women. White women are viewed, in this society and since the beginning of the concept of race, as the epitome of beauty. Logically, African-American women attempt to emulate the white standard. This creates an inferiority complex, because the epitome of beauty is white woman, than any other race can be deemed as inferior; this deteriorates African-American women’s self-worth. To remedy worthlessness, many body modification techniques have been made to fully mimic white women in terms of beauty. This emulation still is being done and it is continuous, because of the psychological ‘white fantasization .

Colorism is a discrimination that favors lighter skin more than darker skin. For the black community, these images in the media have a profound effect on women of color because in our society lighter skin is seen as “prettier”. This is why attractive black women are constantly asked if they are mixed, because it is not the “norm” for a darker skin woman to be considered beautiful. There are some mixed women who are born with thicker hair, regular brown eyes, and brown skin, and they receive discrimination because they are not the type of

If you take a look at most Hollywood movies, a good majority of the actresses are fair skinnend. One of the first African American female actress was Nina Mae McKinney whom as been inducted into the Black Filmmakers Hall of Fame. Since she was black she was only offered low budget films and looked at as the standard barer for future lead roles when using black women. Fredi Washington was a light skin, light eye female and was described as being too beautiful to play a maid but wasn’nt offered romantic leads. Her skin was so pale that some

If a black woman had dark skin she would resemble a man, therefore making her ugly in society’s standards. This pressures black women to constantly be "compatible with the white female standard of beauty" (Ashe 580) in order to be socially accepted in society. Intuitively black women understood that in order to be considered desirable, the less black they had to look. This unfortunate perception of beauty stems from a long pattern of "sociohistorical racial injustices" (Bealer 312) towards darker skinned African Americans. Maria Racine states in her review that since slavery black people who approximated closer to whites were sexually sought after by black slave men and white plantation owners and were considered to live a somewhat "easy coexistence" because of their appearance (Racine 283). Since it’s start, colorism laid the pathway of racial prejudice towards dark skinned individuals. The result of treating dark African Americans as subhuman beings led to the altering of the black psyche by creating a "pervasive hierarchy" of beauty that black woman constantly combated or were forced to accept. (Bealer 312).

This problem is called Colorism. Colorism is racial bias, both intra and interracial, based on the tone of one’s skin. This can be as minor as social interactions, and as major as segregation. Colorism is a real and relevant problem; According to Shankar Vedantam, a writer for the New York Times, we have a way of thinking based off of “culture and history,” which tends to subconsciously privilege those who have lighter skinned as opposed to darker skin.

In recent history massive wars, resulting in countless lives lost, have been waged simply over not belonging to the ‘right’ or ‘our’ race. Most people would agree the concept of disliking someone simply because they look different and belong to another race, is pure ignorance. To say that because a person has dark skin that they will respond or behave in a certain manner is again ignorant.

Back in the early 1800’s, the color of one’s skin mattered amongst African Americans and Caucasian people. There was infidelity between the Caucasian slave owners and the African American slaves. Of course, the outcome of that produced a fairer toned child. In most cases the child could pass as white. The mixed toned kids got to be inside doing housework, while the dark Negroes worked in the fields, under extraneous work conditions,”their dark-toned peers toiled in the fields”(Maxwell). From the early 1800’s to modern day, there is controversy that light or bi-racial African Americans are better than dark colored African Americans. African Americans had to go through tests to see if they were able to receive priviledges

“Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. We are the change that we seek” Barack Obama. The question is always asked does the media reflect the reality of society, or does society try and imitate the reality shown by the media? There are a number of stereotypes associated with African Americans in our society such as African American men are athletes, rappers, criminals, deviant, streetwise, uneducated, and unemployed just to name a few. African Americans in the media have changed through the years. The history of African Americans on TV or minorities in general is hampered by the racial conflicts and segregation that are embedded in American society. Historically, black actors have been grouped stereotypically and assigned to comedy. This has often been traced to the genre of black minstrelsy that was popular in the early 20th century.

Over the course of the years, society has taught black girls that the darker their skin tone is, the uglier they are which triggered them to do their best to meet Eurocentric beauty standards such as having light skin, slim nose and straight hair.

Throughout many decades, African American women have been able to set their own standards of beauty. Lonnae Parker, a writer for The Washington Post, states in her article Black women heavier and happier with their bodies than white women, poll finds, that “Freed from that high-powered media gaze, generations of black women have fashioned their own definitions of beauty with major assists from literature, music, and help from their friends” (Parker, 2012). The importance of this quote is that they were getting help from their culture, the music and literature is essentially the culture that helped them to define their own standards of beauty. By being isolated

Many studies show that light skinned blacks were favored by the dominant white society allowing lighted skinned blacks to have a better opportunity for lighted skinned blacks in the business world. So the advantages by lighted skinned blacks have accumulated over time so the light complexion African Americans are seen as the most successful.

Sated in my introduction an employer would rather hire an African American of lighter skin than dark skin. Thus, gives the light skin population more jobs and maybe even higher pay than dark skin people. Starr says that “Georgia study shows that employers prefer light-skinned black men to dark skinned men regardless of their qualifications” (Starr). Even if a light-skinned male almost no experience he will still be chosen over a dark-skinned male. According to Starr, a Detroit party promoter gave out flyers for a party giving free admission to light skinned women only (Starr). The party was soon cancelled because a women’s activist group protested on the party’s

Colorism is an issue amongst African Americans that is slowly disunifying the culture. The idea that is constantly reiterated in the African American community is that if you are light skinned you have a better job with more income, more successful, have more relationships, and are deemed less of a threat, essentially living the “best of both worlds”. If are darker skinned you are jobless or at a job that is not moving you into the future, less successful, passed by a potential mate, and is labeled as a common crook. The ideas about color pigmentation in the African American community all goes back to the original argument made numerous of times: “White is good, Black is bad”. Slavery is a primary reason why African Americans have this

Participants in the study reported feelings of inadequacy in comparison to their lighter skinned counterparts in everything from school competitions to mate selection. These feelings of inadequacy remained prevalent from childhood through adulthood. Media also plays a key role in how the skin tone bias is perpetuated. Rap and Hip-Hop music videos often portray lighter skinned women as the love interest of the main character or the woman the male finds sexually desirable (Wallace, Townsend, Glasgow, & Ojie, 2011). Movies and television programs targeted towards African Americans may also have a light skinned woman as the successful, attractive character with a juxtaposing character who is darker, loud, obnoxious, and often fits into the “sassy sidekick” trope. A popular Black situational comedy in the 1990s, Martin, was a prime example of this (Walter et al., 1992). The main character’s girlfriend Gina, was a successful, beautiful lighter skinned woman and her best friend, Pam, was dark skinned and often the recipient of Martin’s jokes about her appearance. Exposure to these repeated stereotypes for Black women only furthers the notion that light skin is somehow superior to dark skin. This could mean that for African American women, having darker skin is a risk factor for developing body dissatisfaction.

Many people across the world still judge based on color, a recent study showed that when a European American is conversing with an African American they will typically cross their arms or