She’s pretty for a dark skinned girl.

Welcome to day 10 of my 31 day blog challenge. I hope your day went well and even if it didn’t, tomorrow is a new day! Hopefully, today’s blog will add a little value to your day 😊

Let’s get into today’s post

When I was growing up, my dad would get us to repeat the following words.

I am a Royal Princess.

And anything he did not consider as ‘royal’, he would say ‘it was against our custom, tradition and religion’. Wow, I actually remember his words, word for word!

His way of parenting may seem a little extreme but his words penetrated and we actually believed that we were royal princesses! (not to mention, my first name is Princess so it sunk in pretty quickly) Those words of affirmation set us off to a great start and nothing negative anyone said could take root.

I remember in school, the Caribbean kids would bully and make vile jokes, calling African kids ‘ABC’s’, which stood for African Bobo Catcher. It was horrible.

Because my father is Jamaican and my mother is Ghanaian, I was ‘half a ABC’ – can you imagine! 🤔

The ignorance and lack of education about and within the Afro – Caribbean community, when I was in school, was a joke and absolutely absurd ( for the lack of a better word)

Years on, I’m very disappointed and it really saddens me that we still face and experience ignorance among our communities.

I didn’t realise that colourism within the black community is still a thing. Following the evolution of the #problack movement, #blacklivesmatter, #blacklove and the recent takeover with images of darker skinned women all over instagram, #blackisbeautiful. I mean, surely we have moved on from futile conversations surrounding light skin vs dark skin?

Well, clearly not…

I went to our local convenience shop to grab a few things (today) and there were a few Afro-Caribbean school girls in the shop huddling around a phone. Perhaps they were on social media? They were laughing and talking quite loudly. As I went over to the till to pay for my items, one of them said,

She’s pretty for a dark skinned girl

*one second, let me catch my breath*

Honestly, words can not describe my confusion. I mean, 3 of the girls were dark skinned! What is that all about! What does that even mean?

I’m not even going to get into the media and why black girls feel as through they need to bleach their skin to feel a sense of belonging… That’s for another blog post altogether.

Black is Black regardless of the shade. Your complexion doesn’t diminish or beautify who you are. Your confidence in knowing who you are does that all by itself.

I want to highlight something. Something Gabrielle Union said during her interview with Oprah Winfrey. They were talking about what she will say to her new born baby girl everyday. In addition to other things, Gabrielle mentioned the following;

Your skin is rich and it holds so much history and beauty.

Wait – can we take a minute to admire those words. I was completely blown away, how deep is that?

Listen.

Black girl, no matter your shade, you are beautiful and your skin holds so much history! Your skin is your external covering, wrapping and protecting the treasure within. That treasure is your integrity, intelligence, spirituality, ability to manage and multitask, words of wisdom, high standards and so much more!!!

Don’t become apart of the problem and give the racist, uneducated and hypocrite the ammunition to despise the colour of your skin.

Black girl, your skin holds so much history and beauty so love the skin you’re in. But remember, you are more than your skin, so much more…

If you enjoyed it, please leave a 🌟 or a comment. Catch up here if you missed yesterday’s post. See you tomorrow for another one. ✌🏽

#day10of31

#31dayblogchallege