The Complexion Obsession pt. 2
Here’s part two of Joy Daily’s documentary, The Complexion Obsession, where she talks to journalists, models, artists and scholars about whether dark skin is still discriminated against in the music industry. Shameless plug: I make a cameo at 7:59.
It’s awful that in 2010 people are still brainwashed enough to believe that lighter is better. With regard to the Barbie dolls, those children broke my heart. It’s a plastic freaking doll and with the exception of the outfits and “skin” color, they look exactly the same. Wow.
CLICK HERE for part 1.
Category: Hip-Hop, Music, News, Pop Culture, TV/Film, Videos
About the Author (Author Profile)
Starrene Rhett Rocque is a recovering journalist who often fantasizes about becoming a shotgun-toting B-movie heroine.Subscribe
If you enjoyed this article, subscribe to receive more just like it.
Comments (10)
Trackback URL | Comments RSS Feed
Sites That Link to this Post
- Hydrate and Rejuvenate | Dead Sea Mask | March 7, 2010
- The Complexion Obsession Part 2 « Who Is Nola Darling? | March 9, 2010
Go girl.. I peeped the cameo! Crazy shit. I love chocolate women. Then again, I love all women. Skin color makes no difference to me. I fall in love with personalities in the long run.
The extreme irony about this subject and discussing it with an industry that has perpetuated it more than any other industry isn’t lost on me.
I almost find it comical.
“We [‘we’ being the hip hop industry] know of the problem… but yeah, we’re not really doing anything to change it, naw mean?!”
Whatever.
And OF COURSE the light-skinned models don’t really ‘think’ about the issue because they don’t really have an issue. They’re profiting from this unlike any other ‘color’ of women.
Hypocrisy at its best.
@BiggRuss
I agree. I found myself getting really irritated by the folks who kept trying to sweep it under the rug with that ‘ol BS about don’t let it bother you. I do believe that it’s possible for a dark skin model to carve a successful career but the truth is, she does have to work harder and her light skin counter parts do have it easier because the industry is filled with people who don’t think it’s a big deal. Sadly, I don’t think a lot of those people were being real. A major problem in the industry is that people will see a problem but won’t say or attempt to do anything about it because they don’t want to destroy relationships. It’s really sad.
Props to Joy.But my believe is that it has nothing to do with color.It has alot to do with attitude. Some black girls have a problem and are difficult to work with while fair skin girls are easier to work with cause they have less hangups on their
skin color.
Also it stills centers around the casting couch.
wow @ them comments from Chris….
duke you just re-affirmed a stereotype….
on the contrary, most dark skinned females do not have innate hang ups about their skin and to tell you the truth I’ve met just as many light skin chicks that are just as “difficult to work with”….
@Chris
Ligther girls have just as many hang ups about their skin color than darker girls. And attitude doesn’t have anything to do with complexion. The point is that it’s a syndrome created during slavery–the Willie Lynch syndrome which people are still foolish enough to fall for. I say that to say that light skin girls get teased and made fun of too and have just as many hang ups about their skin and in some cases, they manifest it by being difficult because they believe that their skin gives them privilege. But then you have light skin girls who want to be brown because of the way they’re treated, trust me, I know quite a few. But it’s thinking like yours that helps to perpetuate the problem. Imagine a casting directing saying that they’re not going to hire a dark skinned female because they have more hang ups about their skin. That’s just silly.
@Big DO
We are so on the same page with that one. smh
It’s sad to see how Brainwashed those young kids were. They were pointing to the white doll before Joy was even done asking the question. The teenage girl did make a valid point about the black or un-fair skinned dolls-Props @ Chris Crow up above for reminding us that white folks are “fair” skinned. smh*-are not made with any care or attention to detail aside from a different surface color. The doll looked oddly proportioned even to me. This issue will never be rectified until it comes from the top. It’s the artist that have to make a stand and demand what they want to see, everyone down the ladder is just going through the motions to keep their jobs for the most part, and I can’t blame them for that.
Huummm…I was hoping part two would delve deeper into the real underlying reasons for the “internalized” preference for light skin. I say internalized because even very young children have these preferences, as evidenced by the “doll” experiments and the anecdotal comments from younger relatives feeling this way. Back in the early 1960’s (or earlier), when the first “doll” experiment took place, the “Black is Beautiful” epiphany had not yet occurred; there were practically no positive images of dark-skinned people in the medium of that era, and James Brown had not yet declared, “say it loud, I’m Black and I’m proud,” therefore, the responses of the children were not that surprising. However, this is the so-called “new millineum” so the fact that these negative responses still prevail indicates that a really deep seated psychosis is present in our collective psyches. I hope more learned people are interviewed if there are subsequent parts to this documentary. From what I’ve seen so far, most of the responses are self-serving, from people that don’t want to upset the “status quo” because they want to continue to “get paid’ for being the “right” hue.