links for 2009-09-08
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"This past Memorial Day, I opened the medicine cabinet at my aunt’s house looking for toothpaste only to find a tube of Fair & Lovely staring back at me. My heart sank. I yelled for my 10-year old cousin. “What is THIS?” I asked her, holding the tube gingerly.
“What?” she said innocently, “It’s just suntan lotion so I don’t get dark.” I looked at the ingredient list. Indeed, among the ingredients was “sunscreen.” I shouldn’t have been surprised. This was the same girl who had teased her seven-year old darker-skinned cousin so much that a year later, the poor kid still adamantly states “I’m not pretty.” Little wonder given that our mothers come from a country where bridal makeup still means you pancake the woman in white foundation from the neck-up and then hide her hands under her dupatta so the color disparity doesn’t show."
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"People, in the panic of recession, don't dare to put a girl of color in their campaign, full stop." She added, "This year, we have gone back all the way that we had advanced. I don't see any black woman, or of any other race, in big advertising campaigns."
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"The shirt at right is a variation on the one I saw, one of several "gangsta" SpongeBob tees you might find for sale in a neighborhood like Sunset Park, at a boardwalk gift shop, or on eBay. The SpongeBob shirts serve notice that a gray-market tradition at least two decades old is alive and kicking—one in which iconic cartoon characters are reimagined as cartoonishly "urban" and then plastered across bootleg merchandise. "
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"It's not unusual to find a barbecue restaurant in the South where the ribs are so good you want to run home and kiss your mom. But it's a rare find to discover the South's main delicacy cooked up by Lebanese immigrants in Mississippi, who defied segregation and who've been doing it since 1924."
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The tipster ShyGirlJ described it best: "That's right – "ethnic hair"! This was on AOL's front page. "Follow these step-by-step tips a for smooth, sleek, DIY hair." "
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"The overrepresentation of African Americans is not explained by use rates. According to the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, the percentage of African Americans and whites who use marijuana over any 30-day period are similar. However, for the 18-25 age group — which constitutes a substantial proportion of marijuana arrests — African Americans regularly use marijuana at rates lower than whites (16.5% and 18.4%, respectively), indicating that their overrepresentation may be even more profound."
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"They envisioned a neighborhood where whites and blacks, gays and straights, could live in harmony.
"What we wanted was an integrated community," Polsky said. "We had wonderful neighbors who were right with us."
Their dream has blossomed into a national model."
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" The gallery represents a cross section of official and unofficial Washington, from President Obama to the doorman at the Madison Hotel, from the head of the National Rifle Association to a shoeshine man. There are those who receive their pay in the form of salary and bonuses; there are those who collect theirs in a plastic cup."
Carmen Van Kerckhove is co-founder and president of
Deaf Indian Muslim Anarchist wrote:
I am very glad that Naomi Campbell, a hot-shot, well known household-name model is speaking out about racism and lack of WOC in the fashion world.
It’s great she’s making good use of her name and fame.
Posted 08 Sep 2009 at 11:43 am ¶
Lyonside wrote:
I want to highly recommend the Inquirer article re: Mt. Airy – its my home neighborhood where I spent most of my childhood (my mom and sibs were raised 2 blocks away from West Mt. Airy, my dad currently lives there, and we have friends and relatives scattered around East and West Mt. Airy). And I never KNEW about these two women who fought to open up Mt. Airy.
Even with the “white flight” that still plagues much of Philadelphia (And other urban centers), Mt. Airy takes a hella lot of pride in being diverse. It isn’t perfect (nothing is), and parts of it are having the same struggles as the rest of the city. But the area is both economically and ethnically diverse, everything from apartments and rowhomes to victorian mansions, all right next to each other. Oh, and unlike other parts of the city, it has multiple public transit options, and is still pretty affordable for first time homeowners and people looking for apartment houses.
Posted 08 Sep 2009 at 1:36 pm ¶
inkst wrote:
@ Lyonside: thanks for pointing out that article. I was totally unaware that neighborhood existed, and it was a really moving story.
And thanks to Racialicious for linking
Posted 08 Sep 2009 at 4:32 pm ¶
m. wrote:
Oh, Naomi Campbell; you are really one to run your mouth about “racism” when you literally JUST dressed up as an Indian princess a few weeks ago. Of course, “girl of color” = Black (and maybe sometimes Asian), so whatever. Either way, how many times has a model raised this complaint (in the meekest of voices) and then gone back to their career of challenging absolutely nothing? Please.
My point is that this is nothing newsworthy or interesting. It’s fashion, if there’s going to be any mention of “racism” from a big name model’s mouth who does RUNWAY, then it should be about all the misappropriating designers do of “ethnic” dress and co-opting of “ethnic” looks for their shows. If we’re talking print, mention all the fucked up spreads with “ethnic” themes. As for the industry lacking anything? It’s DESIGNERS of color.
Posted 10 Sep 2009 at 11:36 pm ¶