Light and Dark Beauty among Somalis

Ok, I’m a somali gurl living in Toronto, Canada and I agree with you in some parts but not in others.I’m light skin and my mother and older sister are light skin, but my younger sister and older brother are dark, they got their skin colour from our dad’s side. Just to make this whole thing short not all somali women bleach they’re skin, maybe some but not most , In Toronto I don’t know one person who bleaches their skin. I love my skin colour and many other girls love their skin colour, and trust me nobody i mean nobody envy’s the barvaanies skin colour, i know many that are darker than me.

5/5/2004 19:33

The same applies for the indians, Ethiopians etc as well as many Western Africans and Carribean women. You can walk into any of their establishments and see skin bleaching creams that are being sold.
There is a wide variety of tones amongst the somalis. Where as some may bleach others may not. It’s an epidemic that faces many black women period.

hi baby how are u sis me i am fin soSOMALI WOMEN BLEACH THEIR SKIN TO LOOK GOOD, Y THE HELL DO U CARE ,COME ON NOW.IT’S LIKE COME ON IF THEY FEEL LIKE BLEACHING THEIR SKIN TO LOOK GOOD, SO BE IT.U CAN’T FORCE THEM NOT TO .SO STOP WITH THIS BULLSHIT ABOUT SOMALI WOMEN WANTING TO BE LIGHT SKIN, AND TO RESORT TO ANYTHING TO GET IT.IT’S LIKE A BURNETTE WANTING TO BE BLOND, BECAUSE THE STANDARD OF WHITE BEAUTY IS BLOND HAIR AND BLUE EYES, AND THE STANDARD OF BLACK BEAUTY IS LIGHT SKIN AND CAUCASIAN FEATURES.

REMEMBER IMAN, SHE WAS A DARK SKIN BLACK GIRL WITH CAUCASIAN FEATURES,AND AS LONG AS SHE HAD CAUCASIAN FEATURES SHE’S BEAUTIFUL, SHE REALLY DIDN’T NEED LIGHT SKIN. BUT WHEN YOU’VE GOT NEGROID FEATURES AND LIGHTSKIN YOUR STILL ACCEPTABLE.

I’M DONE WITH THIS SHIT.

my name bazi and u what is your name plz so by ok

9/7/2004 12:08:50 PM

Wow, don’t take it so personally. I am a dark skinned west indian woman and here we have a major problem with skin bleaching in fact we even have a saying “If you ain’t red(light skinned) yuh dead”
Light skin is revered in many post colonial societies and yes that includes Somalia. I work as a product manager for a major american cosmetics brand and I can’t tell you the countless faces I’ve seen that were bleached two or three shades lighter than the attatched body.

I think the obsession comes from the media and our own self hate which is a direct by product of colonialism. Remember house nigger and field nigger? well everyone wanted to be a house nigger right? (don’t be offended by the word I used it to make a point, if you’re offended then my point was well made)lighter skin meant a better life and here in the Caribbean sometimes it still does. Whites get the top pay and the closer you can get to that the better off you’ll be.

I know many woman who have said to me how lucky I am to be dating a white man, “at least my kids won’t be so dark, and they’ll have ‘good’ hair” They don’t realise I’d be dating him if he was green or purple or black as the bottom of the kettle. But still there is right infront of my face this preoccupation with whiteness.

All the magazines that show dark skinned women only show ‘dark’ as it relates to their own prejudice. Halle Berry is NOT dark, Halle is a red girl (light skin) or a ‘browning’ as they call her in Jamaica, she may be darker than a white girl but she is about ten shades away from being dark. All the non white women that are shown in the media could pass for white but for their skin tones and don’t tell me about Alek Wek because you know she is used as a caricature of blackness rather than an expression of genuine appreciation of her African beauty.

Every day I get requests for skin bleaching cream EVERY DAY! so don’t tell me that this isn’t an issue with black women or that the young women of any post colonial society have got over it.

ok yes i would have to agree that some and i would even go as far as to say that alot of somali women bleach. But all to some degrees, others lighten ever so lightly or give the face a shine or a more even complextion. this i dont feel is any thing to be ashammed of i mean white people spend millions of pound a year on darkening there skin its an industry. But i do oppose on quite servere methods of bleaching which i have come across, like lightening your skin so much that your that you begin to get spider veins on your face and begin to develop a quite noticeable unatural shine to your skin. Here its a case of not having confidence with your natural skin colour. This i am afraid is reality and there are many historical, psycological and media based reasons. yes its sad but the main thing is people must lovethe natural bueaty god has given us its all about confidence and do not allow people to psycologically belittle you. ok i know it easy well and sad but the real question is how are we as a nation going to fix hundreds of years of history, media and social influence to help the world to become a better place?

Glitz, you are dead wrong. have you ever ask yourself why the two Somali models Iman and Waris are both dark. I am dark and tall like them, I have never had shortage of men, trust me, also top Newyork Modeling agencies and some in France show interest in me and were begging for me to became a model. I am in the fashion industry but not as a model. I refuse to become one. they pursue me for a long time now to becamea model and I have no interest.
When I am with my light skined Somali female friends, mostly bleach and some nature who bleach even more, trust me men prefer me over them. I only date SOmalimen therefore, when I say men I mean Somalimen, and that is not bragging but its the reality.

The Europian men, they go after me like I am made of honey and chocolete, :) I have never understood the need for these females to bleach themselves, even the somali men now complain about it. Many Somali men compliament me for my dark skinn and for being nature.

These women should reliaze that there are men who are attracted to Dark Skinned sister, fat sister, short sisters, etc. Each women will have many admirers. and of course some prefer light skinned. so why deprive the ones who like dark skinned sisters the choice. ;)
The blacker the berry, the sweeter the juice ;) once you go black you don’t go back loooooooool

See ya!

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