Shades

Since when did lighter pigmentation mean you were better? Recently, in African American society there seems to be a battle between light skin and dark skin African Americans.

We are all black and descend from the same roots. Im sure when we all receive a survey and they ask for your race we say African American/Black not other and put down light or dark skin African American. There are larger battles to be dealt with in the black community such as drugs or crime, but most blacks want to be so ignorant to argue over skin color to people of your own race and ethnicity. What happen to Brotherhood?

This breakdown amongst my fellow black people has even made its way to twitter with treading topics of #teamdarkskin and #teamlightskin. You might even hear blacks to say to one another "thats why you would be a house nigga" because one is light skin or "thats why you would be in the fields picking cotton" because another was dark skin. Well here is a quick history lesson. Back during the times of slavery yes it was true that lighter African Americans worked in the house usually and darker African Americans were out in the field. This though was just another tactic Caucasians used to seperate blacks and in return try to get them fight against each other. Its sad to say that it is now 2010 and the tactics they used several years ago are still separating us and present in our society.

African Americans need to come together as one and not as light skin or dark skin. Media has played apart in the battle to because on television there are a lot more light skin black actors, singers, model, and performers that are characterized as the best or most successful. While not many dark skin blacks that have found the lime light. That is not all the media fault, but they do play a part in this on going battle. This seperation could all stop if we just realized there are many more important things to be worried about than you wanting to be with light skin women because you do not want your child being as dark as you. All shades of black is beautiful because BLACK is beautiful. Once African American society can come together and learn that we are all equal and beautiful we can get past trying to just look nice and work toward real goals like being president of the United States. Unity is the key to the future in the black community and I hope soon we find that key to open the door to new and expanding opportunities in the world.