Love the skin you're in...

The other night i was in the club and i saw something that sparked the idea for this blog. There was a heavy set girl with some small clothes on. Before you start laughing, I'm not trying to make fun of big women, but in my opinion, something needs to be said.

For many years, women have gone to many extremes to be considered beautiful. In Thailand, women wear long bracelets to elongate their necks, in France, rich women used to wear corsets to show their curves, in Africa, women would get piercing and elaborate dresses to show off their beauty. Today, society portrays the "ideal woman" as super skinny with nice long hair. I don't know whose ideals those were but they are becoming the ideals of many people today.

Women, all shapes and sizes are doing what they can to try to fit this persona. This is where I step in and say, love the skin you're in. How happy can a woman be when she's going to these extremes to look like something she isn't. Now, back to this girl from the club. I feel like she squeezed into those clothes to try to fit that "ideal woman" image, but those clothes weren't fitting her. Sometimes I can't but feel sorry for some of these women because they don't like themselves and are sometimes going to drastic measures to fit this "image."

Get Me Bodied

Throughout history, the sexuality of African Americans have been hypersexualized, where their bodies have been flaunted all through the media, but more specifically the male. Not only have black men been hypersexualized, but they have embodied this hypersexuality. What is it about the super sexual nature that makes us men want to exhibit our sexuality in such a manner?

Well lets take a step back, a large step back. Back to the days of slavery. During the slave trade, the white master would get the male slave with the largest genital, take him to a breeding room, and make him mate with a young girl. While on the plantations, the wives of slave masters would have sex with the strongest black man on the plantation behind her husband's back to fulfill her sexual fantasies.

We see through these two acts of selection that other men that didn't meet these qualifications may have sought to do so. Throughout the duration of time, it has been innately implanted in us because after seeing it once, each generation has wanted to accomplish something greater than that of the last. This is evident in today's culture; men try to meet or surpass the bodily characteristics of the men before them.

Taste the Rainbow

Before you continue to read this post, take a few minutes to watch the video in this link.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mJgC9LEBTuQ

It's so funny to see people stereotyped based on their race and gender, right? Because that's exactly what this video is making clear. In this video we see that each person is assigned a color based on the color fo their skin or their gender, what's up with that? The sad thing is, that's the way the original cast of The Mighty Morphing Power Rangers were assigned their colors. Although we may never really pay attention to these things, that's the way it was as seen in the picture below.

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In the video, as Zordon named off each color for each person, he gave a few attributes as to why they are their particular color. He deemed the black guy the Black Ranger because of his "strength and durability," we all know this was one of the main reasons for slavery. He assigned the Asian girl the Yellow Ranger because of her "agility," asians are well known for martial arts which exhibits their grace and agility. He also mentioned her being well in math, which is another big stereotype made toward asians. He assigned the white guy to be the White Ranger because he wanted him to be the leader and we see in America's white supremacist society, the white man is the next best thing since sliced bread.

Finally, the one that really got me was the Pink Ranger. He assigned the girl to be the Pink Ranger simply because she was the girl, and no other reason. She even asked to be the leader because she was more qualified than the White Ranger and Zordon laughed in her face. That was a great example of the way things are in American society. Even though the female has the qualifications and maybe more than a man, she isn't selected for a particular position based on her gender. It is because we live in a male dominated society this is so, and because of these circumstances, women make on average 33% less than a man does. It's almost fascinating the way we automatically stereotype each other today, it almost seems innate.

Booty Got Swagg?

Because of the African ancestry, black sexuality, specifically of the female, has often been rendered primitive and or wild. This is seen during the times of slavery when slave owners would rape many female slaves to fulfill fantasies of animalistic sex that couldnt be provided by their much too conservative wives. Not only were the primitive, animalistic attributes of black female sexuality used as tools of fanatical fulfillment, but also largely exploited. Which is most notably seen through the accounts of Sara Baartman.

Born sometime during 1789, Sara Baartman was a native of the Cape of Good Hope until she was taken from her home in 1810. She was taken to Europe, where she traveled all over England and France in a cage exhibiting her rather large behind. For this, she was crowned the Hottentot Venus. These shows weren't free though, viewers had to pay a small price to see this. She kept some of the money she kept but often gave some to the exhibitor. She went on to die at age 26, and that's when the horror began. Her body was dissected to examine her primitive sexuality. Many parts of her body was placed on display including her labia, skeleton, and brain.

Which brings me to present day. Women have been and still are being exploited in music, movies, and videos. History has a vicious way of repeating itself because even after all the talk and controversy over the Hottentot Venus, we still see the exploitation. Videos like Tip Drill by Nelly, Donk and Booty Got Swagg by Soulja Boy explicitly exhibit the exploitation of women, but it's socially accepted because sex sales.

Cat Got Your Tongue

Has it occurred to you that the largest female crazes of today, Hello Kitty, has no mouth? Hello Kitty is a cartoon created by the Japanese artist Ikuko Shimizu. Now, maybe he forgot to draw the mouth on this little kitten or maybe it was intentional, we can really never know, but what we can do is analyze the way things are. Why does this character lack one of the most powerful body parts? The only thing worse than not having a mouth is probably not having a brain! In the Japanese culture, just as in any other, the woman has been misogynized since the beginning of time and for the artist to forget the mouth on this character is only evidence.
What does it mean to not have a mouth? No mouth essentially means no power. We see in many aspects of life the mouth is detrimental in our lives. In the Christian Bible Proverbs 18:21 says, "Death and life are in the power of the tongue: and they that love it shall eat the fruit thereof." Biologically, the mouth is the initial point in the digestion mechanism; detrimental for survival. Without the ability to speak, how can we communicate? Through the "mouthlessness" of this character I get the feeling the artist believes women should only speak when spoken to, if even then. At first glance, one doesn't really notice this beloved kitten doesn't have a mouth, but by allowing our daughters, sister, nieces and any female to fall in love with this character is subliminally saying it's alright for women to walk around without a voice, it's alright to not be heard, it's alright not be able to speak up for yourself.