Colorism, Good Hair & Willie’s Rope

If you have not heard yet, last month Sean Puffy Combs, P-Diddy or whatever he goes by these days had a promotion casting call for Ciroc Vodka, a brand he will be promoting for up to $100 million in compensation. The casting call asked that models be “white, Hispanic or LIGHT-SKINNED African-American women, 5 feet 6 inches or taller and no larger than a size 7. Notice the blatant exclusion of dark-skinned sisters? Obviously, this caused an uproar and Puffy released a clean-up statement saying “He loves women of all shades” and that his camp had nothing to do with the ad. I can’t prove whether he had anything to do with it or not but it doesn’t seem far-fetched for Puffy. The fact that a Black man could send out a casting call for women who are supposed to be perceived as beautiful and appealing and exclude an entire portion of his own race is troubling to say the least. Notice there were no restrictions on the white or Hispanic women.     dumb-ass-puffy2                                                                              

What’s even more troubling is that Puffy does not stand alone in such idiotic statements in the hip-hop…no make that rap community. Last year rapper “Yung Berg” caught flack for referring to dark -skinned sisters as “dark butts.” I honestly cringe as I write this. He went on to say that he doesn’t deal with dark butts and that he has a pool test that says if a woman doesn’t look the same or better after she comes out of the pool then she’s not attractive. That is awful. These are words Black men use to describe their own women. These are words coming from our “brothers?” Wow. He got a lot of negative responses as a result of this and of course he tried to clean it up. Kanye West made a reference to his love of mixed women who he referred to as “mutts.” Pharrell was accused of not having dark-skinned sisters in his videos. Need I go on?

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April 7th, 2009 Stay Woke Tags: , , 11 Comments

Child Support Woes

Ray Charles sang “Child support. Alimony. She’s eating steak. I’m eating bologna.” He lamented about the woes ofgavel having to pay up to an ex. He’s making the money and she’s taking the money.

Mos Def ran down several scenarios of what Beef really is. He said Beef is when a gold digger has your seed in her with one hand out saying pay me ni$$a…Damn.

On the flip side, if you’re alive you’ve surely heard of the numerous Black men as dead beat dads. At least one of your sisters, cousins or girlfriends has a child with a man who is not involved in the child’s life and/or not paying child support.

 

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January 24th, 2009 Parenting/Family Tags: 11 Comments

Clever's Corner

Greetings

Join us this Women's History Month as we
celebrate all things feminine.

New Blog! I don't know about you but I'm tired of
the overkill of the "Black women are not marriage
material" topic in the media.

It looks like mother nature has given us a break
from all the slushy white stuff. We've actually
gotten sun and mild temperatures these last few
days. Niiiice! I hope the weather is lovely where
you are too.

Have a great week. Peace & Blessings.