On Monday, a media industry blog revealed that Essence, a lifestyle magazine geared towards black women, had hired a new fashion director named Ellianna Placas, to begin in September. But it was not the lines on her resume touting O: The Oprah Magazine and Us Weekly that attracted attention. It was the color of Placas’ skin: white.
“I don’t know who Snooki is.”
Wait, I voted for this man?
When President Barack Obama visited “The View” this morning, people living in red states and blue states alike crowded around the TV for the big event. In between cute anecdotes about Sasha and Malia and softball questions about Lindsay Lohan’s jail sentence, he fielded questions about Afghanistan, unemployment, racism, and the economy. And yes, the show’s token conservative, Elisabeth Hasselbeck, behaved herself. Keep reading »
Wow, SkinWhite. Symbolism much? Latino pop culture blog Guanabee noticed this ad for SkinWhite skin lightening cream which conveys a message about race via black and white chess pieces: “See, the white queen is reigning over all the black pieces. That’s because the black king took her as his queen. Because she’s white. Get it?”
It’s unknown if this ad is “spec work” or if it actually ran anywhere. But the fact that an ad for a product that helps darker-skinned people bleach their skin — itself disconcerting, as we recently discussed regarding Vaseline’s skin lightening app on Facebook — thought to depict “white wins over black” as a concept is troubling enough. [Guanabee] Keep reading »
Most of us either know Chad “Ochocinco” Johnson as an NFL star or a toe-tapper on “Dancing With The Stars.” But Ochocinco’s most recent role has been as pasha to his very own harem of women on the VH1 reality dating show “Ochocinco: The Ultimate Catch.” The star has caught some flack recently for only choosing two black women on the show from an array of beauties. So Essence.com sat down with him to discuss how some black women feel snubbed that a black man chose women representing other ethnicities to be his dates; his response was respectful but slightly dismissive. “I’ve never heard other races complaining about their men dating outside of their race besides black people,” Ochocinco said. “I hate that we continue to pull that race card.” Keep reading »
Vaseline has launched a Facebook app in India that allows users to lighten or whiten their skin tone in their profile photos. The app promotes Vaseline’s skin-lightening creams for men and feature Bollywood actor Shahid Kapur, whose face is spliced in two, half dark, half light. When downloading the app, Facebook says “Try the Vaseline Men Be Prepared Application for a fairer and spotless profile picture.”
Oh, if only this were about removing “spots.” Keep reading »
“I respect designers who aren’t afraid to go outside the box. I went to a Jean Paul Gaultier show, and I saw girls who are thicker than me, beautiful and voluptuous and different ethnicities. That made me so excited. I thought, ‘Okay, I can work that, for sure.’ It’s clear there are definitely fewer black women in the high-fashion industry. One of the things I respected most about Gucci was that they did a print campaign with me [in 2008]. I’m a black girl on a fashion spread for Gucci — that was a big deal.”
— Rihanna talks to Elle about diversity in high fashion. But what we really want to know is how does she feel about obvious Photoshopping? [E! Online] Keep reading »
Alicia Keys‘ new music video for “Unthinkable (I’m Ready)” addresses the heavy topic of interracial dating throughout the decades. I like the video, actually, because it shows how bigotry doesn’t necessarily disappear with time. But over at Feministing, our friend Courtney M. Martin — who’s also a Frisky contributor — is unimpressed. Martin found the “white dude in a truck and a bunch of angry black men” motif annoying, accusing Keys’ video of “fall[ing] into all of the tired stereotypes of the tragic interracial love story.”
Surely interracial dating is a complicated issue to deal with in a five minute-long music video, but maybe Alicia Keys could have been more original. What do you think? [Feministing] Keep reading »
Warning: this clip from a new ABC TV show called “What Would You Do?” is hard to watch, even though I know the “abusive boyfriend” and the “abused girlfriend” are only actors.
On four different occasions, “What Would You Do?” filmed diners at a restaurant watching two “couples” — one white, one black — sit down at a table when the “girlfriend” has obviously just been beat up. In both cases the “girlfriend,” who has cuts on her face and bruises on her arms, is terrified of her “boyfriend” and tells him to stop making a scene in public. Of course, he does not stop making a scene at all and only escalates his anger in front of all the other diners.
Good Samaritan strangers step in to help these abused “girlfriends.” Except when they are dressed provocatively, that is. Keep reading »
I haven’t seen “The Back-up Plan” yet, which is Jennifer Lopez‘s new flick about a woman who conceives via a sperm donor before meeting a guy she falls in love with. I just read this post at Feministing by blogger Miriam Perez, though, which pointed out something kind of odd: Lopez’s character in the film not only has a Caucasian grandmother, but gives birth to blue-eyed, redheaded, light-skinned twin babies. Keep reading »
entertainment
Face-Off: “Mad Men”‘s Pete Campbell & “Game Of Thrones”‘ Theon Greyjoy Are Kind Of The Same Person |
guys
Girl Talk: I Would Like To Have Guy Friends |
relationships
4 Things To Remember If You Never Hear From Them Again |
|
style
10 Beauty Hacks That Save Every Woman Time (And Money) |
|
sex
Sex Tips That Are Kinky, Not Freaky |
