Black Femininity - Blog Posts
Sakalava women of Madagascar and face paint
self-ac·tu·al·i·za·tion
“the realization or fulfillment of one's talents and potentialities, especially considered as a drive or need present in everyone.”
You are gorgeous darling, absolutely gorgeous💕
🩷🩷🩷🩷💋💋💋💋
@thegirljt
hair that matches your skin tone >>
Warrior Women!
NO. 1
Many women were able to fight in battles, defend their kingdoms, and take up leadership roles, titled ‘warrior women,’ throughout the centuries. Their stories are inspiring and motivational for women everywhere to continue to be independent, strong, and courageous. The Dahomey Amazons were a real-life all-female warrior militia that existed from the 17th century to the 19th in the kingdom of Dahomey, today Benin of West Africa. They resulted from the male population facing high casualties from war and frequent violence from neighboring West African states, and the king at the time, King Houegbadja, implemented them. They called themselves the Mino, meaning ‘Our Mothers,’ in the Fon language, and were recruited as young as eight. Some voluntarily enrolled, while others involuntarily by their fathers or fathers. The Dahomey women warriors earned their reputation as fierce warriors, often earning the praise of enemies that they defeated in battle.
NO. 2
For the Greeks, they had the Amazonians; several tales from Greek mythology have been written about them. They were raised to fight from birth, where they would defeat and kidnap male warriors and keep them as enslaved peoples, mated with them, and kept their daughters raised as Amazons while having their sons be returned to their fathers. In one tale, the fight against the mythical Heracles, where one of his labors was to obtain the girdle from queen Hippolyte, the queen of the Amazons. They weren’t just mythical though; they were just real as well. Many burial sites revealed that ‘‘In the grasslands of inner Asia, from the Black Sea to western China, Scythian women had the same skills as their men: wielding bows, riding and herding animals, fighting – and dying from their injuries. Their remains have been found in tomb mounds from Crimea to western China.’’
NO. 3
The Valkyries were the Norse equivalent of female warriors, who, in mythology, guide the souls of the noblest of the dead to Valhall. Many famous poems and Eddas are centered around these famous warriors of Odin, king of the gods. Still, we’re not talking about mythology but actual female Viking warriors. In 2019, archaeologists uncovered the remains of a decorated female warrior from the 10th century, proving women held high-status positions in Viking culture. ‘‘Several weapons were buried alongside the body, including a sword, armor-piercing arrows, a battle knife, an axe, a spear, and two shields, indicating that the skeleton was likely that of a warrior. Accompanying the wide array of weapons were two horses, a full set of game pieces, and a gaming board. The gaming pieces suggest that the person buried was a high-ranking combatant who was knowledgeable of strategies and tactics.’’
This famed author deserves to have her writings continuously celebrated.
I’m begging Black girls and especially younger Black girls to please stop going on the Internet and complaining about being the least attractive/feminine/desirable and how guys don’t want you and how much you hate being a Black girl and wish you were another race(usually white/East Asian is what I see) so that you could be seen as beautiful/get the guy you want/not hate yourself every time you look into a mirror. Please. Stop doing that shit. I understand the soul-crushing way that Black girls are treated in society, and how insistent the world and people in general are in stripping us of our femininity and beauty and trying to gaslight us into believing that we’re ugly, and because of that it is so so easy to fall prey to the “we’re the ugliest of women and no one will ever love us” mentality. But when you make posts like these, talking down on yourself for being Black and expressing envy towards non-Black women, you are not only shitting on every Black woman out there who looks like you, you’re also giving non-Black girls an ego boost and letting them believe that they really are more attractive and valuable than us and that we’re “the ugly ones” because Black girls themselves are saying it and self-deprecating themselves.
I’m begging you to please stop going on these intensely anti-Black and misogynistic hate sites dedicated to hating on/tearing down women and venting about how being a Black girl is such a curse and a terrible burden and how you’ll never be as beautiful as a white/Asian woman because you have dark skin and coily hair. All you’re doing is putting yourself in harm’s way and validating the way people already think about us while shitting on your fellow Black sisters by painting us all with the “undesirable/ugly” brush. I understand that the rest of the world constantly tells us that we’re ugly/unlovable and less womanly than the rest of the groups. I understand feeling anger, confusion, and frustration at how were treated by people who are supposed to care about us and protect us. I understand feeding into it. But please don’t. Especially not on sites that prey on women’s insecurities and are filled to the brim with people who hate Black women with a seething passion. They’re only going to tell you that you’re right, not comfort you and make you feel better, you can’t rely on these sites for validation. Please talk to your friends and family or a therapist if you feel insecure about your race, and either follow Black female content creators who uplift Black women/girls or get off of social media for the betterment of your own mental health. Please. I’m begging you. 🙏🏿
We need to start telling Black girls that they’re beautiful again I’m so fucking serious. Enough of the “average Black girl” bullshit and pretending to be positive while tearing yourselves(and other Black women) down. No, you are not average just because you don’t wear makeup or wigs or extensions and aren’t slim thick and don’t look like an IG baddie(no shade to IG baddies ofc, you do you!). The whole “well ya see saying all women are beautiful is misogynistic because it places beauty as our primary value as women” shit doesn’t apply to Black women and never has. Black women live in a society that insists on telling us that we’re not beautiful any time we try to be confident about ourselves and how we(naturally) look. So let’s not give them the satisfaction. All Black girls are beautiful. Lightskin, brownskin, darkskin, short, tall, skinny, fat, muscular, cis, trans, girly, tomboyish, short-haired and long-haired, no matter what you look like, if you are a Black girl, then you are beautiful by default! Period! 💅🏿
Black women are really beautiful. This dude online was calling a really beautiful ethnic woman ugly because she looked more on the natural homely side and I realized how screwed the black community is. Like that's what your people naturally look like. It's really pitiful he felt he needed to say that just to clarify that ofc a natural woman of color can't be seen as beautiful. I don't blame some women for just saying screw all men cause it's normal for a dude to say you're ugly if you're natural. Yet they can and will shame you if you try to look like the societal standard. Meanwhile he was working on his health and on a spiritual journey, men are so unserious.
Might be just a little enamored with her face card
