Hypergamy and Colorism: All that Glitters Isn't Gold
I am ecstatic that in 2019 more black women are waking up and leveling up both in mentality and in appearance. Although I existed most of my life as a “girly girl”, my journey has really been about taking my mentality to the next level and sharpening up some areas where I lack and learning that being a feminine dark-skinned woman is okay.
It is so refreshing to see my fellow dark skinned sisters embracing their natural femininity and embracing the idea that they are deserving of everything life has to offer to them. Although most of my journey has been eye opening in a positive way, there are a few things that I have experienced as a dark-skinned woman, that have been eye opening in a...not so great way.
Before I continue, I would like to give a disclaimer: This has been MY experience, MY observations and MY opinions. I trust the readers to already understand that however, some people like to get all out of sorts if they experience, or hold a different opinion.
The most jarring thing I’ve experienced on this journey are the amount of black men who genuinely feel that darker skinned black women like myself are “weird”, “white woman wannabe”, and “entitled” just for acting and thinking that frankly we deserve the same deal as every other race of women. This is something that I've heard on the Internets from dark skinned women leveling up or practicing hypergamy but of course seeing is believing.
This is worth mentioning because many black women on this journey are doing so in the hopes of leaving behind the Pookies’ and Ray Rays’ and going for the professional Dantes. From my experience I will say that out of all my interactions with high earning men, black high earning men tended to be less willing to treat me as well. I even had a professional Dante I was seeing at the time tell “that’s some white women mess”, when I asked him to pull out my chair for me at a nice restaurant. This is something that I don’t experience a lot with non-black men. Most of them are generally used to the expectations of women in general.
Before I get accused of making non-black men look like the savior for dark skinned black women, let me bring you to my next point of experience…
Just as I’ve had plenty of experiences with black men treating me a certain way, I'd like to caution my fellow dark-skinned sisters about non-black men who choose black women, especially dark skinned black women because they think we are low-maintenance or low hanging fruit. I’ve had non-black men, specifically Asian and Middle Eastern men who expected sex on the first date because they took me to a nice restaurant. Or they will be overly sexual with you and refuse to treat you like a lady because they think that black women are easy. Just like the above experience, I’ve had a non-black men tell me, after I moved his hand from my butt, which he grabbed within the first 5 minutes of us meeting, that “You’re pretty prude for a black chick”. Yeah…
The point of this article wasn’t to deter, or scare any dark-skinned woman from hypergamy or dating high earning men; I just think that a lot of us, myself included, get into the journey and have on rose colored glasses on in the beginning.
Then when we have experiences that don’t fit what we think the narrative of this journey is, it can stifle our growth. I just want dark-skinned women to be aware and to go into this journey realistically, not idealistically.
Liv is a new blogger for DDS Magazine. She graduated University in 2018, with a degree in History & English Lit and in her free time is an avid creative writer, History & Fashion enthusiast, as well as a cat-mom to three kittens. When she is not creating, she works at a children's non-profit and enjoys spending her weekends doing Pilates, hiking, shopping and indulging in Sci-fi novels.