So when I was growing up, which I've come to learn may have been a unique experience, there wasn't this light skinned vs. dark skinned contentiousness. Maybe it's because there weren't a whole lot black kids in my schools, so we stuck together more. Or maybe it's because within my family there are light skinned folks and dark skinned folks and I was never raised to see any real difference between us. My grandma was dark, my grandpa light and their kids spanned the difference between them. But I say that to say, when I was growing up, black kids was black kids. My best friend in high school was really dark and I'm fairly light (not Steph light though) and other people would point out how 'black' he was but I never saw that until they pointed it out. But so given all that, it makes me sad talking to kids today and seeing them embrace this "team light skin vs. team dark skin" shit. It really makes me sad that we have regressed to this kind of colonial thinking.


*I know that stuff about my own past is divorced from larger history and is about my very specific microcosm. I know that it doesn't acknowledge how white supremacy has impacted and even as a young person impacted me in ways I didn't understand or recognize. I know that as a lighter skinned person, I'm also sheltered by the degree of privilege my shade afforded me. But I thought my experience as not dividing black folks was more common than it apparently actually was.