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Skin Tone and Stratification in the Black Community on JSTOR

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Data from the National Survey of Black Americans (NSBA)(1979-80) are used to examine the effects of skin-tone variations of blacks on educational attainment, oc...

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The nation's most fawned over incarcerated man has inspired a trend on Twitter.

Although Jeremy Meeks, 30, is being held in San Joaquin Jail on $900,000 bail on weapons charges, that hasn't stopped women - and men - from swooning over his looks.

So much so, Meeks' mugshot helped spawn #FelonCrushFriday, where people are posting attractive mugshots.
https://twitter.com/AtEaze808/status/480004906925838337
As for Meeks, he says he appreciates all the attention, but wants the world to know he's no "kingpin." In a jailhouse interview with KXTV, Meeks said his wife told him about how he blew up on social media.

Meeks' mother, Katherine Angier, even created a GoFundMe page for her son, calling him "so sweet."

He also has a three-year-old son.

"He has a job and ... He was on his way to work. With no gang affiliations as per two of the charges. He has old tattoos..which causes him to be sterotyped [sic]," Angier wrote. "Please help him get a fair trial or else he'll be railroaded."

The page has a $25,000 goal.

Meeks, who spent nine years in prison for grand theft, told KXTV that he is no longer a gang member.

His sister told TMZ he is a practicing Christian and was only carrying a gun because he has to protect himself.

As for the tear drop tattoo on his face, Meeks said he's done some things in the past that he's not proud of.

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'Sexy felon' Jeremy Meeks inspires #FelonCrushFriday

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The nation's most fawned over incarcerated man has inspired a trend on Twitter. Although Jeremy Meeks, 30, is being held in San Joaquin Jail on $900,000 bail on weapons charges, that hasn't stopped women -- and men -- from swooning over his looks. So much so, Meeks' mugshot helped spawn #FelonCrushFriday, where people are posting attractive mugshots.

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Is it illegal to be this sexy? When police say this man was arrested on felony weapons charges, are they talking about those piercing blue eyes?

Jeremy Meeks, 30, was swept up in the Stockton, Calif. Police Department's "Operation Ceasefire" sting in response to a recent wave of gang-related robberies and shootings, has the most popular mugshot ever posted to the police department's Facebook page.

Meeks has a strong jawline, the perfect amount of stubble, and 5 felony charges for weapons and gang activity. He's being held on $900,000 bail, which some of his adoring fans would gladly pay.

"If he gets his life together he could make millions as a model. Omg," wrote a typical commenter on the police department's Facebook post, which now has 55,000 likes.

😩😂👏 call @hugoboss call @givenchyofficial call @calvinklein #freejeremymeeks #calvinklein #hugoboss #givenchy #je... pic.twitter.com/XD2Z4YU6D6

- Eribe Ramirez (@EribeRami9) June 20, 2014

Sorry, ladies (and some dudes) of Facebook: He's married.

"I just visited my wife, and she said it like, blew up all over Facebook," Meeks told ABC News 10 from jail.

He took the interview opportunity to explain that police found a pistol in his trunk, but he's "no longer a gangster." Meeks previously spent 9 years in prison for grand theft, and he says the teardrop tattoo on his face is because "he's done some things in his past that he's not proud of."

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The Internet Has a Huge Crush on This Sexy Felon

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Is it illegal to be this sexy? When police say this man was arrested on felony weapons charges, are they talking about those piercing blue eyes? Jeremy Meeks, 30, was swept up in the Stockton, Calif.

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What do you see when you look at this photo of Kylie Jenner? If you answered total ignorance, you're with the millions who were upset by pics posted by the youngest Kardashian-Jenner on Saturday night. But, according to Kylie, it's not what it looks like. "This is all black light and neon lights people lets all calm down," she responded via Instagram. Fair enough.

But, if the silvery makeup and lighting doesn't look like Blackface, what about the photo's original caption which read, "What I wish I looked like all the time." She has an answer for that too...sparkles, people. Sparkles.

Yes, In another world I wish I could have pink hair & blue eyes & covered in sparkles.
- Kylie Jenner (@KylieJenner) April 5, 2015

SRSLY Presented by Racked: Two Grown-Ass Women Take on the Kylie Jenner Lip Challenge (Try Hards, Season 1, Ep. 5)

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Kylie Jenner Tries to Gloss Over Controversial Instagram

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What do you see when you look at this photo of Kylie Jenner? If you answered total ignorance, you're with the millions who were upset by pics posted by the youngest Kardashian-Jenner on Saturday night. But, according to Kylie, it's not what it looks like.

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As much as we would prefer not to discuss it, skin tone complications of the past still afflict the psyche of present-day America, according to a 2011 study that found people of mixed race are placed below Whites socially, but ahead of Blacks.

To be sure, the findings do not isolate the issue to the Black community alone. Rather, the report shows the issue is pervasive in mainstream America as well. The study was conducted by Pamela Bennett, an assistant professor of sociology at Johns Hopkins University, found that multiracial people - such as Black-White, Asian-White or Native American-White - fall between Blacks and Whites in the American social hierarchy.

Former NBA player Gilbert Arenas recently came under fire for making disparaging remarks about dark-skinned Black women.

The 2011 study reports that mixed-race people are socially placed below whites, but ahead of blacks. Moreover, the article cites another study that reveals dark-skin black women are given stiffer prison sentences than their lighter-skin counterparts.

The study, which sampled over 12,000 Black women imprisoned in North Carolina between 1995 and 2009, showed that light-skinned women were sentenced to 12 percent less time behind bars than their darker-skinned counterparts. The results also showed that having light skin reduces the actual time served by 11 percent.

Even employers seem to prefer the lighter-skin Blacks among us:

A 2006 University of Georgia study showed that employers prefer light-skinned black men to dark-skinned men, regardless of their qualifications. We found that a light-skinned black male can have only a Bachelor's degree and typical work experience and still be preferred over a dark-skinned black male with an MBA and past managerial positions," said Matthew S. Harrison in 2006, then a doctoral student in applied industrial organizational psychology at Georgia.

But when it is not mainstream society (code words for white folks), it is people within our own community making light of our historical pain:

In Oct. 2007, a Detroit party promoter caused an uproar when he promoted a party giving free admission to light-skinned women only. Ulysses Barnes - or "DJ Lish" - promoted a party for "Light Skinned Women & All Libras" but promptly cancelled it after women and activist groups protested the party's premise.

Barns' defense of the party theme was hardly comforting. The Michigan Citizen quoted him as saying "he had plans for "Sexy Chocolate'' and "Sexy Caramel'' parties too, and that "it was just a party thing.'' Read the rest of the article to see how other women didn't see his casual reflection of his ill-conceived party theme as "just a party thing."
SEE ALSO: Eddie Murphy's Wife Scammed Out Of Millions

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STUDY: Light-Skin Blacks Preferred Over Dark-Skin Ones

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As much as we would prefer not to discuss it, skin tone complications of the past still afflict the psyche of present-day America, according to a 2011 study that found people of mixed race are placed below Whites socially, but ahead of Blacks.

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Light Skin Vs. Dark Skin: Breaking the Mental Chains

By Akira X Roberson | Last updated: May 19, 2014 - 12:02:19 PM

What's your opinion on this article?

People often think that stereotypes are made by another race and their view of the race they are labeling. But what most don't think about are the labeling and divisive stereotypes that are used within a race; such as stereotypes often used in the Black community.

This type of division in a race can be poisoning and indirectly divisive.

Stereotypes such as Light Skin Vs. Dark Skin within the Black community are cancerous, dangerous, and shape how we view ourselves and our people. Fortunately, we can solve this problem by teaching and mentally reshaping how we've been trained to think and behave.

This stereotyping is seen as joking and not serious, at least that's what is thought.

It is also rare that anyone questions where Light Skin Vs. Dark Skin originated. "It just exists, and it is somewhat passed on. ... Even young children use these jokes and labels." But the question stands where did it get its beginning and how was it enforced?

Light Skin Vs. Dark Skin emerges at least as early as 1712 in the Colony of Virginia on the banks of the James River and Willie Lynch. Willie Lynch spoke of ways to break apart the tightly unified Black man and woman. The unity between the slaves led to revolts. They killed their owners and those families and often ran away. Considering this, Willie Lynch devised a plan that would control the slaves physically and mentally for 300 years or more if executed correctly.

The Lynch plan consisted of:

"Crossbreeding Niggers mean taking so many drops of good white blood and putting them into as many nigger women as possible, varying the drops by the various tone that you want, and then letting them breed with each other until another circle of color appears as you desire. What this means is this; Put the niggers and the horse in breeding pot, mix some asses and some good white blood and what do you get? You got multiple of colors of ass backward, unusual niggers, running, tied to backward ass long-headed mules, the one productive of itself, the other sterile, (The one Constant, the other dying, we keep the nigger constant for we may replace the mules for another tool) both mule and nigger tied to each other, neither knowing where the other came from and neither productive for itself, nor without each other."

Furthermore, he suggested destroying the mother language of Black people, and he wanted to limit the understanding of the English language.

"Being a fool is one of the Basic ingredients of any incidents to the maintenance of the Slavery System," said Lynch.

By making us foolish, small differences like color shade could be used to break our unity-thus creating light skin verses dark skin. Willie Lynch's plan ultimately was to take the small differences between Blacks and make them bigger. Lastly, he has to use a method to instill these differences among Blacks.

Additionally, Willie Lynch had principles for breaking apart unified Black people and turning them into foolish slaves. He used fear as one of the mentally bonding chains. He suggested taking the strongest Black male, tying his arms and legs to two horses, lighting him on fire and making the horses run into two different directions. He would then make the pregnant women, children, and slaves watch to instill this fear. He would then take another strong Black male and whip him to near death, but not enough to kill him. The pregnant women would pass this fear off on to their offspring and the children would have this image engraved in their brains. It was breaking the strong image of the Black male; making the woman independent of him. The male children would be made strong physically but weak mentally.

This process aided in allowing differences to become problematic; those differences have created a rift within the Black race.

Such differences and inequalities also manifest in the work place, the criminal justice system, socioeconomic status, and education. "According to research by Arthur Goldsmith, Darrick Hamilton, and William Darity, employers tend to prefer light-skinned Black employees over dark skinned black employees," noted one source.

"Similarly, research by Jennifer Eberhardt, Paul Davies, Valeries Purdie-Vaughns, and Sheri Lynn Johnson demonstrates that 'blacker-looking' African American males are more likely to receive the death penalty compared to their lighter-skinned counterparts for comparable capital crimes," noted other experts.

These inequalities have shown up in socioeconomic status, and education. For example, "Light skin attains a higher socioeconomic status in its own right, through greater education and workforce mobility," according to research on Colorism.

This "anti-Black" bias is evident in beauty standards and has caused self-hatred within the Black race. Beauty is measured by how White one looks. During an experiment in 2010, three psychologists found Black children chose a White doll and associated the White doll with good characteristics over the Black doll. Also the Black doll was associated with bad characteristics. The age group was 4 to 5 and 9 to 10; at such ages how do they know that Black is ugly? What images have they been shown that would make them believe that Black is beautiful?

"Studies show that non-whites tend to embrace the beauty standards prevalent in most societies, which grant a higher desirability to lighter skin than to darker skin," noted an author on Colorism. Why is that?

It has also come into the light, that Black celebrities are bleaching themselves. Some of the most notable Black celebrities accused of bleaching are Sammy Sosa, Rihanna, Beyoncé, and many others who are not famous use dangerous skin bleaching creams.

But why, what and who have convinced them that their skin wasn't beautiful when it was brown? Unbeknownst to them this self-hatred has been indirectly affecting them.

There is a solution to this Light Skinned-Dark Skinned problem and the issues that come with it.

The solution to this problem is simple: Educate Black children at an early age about history and how race mixing was used as a weapon of mind control. Once they understand this, all the other issues such as self-hatred and the divisions are erased. This is the only way to ensure these mental chains are broken. Light Skin Vs. Dark Skin was created through a process. So education has to reverse that process. This teaching will have to be instilled into young children at an early age all the way into adulthood.

Once these teachings have been correctly executed, the process that Willie Lynch instilled in the Black race will be broken completely. There will be a new enlightenment in the Black community and there will be more progress as a race. Self-hatred will be a thing of the past. The inequalities that exist because of divisions made by our ignorance will be no more. The Black race will be unified and strong like it once was before our enslavement.

(Akira X Roberson of Muhammad Mosque No. 28 in St. Louis, Mo., is a member of the Nation of Islam's Vanguard Class and attends Francis Howell North high school. She will graduate this year. This commentary is adapted from an essay she was required to write and present as a senior. "I chose to write my essay on Light Skin Vs. Dark Skin: Breaking the Mental Chains. I chose this topic because I've dealt with being labeled light skinned from a very young age up until now. Now that I'm older I see it a lot more, and it's mostly from Black people of course. The school that I go to is somewhat diverse, but predominately White and interracial. That being said, there is a great number of Light Skin Vs. Dark Skin stereotypes. So I knew I had to try really hard to get this message of where this label came from and what it has done to our people. My overall grade on the paper was a 91 percent-one of the best grades in the class," she said.)

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Light Skin Vs. Dark Skin: Breaking the Mental Chains

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By Akira X Roberson | Last updated: May 19, 2014 - 12:02:19 PM What's your opinion on this article? People often think that stereotypes are made by another race and their view of the race they are labeling.

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the official dark girls movie website blog

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Preview | The Official Dark Girls Movie Website

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The Official Dark Girls Movie Website - The Story of Color, Gender, and Race

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Bracing New Documentary "Dark Girls" Delves Beneath The Skins of Women Darker Than Most and the Separate Lives They Lead Film to Premier in September at the Toronto International Film Festival
Has anything really changed since the days of American slavery when dark-skinned Blacks were made to suffer even greater indignities than their lighter skinned counterparts? Ask today's dark Black woman.

Dual documentary Directors/Producers D. Channsin Berry (Urban Winter Entertainment) and Bill Duke (Duke Media) took their cameras into everyday America in search of pointed, unfiltered and penetrating interviews with Black women of the darkest hues for their emotional expose', "Dark Girls". Two years in the making and slated to premier at the Toronto International Film Festival, "Dark Girls" pulls back our country's curtain to reveal that the deep seated biases and hatreds of racism - within and outside of the Black American culture - remain bitterly entrenched.

Berry states of the film's origin, "When Bill called me with the idea of a documentary about dark-skinned women, I was in right away. Being a dark-skinned Black man, like Bill, I have gone through similar traumas. Being separated and discriminated against by our own people. It stifles your self-esteem. Bill and I shared our similar experiences and immediately understood that we knew the best way to approach this."

Duke adds, "In the late `60s a famous psychological study was done in which a young Black girl was presented with a set of dolls. Every time the she was asked to point to the one that wasn't pretty, not smart, etc., she pointed to the Black doll that looked just like her. In her mind, she was already indoctrinated. To watch her do that was heartbreaking and infuriating. CNN did the test again recently - decades later - with little progress. As the filmmakers behind 'Dark Girls,' our goal is to take that little girl's finger off that doll."

Dark-skinned Black American women from all walks of life will be covered with a key focus trained tightly upon women struggling for upward mobility in the workplace of Corporate America. "The sickness is so crazy," Berry continues. "These ladies broke it down to the degree that dark-skinned 'sistas' with 'good' hair vs. dark-skinned women with 'kinky' hair were given edges when it came time for coveted promotions." Additional interviewees for "Dark Girls" include White men in loving intimate relationships with Black women that were passed over by "their own men," as well as dark-skinned women of Latin and Panamanian background to bring a world perspective to the issue of dark vs. light.

Berry concludes, "The skin issue is a discussion we all need to have once and for all...so we can eradicate it."

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the official dark girls movie website blog

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Bracing New Documentary "Dark Girls" Delves Beneath The Skins of Women Darker Than Most and the Separate Lives They Lead Film to Premier in September at the Toronto International Film Festival Has anything really changed since the days of American slavery when dark-skinned Blacks were made to suffer even greater indignities than their lighter skinned counterparts?

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Scott L. asks: Is it true that Michael Jackson bleached his skin to turn himself white?

Many scandals marred Michael Jackson's personal life, overshadowing his otherwise remarkable musical career. One such scandal was the obvious change in his appearance, especially his skin color, which started from the mid-eighties to slowly but surely turn from dark to white.

By the mid-nineties when Jackson released his album History (1995), it was more than obvious even to his most dedicated fans that the man of Thriller (1982) looked nothing like the man who had recently married Elvis Presley's daughter, Lisa Marie. By this time, Michael Jackson was milky white; a skin-color transition that started almost a decade earlier was more or less complete. So what happened?

According to his family and Jackson himself, the "King of Pop" had vitiligo, a condition that causes depigmentation of parts of the skin, which usually results in white spots on the patient's body; these are even more noticeable if the person has a dark complexion as in Jackson's case. The 1 in 250 or so people who have this condition typically first start seeing signs of it beginning between 10 and 30 years old. Approximately 30% of the people who have it also have it run in their family, which is true of Jackson.

In addition to this skin disorder, Jackson also reportedly suffered from systemic lupus erythematosus, which besides potentially being a very serious condition can also cause loss of skin pigmentation.

When the controversy about his changing skin color hit its zenith, Jackson spoke openly about his vitiligo for the first time in an interview he gave to Oprah in 1993. He said among other things,

It is something I cannot help. When people make up stories that I don't want to be who I am, it hurts me. It's a problem for me. I can't control it. But what about all the millions of people who sit in the sun to become darker, to become other than what they are. Nobody says nothing about that.

In the days after, at Jackson's request his condition was publicly confirmed by his dermatologist, Dr. Arnold Klein, who also stated Jackson was first diagnosed with the condition in 1984. It was also confirmed that he had lupus erythematosus, but that it was in remission.

Conspiracy theorists propose that there was much more to it than this. That in fact Jackson had no such disease and that he, instead, systematically bleached his skin using Benoquin cream and other medical cocktails in his quest to look like a white person.

The obvious and extensive cosmetic surgeries he had on his eyebrows, eyelashes, lips, and nose only served to enforce the theory that he was simply purposefully tweaking his appearance even more by bleaching his skin.

So is there any truth to this? Dr. Christopher Rogers, deputy medical examiner at the Los Angeles Coroner's Office and the man who conducted Michael Jackson's autopsy, chimed in on this after performing the autopsy on Jackson. Dr. Rogers confirmed that Jackson indeed suffered from vitiligo, most noticeably with patches around his face, chest, abdomen, and arms.

So did he also bleach his skin? According to dermatologist Dr. Hanish Babu, Jackson did; this is sometimes a treatment used for those with vitiligo.

When these white patches first started appearing, you can see from certain of Jackson's concert footage that he was trying to mask them with makeup matching his original skin color. Once the patches became too numerous to easily hide with makeup (and he supposedly became tired of the extensive time needed to apply the makeup every day), he switched strategies and began the process of bleaching his skin, supposedly under the care of his dermatologist and using 20% monobenzyl ether of hydroquinone (Benoquin Cream). Much later, in June of 2009 after his death, tubes of Benoquin and hydroquinone were found in Jackson's home. As Dr. David Sawcer said, "some patients with vitiligo get to the point where it makes more sense to remove the brown bits because so much of the skin is pale."

Besides giving him a white complexion, this also results in being prone to sun burns, which is why in later years he often kept himself nearly completely covered when outside in the sun. (See What Causes Sunburns and How Sunscreen Prevents It)

In the end, only Jackson knew his true motivation for ultimately choosing to bleach his skin, whether as a treatment for his vitiligo to even out his skin color as reported, or as the conspiracy theorists claim, to further change his appearance to more of a Caucasian look, though one would think the latter would be an odd move for the co-author of the line (with Bill Bottrell), "It don't matter if you're black or white."

If you liked this article, you might also enjoy our new popular podcast, The BrainFood Show ( iTunes, Spotify, Google Play Music, Feed), as well as:

Bonus Facts:

Thanks to his vitiligo and needing frequent care from a dermatologist, Jackson met Debbie Rowe, a nurse of his dermatologist. The two became fast friends and over a decade after they first met, they married in 1996. They divorced three years later, but reportedly remained friends for the rest of his life.

The autopsy also found that Jackson's lips were tattooed pink, while his eyebrows were tattooed a dark hue. The front of his scalp was also tattooed black, apparently to blend his hairline in with the wigs he wore (he was balding). Also according to the autopsy, Michael Jackson was 5´9˝ and 136 lbs at the time of his death.

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Why Michael Jackson's Skin Turned White as He Got Older

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Scott L. asks: Is it true that Michael Jackson bleached his skin to turn himself white? Many scandals marred Michael Jackson's personal life, overshadowing his otherwise remarkable musical career. One such scandal was the obvious change in his appearance, especially his skin color, which started from the mid-eighties to slowly but surely turn from dark to white.

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Actresses talk about the Light Vs Darkskin Issue

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Actresses talk about the Light Vs Darkskin Issue

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Actresses Tackle the Debate over Light vs. Dark Skin

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The devaluing of dark-skinned women, which is discussed in the documentary 'Dark Girls,' is something many African-American actresses must overcome. Watch as Alfre Woodard, Viola Davis, Phylicia Rashad and Gabrielle Union tackle the complex issues surrounding people's perception of light versus dark skin.