Red, purple and blue people? Those ones made me laugh. I have never seen a naturally purple, red, orange, or blue person in my life. Of course, people look orange when they're over-tanned, or some people turn 'blue' in the face when they are sick, but that's where it ends. No one is actually born these colours in real life, not unless Avatar is real-life. But these are all colours that are ascribed to whole races and peoples. It does not help that these colours, and the people that are said to wear them, are associated with certain qualities, good or bad, real or imagined.
It might not change anything now to talk about trying to dismiss these unrealistic colours or making them more true-to-skin, but it would be really great if people would stop and think about the colour labels pasted on them and others.
Recently, I took to wearing white and black to make a statement. It was either I was beginning to seem like an ordinary white-and-black fashion lover or the message was clearly not hitting home, because no one stopped to ask me why I was almost always dressed in black and white, or complete black, from shoulder to feet. Even my friends and acquaintances did not seem to find it odd. Maybe, I should have attached a board that read, “If I wear/were black, you shouldn't be able to see my face'. If a 'white' person is actually white, then, he should be as white as the colour white. Where does truthfulness, honesty, and correctness, whether political or otherwise feature in this colour coding?
On more than one occasion, I have had to describe myself as black, basically because that's what society tags me as; many forms ask if you're black, white, etcetera. If only the colours actually matched the skins.
I have had to compare my skin colour with the real 'black' colour I ought to be. It turns out I'm definitely browner than I am black. There are in fact people who are actually black skinned, but not all 'black' people are black-skinned. It is also ironic that in Africa, you would have some people calling other people black or chocolate or fair; when in the larger society, everyone is 'black'. The way I see it, it is better to just call people by their actual race-names- African, European, Asian, and etcetera; or even by their nationalities.
So, does that mean that I should call myself brown, simply because in actual fact I am more brown-skinned than black skinned? I honestly wish I could, but there's another race occupying that slot. Describing yourself as African or European, or even Chinese, Malian, Brazilian, Egyptian, and etcetera seems to be inadequate.
Society calls me black, so that's what I must be?
