1. Sugar daddy post “Dear Sugar Daddy. Last month we celebrated Christmas. It was probably a difficult month for you. I mean you have your wife at home to buy gifts for as well as your own kids and extended family that may live on your property. Crucial to that however you can’t forget that you have your sugar baby waiting on the sidelines. All year you have showered her with gifts and December really shouldn’t have been any different. In fact, considering the standard that you have set during the year I expect that Sugar Baby was going to be hopeful for a pricey gift. It goes without saying that you may not have seen Sugar Baby a lot during this festive period for many reasons including the fact that your wife is at home 24/7 or because Sugar Baby has been sent to visit granny for the holidays. I mean, she is only 16 after all…” 2. Making friends online“Dear Olivia "I wanted to write this to you and tell you how thankful I am that I finally met you. When we first interacted in the middle of last year I didn’t think that we would be chatting daily. After tagging you incorrectly on my natural hair page (AfroHealthSA) you corrected me but then still went on to follow the page. Soon after that you followed my private account and as I usually do, I followed back. A few weeks later you sent me a direct message and asked if you could do a post about me on your website. As we chatted through emails I found that you were a nice human being. My gut told me that you were genuine and when you mentioned your desire to come to South Africa I gave you my number and told you to send me a message if you didn’t think I was too weird. I kind of expected you to just say thank you and never make use of my number, but…” That time I hosted a Body Image series and there were some awesome pieces written for me by some of my friends. 3. One by the lovely Habrey “One of my most vivid memories of high school involves me hiding under my desk, crying. I'd been telling friends of mine about a 5km run/walk I'd done with my family the weekend before. A boy in my class called me a liar. How could someone who could do a 5k possibly be as fat as me?! Meet 13year old me:…” 4. One by my twin Michelle “… I was in grade 4 and the Leon Schuster movie, (a name I conveniently forget) had come out into cinemas and was all the rage. At some point during this period it was decided that I was no longer cool by the friends that I had proclaimed to be my BFFs. At this stage, I hadn't realized that I had slowly been ostracized from my group of friends, in my mind they were always just busy, until one day they accidentally on purpose bumped into me, raised their right and said "Owe, fat one". It was the first time in my life I had realized that my looks were a contributing factor in whether or not society would accept me. After all, if my very best friends were able to find flaw in who I was as a person because of my looks, what was to stop total strangers from judging me on the same grounds. …” 5. One by my girl crush Yolanda “… At a young age I was immediately made aware of the fact that I was not like “them” (the people you should aspire to look like). As a black, short, chubby girl with afro textured hair, the media and all its agents did not hesitate in letting me know that I was definitely not the “in” thing. None of the people on television or in magazines looked like me and if they did, they were far from being the “cool kids”. The world of comparison had unleashed its whip on me, setting me straight and ready to conform. The dream of fitting in and being accepted had been sold and I had bought it, I was willing to do whatever I could to validate my existence. If it meant skipping a meal or two, I was in, staying out of the sun for that yellow bone complexion, relaxing my hair with those dangerous chemicals for that “white girl swing”, best believe I was in!...” 6. A post dedicated to a male friend of mine “… Pictures were taken and food was served. We sat around the table and for the third time work came up. This time you asked me why I work for a small firm. I told you that black women in large firms get swallowed up in the works and aren’t recognized for their personal brilliance and rather for how many points they can score the company in terms of equity practices. Here you didn’t let it go. Nope, this time you loudly said, “Wow! That’s the third time you are mentioning that you are a black woman in the professional world. Doesn’t it get tiring?” Being that we were at a wedding I held my tongue because I didn’t think that the other guests would have appreciated the only black girl at the wedding living up to her stereotype and giving you a tongue lashing. Rest assured though that there were plenty of things that I wanted to say. For one. Screw you and all your white privilege…" 7. That time that I decided that my name is important in its complete and whole form.“Okay so let’s go back to that definition of reappropriation. "...- Reappropriation entails reclaiming something that was previously used in a way that gave it little worth. See how in Exhibit A you decided within seconds of hearing my name that you already wanted an alternative? You wanted to disregard what I had said about my given name. My ‘useful tag’ that separates me from the next person was simply done away with in favour of another tag that had no relation to my existence. By doing away with my name you gave my name no worth at all. But who is to blame here?...”
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HulisaniIntersectional Feminist. Hopeless Romantic. Lover of Life. Archives
January 2018
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