Posted 11th November 2014 1625

As a young African American girl, I have faced so many racial slurs that no one should be put through. I am constantly told that I’m unattractive because I’m black or I’m not as pretty as someone with lighter skin whether this is said indirectly or straight forward this is VERY offensive and tears down someone’s self esteem. I’m also 6 feet tall so people m are constantly telling me how being tall is equal to being a man and that I have man hands and feet. I also have my hair braided up which everyone at my school makes fun of and makes a big deal out of. I don’t want that attention all I want is to be treated normally. But what prompted me to write this was a boy a few shades lighter than I am that I started to like. Everyone told us that we’d be a cute couple and we flirted together a lot but one day when someone said we should date he replied saying ‘I don’t wanna date her I don’t wanna have dark skin kids’. I tried to ignore that but he kept going. He turned around and told me that I’m dark skin and and that I’m not as pretty as a white girl. He put his arm up against mine and asked all the other kids which one of us had prettier skin. When I got upset about this he was shocked and confused and expected me to be ok with all the things that he had just did. The next day when I was still mad at him and ignored him he told me that I was overreacting and kept saying ‘all I said was that I have a prettier skin color than you’ over and over again. The next day he continued to repeat it over and over again until I finally told him just to shut up. He then went to a group of his friends and they all turned around and stared at me and started laughing at me and when I asked them what they were laughing at they said that he had said something funny about me. I tried explaining to my friends but no one listened or understood how deeply all of this had hurt me. My confidence was already nipped and picked at constantly. The fact that I cared about him and liked him and believed that maybe he could somehow feel the same way about me made matters even worse. No one knows just how deep their words and actions are. Please be careful.

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