The DARK COMPLEX...

Below is the uneditted version of an essay that I wrote for PULSE magazine. For the shorter, published version please visit www.gmad.org


The Dark Complex-ion: An inner monologue
A trip into one mahogany man's psyche.






















We've been indoctrinated and convinced by the white racist standard of beauty
The overwhelming popularity of seeing, better off being, and looking white…
-MeShell NdegeOcello, “Soul On Ice”



You’ve felt it all of your life.

At first, you thought it was a crazy outlandish idea, one without merit. You didn’t understand how it could possibly be true in this wonderful world that you’d been born into- the land of milk and honey, peanut butter and jelly, milk and cookies. You stared back at it every morning in the mirror and couldn’t imagine that it would have the consequences that it apparently has. You wrote it off, convinced that if anyone knew that you had these suspicions, you would be ostracized, demonized, forever branded a pariah. All of this, and you were only 5 years old. Even in your underdeveloped adolescent mind, you knew that it was wrong. You knew in your heart of hearts that it went against human nature and understanding. You thought that surely people were more intelligent than that. But ever since that day, you have been proven wrong on so many levels and on too many occasions. The reality was that you felt you were being treated differently because you were dark-skinned. Only five years on the face of the earth, and you had already become aware of The Dark Complex.

You were not light enough to assuage white fear and too dark to “lighten the race” for black assimilation. Being treated differently by those of the Caucasian race seemed par for the course. Even with your childish reasoning you had already internalized that the difference between black people and white people contributed to the difference in treatment that was often bestowed upon you and your family in a “mixed” setting. Strangely enough, that seemed logical to you. But then The Dark Complex came along, and turned even that strange perspective on its head.

You see, The Dark Complex told you that you were going to be treated differently because you were dark—and this inequality in treatment would be administered by your OWN KIND; those who were often mistreated themselves simply because of the color of THEIR skin. However, the color chasm that exists between black skin and white skin was far greater than what existed between black and chocolate, chocolate and brown, brown and mahogany, mahogany and café au lait, café au lait and pecan, pecan and cinnamon, cinnamon and “light”, “light” and “red”; these were the finer points. And because there was an infinitesimally smaller chasm between these shades of the same color, it seemed all the more illogical to you. So you buried it in your subconscious. You thought of it as spurious fodder; ridiculous, even.

Then you went to kindergarten.

You noticed that in Ms. Kanner’s class- since the majority of pupils were of African descent- there was nothing screaming inherent racism from the blackboard. However, you DID notice that the teacher’s pet was a little closer to Ms. Kanner’s color, the hallway monitors always seemed to be a bit closer to pink than you were. The principal was obviously a product of a mixed union. The only “darkies” were the “lunch ladies”, who served you your nutrition during 5th period with a mix of nonchalance and scorn. You still thought nothing of it. But one day, you got into a war of words with another student. Those hours playing “the dozens” in the schoolyard- most of which started with the insult “You’re so black…”, or “Your mother’s so black…”- seemed designed to make you believe that black was something to be ashamed of, made fun of, ridiculed. The word “black” would sometimes be followed by “and ugly” (i.e., “You’re so black and ugly…”) , so much that it seemed the two could be used interchangeably. But you shrugged it off. You knew better.

Then you became a teenager, and your hormones- skewed as you were led to believe that they were- had you looking at others not as just schoolmates but as objects of affection. It was then that your Dark Complex theory found weight. The girls that you convinced yourself you HAD to be attracted to blinked past your cocoa epidermis and made a bee-line for the redbone brothers with the slighter features. The first time it happened, you couldn’t believe it. By the fifth time, you felt like you knew what the deal was. Just as you were becoming more aware of yourself as a sexual being, you realized that there would be times when your pool of paramours could be limited to those who valued the hue of your skin before they got to your heart.

However, even through all of that, you still managed to love yourself all the way into young adulthood. You winced when one of the college applications you fill out requires that you affix a picture of yourself. The Dark Complex once again rears its ugly head as you question why they would need to know what you look like when your academic merit, extracurricular activities and scholastic aptitude tests should provide the admissions counselor with more than enough information upon which to judge your suitability for their school. You pause for a second and wonder if this is a ploy to conspiratorially keep sepia-toned blacks out of those hallowed halls. In any event, you find yourself accepted to this prestigious historically black college and are well into your second year when someone comments that you are somewhat “pretty” and would make an excellent candidate for a certain fraternity- if not for your dark skin. As you hadn’t wanted to pledge that particular organization anyway, you go on to join the fraternity of your choice and dismiss that earlier conversation as just ignorance and the further perpetuation of collegiate stereotypes that had described charter members of these fraternities; stereotypes which no longer applied in the “real world”. Today you still find it amazing that, for at least 80 years before your matriculation, those very stereotypes existed on black college campuses. Even more amazing is that almost 20 years after your graduation, those same stereotypes still seem to exist and don’t appear to be going anywhere anytime soon.


Fast forward to “real” adulthood, because this is where The Dark Complex gets REAL heavy. There you are, ready to take your rightfully earned place in Corporate America.
Because your college grades were above average and your references are stellar, you are lucky enough to have your resume circulated as widely as was possible back then- before the advent of careerbulder.com. You are somewhat taken aback when a human resources manager for a minority-owned business you interview with pulls you aside and apprises you of the company’s “plantation lullabies”. First and foremost, that it appears that only the “upper-echelon blacks” (a term she used to describe those whose ethnicity seemed blurred by a softer hair texture and brighter skin tone than your typical African American) got recommendations for promotions into the “good ole boys club”. You blink twice when she espouses that the only reason you got an interview is because your name isn’t decidedly black. Your eyebrows reach toward your forehead when she postulates that you will have to work twice as hard as your lighter-complected cohorts to gain the same respect. You are saddened both by the possibility that she may be right and the fact that she is black. You will later have a conversation with one of your contemporaries, who will secretly concede that his lighter skin may have assisted in his accelerated ascent of the corporate ladder. “Wow” is the only thing you will be able to manage to get out of your mouth.


But wait, there’s more…
















"They said, if you was white, you'd be alright, If you was brown, stick around, But as you is black, oh brother, Get back, get back, get back."
-- "Black, Brown, and White," by Big Bill Broonzy.

Your love of literature leads you to books like Lawrence Otis Graham’s “Our Kind Of People”, Toni Morrison’s “The Bluest Eye”, and bell hooks' “Salvation” and you begin to realize just how systemic this Complex is among your kind of people. You read about the “divide and conquer” tactics of slave-master Willie Lynch as it pertains to the mental enslavement of blacks by separating us according to where on the color spectrum the tint of our skin falls. You come across psychological studies wherein little black girls are given two dolls- one white and one black- and when asked questions about the characteristics of each, seem to attribute the most negative ones to the black doll. Movies like Spike Lee’s “School Daze” and D.W Griffith’s “Birth of a Nation” reinforce in you how undesirable your shade of sepia can be not only for white folks but for YOUR folks as well.


Then you look at popular media as a whole, and The Complex is in full effect. You wonder if you should be glad that you were born a dark skinned man and not a dark skinned woman, because they seem to get it the worst. You cringe when you are “regaled” with stories where black men are told by their families-their BLACK families- “don’t bring home no dark-skinned woman”. You are incredulous when you hear of darker women being told not to wear red lipstick or to stay out of the sun so as not to appear even more undesirable to a potential suitor. You chuckle (slightly) at the idea that photographer Thierry Le Goues was thought to be so radical (and almost accused of being exploitative) in showcasing dark mahogany-painted nude skin punched up by using nothing but a white background. You not only chuckle but laugh out loud that innovative photographer/graphic artist Jean Paul Goode- simply by introducing the regal dark beauty of Grace Jones- was touted as being so ahead of his time (and he was); as though black skin didn’t exist and wasn’t beautiful before he focused his lens on the obvious.



Even some of the most popular musical artists seem to have fallen prey. You are constantly miffed at and put off by current black hip hop artists featuring mixed race and “other” models in their videos, leaving the darker-skinned and undeniably black models in the background- if they cast a black girl at all. You groove to Kanye West’s music and give him props. You tell everyone that will listen that he is smart, enterprising, and artistically prolific. Then you damn near eat your words when you read that he is quoted in Essence Magazine- a publication geared toward empowering black women- as saying:
“If it wasn’t for race mixing there’d be no video girls. Me and most of our friends like mutts a lot. Yeah, in the hood they call ‘em mutts”.

After making sure that you’ve read that correctly, you shake your head. It’s not that you begrudge Mr. West his preferences; he can choose to date whomever he wants. However, at what point does preference bleed over into prejudice? It is this trend toward unbalanced casting in the media and in the boardroom that leave our mahogany mamis literally in the dark. What do statements like West’s say about THEIR beauty? How are they to compete in the dating world, when the lighter complected women whose “blackness” is visually diluted are seen as the only suitable mates for the modern black heterosexual male?

You pontificate as to if Beyonce, in all of her glamour and with all of her talent, would be as successful as she has been if she were just a couple of shades darker. Then you become incensed that you should even have had to pose that question in the first place. You do a running list of today’s celebrated black beauties (Halle Berry, Kimora Lee, Amerie, Alicia Keys, Mya, Jada Pinkett Smith, Melissa Ford, Tyra Banks, etc.), and it appears that your question has been answered.























But what of the modern homosexual male? You realize that this hybrid vigor is not relegated to just the straight world. That’s right; for all of our supposed progressiveness, gays are not exempt! You never understood why you couldn’t PAY a darker skinned man to give you any attention, while lighter “pretty” boys clung to you like (for lack of a better term) white on rice.


At the height of the “new” internet dating craze, you searched profile after profile and were confounded by the number of mahogany brothers looking for “light-skin blacks and latinos only”. You came to realize that for all of our marginalization by the larger gay community, black gay men have also played The Dark Complex card; black men who exclusively date white men in an obtuse attempt to somehow deny their own blackness; dark men who ONLY date lightskinned men as if their own melanin will somehow dissipate and blend into their lover’s skin as their extremities are intertwined during their most intimate moments; and light skinned men who wouldn’t look twice at another light skinned man because they find dark skin more brute, sexual, hyper-masculinized; animal, even. This is not to say that it is always the case- most of the time people end up with the one that steals their heart, regardless of the melanized stain of his skin (you would like to believe). You begin to realize that your dark skin- however innocuous you may think it is- whether it is simply desired, absolutely abhorred or completely fetishized, will always be a point of contention for some



You find that even in the black gay “ball” scene, the polarization is even more palatable due to the infinitesimally divisive list of “categories”; so much so that it has been a long-held belief by some unnamed sources that the lighter-skinned kids reign in the “fem queen realness” category and that the category of “face” is almost always reserved for those closest to the European ideal. The browner children have been relegated to the non-beauty categories of “sex siren” or “butch queen realness”. In an attempt to address this, there has of late even been further division in the categories; “light and lovely” and “dark and lovely”- as if the two are so mutually exclusive as to not be able to be judged side by side. You wonder: will “lovely” ever just be “LOVELY”, regardless of shading? It brings you right back to where The Dark Complex first found you, at the intersection of beauty and blackness- which for some still cannot peacefully coexist.


Two Lonely Hearts (On the Subway)
It all comes to a head when you’re riding the train home from church one Sunday. Its one of those days when you feel like you look really good; you are sporting a fresh cut, a beautifully tailored suit and perhaps your most stylish shoes. All of that shine on the outside is radiating on the inside, as you look up from your New York Times directly into the eyes of a woman whose gaze you have felt perusing you for at least since you boarded. Just as the train pulls out of the Fulton Street Station, The Dark Complex sits right next to you. You are literally screaming inside when this beautiful black woman; a café au lait confection rocking shoulder-length jet black hair, light brown almond shaped eyes, voluptuous, with just enough pucker in her glossed lip says “excuse me”. Pulling away from the Arts and Leisure section, you make direct eye contact with her.
“Yes?”
“I just gotta tell you. I usually don’t get into darker skinned men, but you are attractive for a dark skinned man. I just wanted to tell you that.”
You’re sitting there, half flattered but completely dumbfounded without a clue as to why. “Oh, uhm…Thank you” was all you could stammer.

Trying to return to your newspaper, something just doesn’t sit right with what you just heard. You can’t concentrate any longer, and you didn’t understand why you are getting incensed at the idea of this “compliment”. Then it hits you..

“Excuse me. I know that you meant that as a compliment and I appreciate the spirit in which it was given, but please don’t say that to another darker-skinned person again.”

Somewhat taken aback, she furrows her brow and her almond-shaped eyes drop to half moons.
“Huh?”
“I said ‘thank you’, but I don’t think you should repeat that to anybody else”.
A little exasperated, she murmurs, “Ooookay, never mind then. Sorry!”
“No I mean, I’m flattered by what you meant, but what you said isn’t complimentary at all”. Sensing her growing inner dialogue (which probably wasn’t complimentary at all at that point), you try to soothe the situation by making it more personal to her..

“I mean, if I said to you ‘I don’t usually like black girls, but you are cute- for a black girl’, how would YOU take that? It is almost like saying that black women ON AVERAGE aren’t attractive, but you’re the exception”
You watch as she processes what you’ve just said. Then her quizzical expression changes to one of embarrassment. “You know, I never thought about it like that” she says.
You exchange a couple of pleasantries with her until you reach your stop, leaving her with some brain candy





And all of that brings you to the present. To this day, you will continue to contend that skin color will always matter- even to those who preach that it shouldn’t. You look at the spouses of the leaders in the black community- your civil rights leaders, your preachers and deacons, your politicians, your musicians and revered actors- and wonder aloud if the fact that their betrothed are polar opposites of their skin tone is the luck of the draw or by design.











So perhaps The Dark Complex has gotten to you without you even realizing it.

You repeat to yourself what you have always said in conversations about black people and skin tone. Namely, that it is only after we thoroughly embrace the idea of beauty in all shades that we as a people may even have a chance. Until then, you’ll continue to watch as the lighter skinned women literally overshadow the darker-skinned women in videos, movies, commercials and reality show competitions. You’ll continue to try to take the backhanded compliments on your attractiveness in spite of your dark hue in stride. You’ll continue to question each person’s motives when you see a “mixed” couple. You’ll continue to give pause when the “majority community” in corporate America are astounded by your articulation and demeanor, as though your race and/or your skin color couldn’t possibly produce someone with an extensive vocabulary and grammatically correct subject/verb agreement. However, you’ll NEVER stop luxuriating in the beauty of your black skin. See, your blackness is fine; the blackness of your skin, the blackness of your mind. You love the skin you’re in. You love your people- Black, Brown, Puerto Rican and Haitian. You’re just getting tired of waiting for black people to realize that just as ebony chanteuse India Arie proclaims that “I am not my hair”, that we are not (just) our skin. What do you think would happen if all black people one day woke up and we were all the same shade of brown? Would darker skin remain demonized by some, denigrated by others, or celebrated by all? “

Is a homogenous dispersion of melanin (thereby making all of us indistinguishable) what it would take in order to eliminate my people’s plight with The Dark Complex?





You tell me…