"Beauty canons are racist, they put pressure on black bodies."
- Organized by the Women with Voice Association, under the title "Afro-feminisms. Empowerment through the Afro aesthetic", a colloquium café was held in Algorta on March 2. The main guest was Desirée Bela-Lobedde, a Catalan activist who spoke about TRIANGLE shortly before the conversation began.
Bela-Lobedde, born in Vilanova i la Geltrú (Barcelona), is an official of the City Council. Their parents are from Equatorial Guinea. He founded his blog in 2011 and has since published several works on aesthetic Afro activism.
What is aesthetic activism?
It's a branch of activism that starts from an aesthetic and supposedly superficial plane. When we think about beauty, that's what comes to mind.
But you claim it's a lot more than that.
Yes, in the case of black women. The beauty canons that are set in our societies are a little bit removed from reality for all women, but they're also white canons. Prick the beauty of white women, long and smooth hair... Black women will never be within that canon.
But a lot of people tried ...
By assimilation, for a long time, we have carried out hair straightening and skin rinsing treatments, using very aggressive products, to the detriment of our health. Thus, aesthetic activism has several functions: on the one hand, it provides information and resources to people with afro hair and black skin in order to take care of that hair and that skin in its natural state. On the other hand, it shows that racism permeates the canons of beauty and continues to impose unhealthy practices on many women for our bodies.
He's used the word "out." Have other supposedly "deeper" activists accused him of this?
Yes. Some people question what I do, thinking that it does not contribute anything to the "struggle". Of course, those who say that don't have to take care of an afro hair, they don't feel that aesthetic pressure. I find it very daring to pretend to delegitimize or give legitimacy from the privilege of not being that experience. I know that what I do has a value for some, many people thank me.
Did you make the way to feminism and the fight against racism from purely beauty or vice versa?
First. I created a blog and the comments of many women started coming to me, I don't know what kind of hairstyle or I don't know what beauty product, but I was also thanked by those who told me that, driven by my blog, they started working their identity. So I said to myself. -This is not just an aesthetic issue. Beauty canons are racist, they put a lot of pressure on black bodies. Sometimes black women don't hire us for a job for our hair. If we add this to the glass ceiling we have all the women... It's clear to me that aesthetic activism is within black feminism.
As you mention black feminism... What is the relationship with white feminism? Is there a willingness to cooperate or is it sometimes conflicting?
A very important question. As a member of one of those feminisms that the hegemonic white feminism mistakenly calls peripheral, I at least -- and I'm just speaking on my behalf -- if a white feminist censor censored me for something, I do nothing to create bad environment or division. That, however, is what we are constantly being accused of. If I ask a white feminist to review her racism, I do so to encourage her to work her tightness. To realize that there are issues that do not affect her, but do affect other women and that you have to take into account. Many times, white feminism doesn't take us into account, it leaves us out.
This news was published by Hiruka and we brought it to the Basque Country thanks to the CC-By-SA license.
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