"I’ve never been looking for white people to apologize for being white. I’m looking for white people to dismantle the system of White Supremacy that builds them up on the backs of people of color. And dark-skinned black people aren’t looking for us to apologize for having light skin, they are looking for us to help dismantle the system that places us above darker-skinned black people in society.
The same system that holds us above and separate from our darker-skinned brothers and sisters is the same system that holds whiteness above and separate from us. And we are a part of this system the moment that we benefit from it. And we do benefit. As a light-skinned black woman, I’m viewed as more desirable, more intelligent, less threatening. I’m treated better by bosses, I have better odds in job interviews. People don’t cross the street when they encounter me on the sidewalk. Yes, there is a large price to pay for all of that—I am fetishized by many in the white community and ostracized by many in the black community—but when placed on a scale, I benefit...
The fact that I can choose to embrace my blackness, or choose to say that I “don’t see color” and float around in some vaguely brown middle-ground is a privilege that many other black people will never know."
http://www.theestablishment.co/2016/03/03/nina-simone-zoe-saldana-and-light-skinned-fragility/
This is very true of my life and I do well to remember it.
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