Masculinization of Black Women

As a black woman, I have had my fair share of experiences of masculinization. But what is it that makes black women appear less feminine in comparison to other races?

All women have such high beauty standards, but it’s much easier for black women to fall behind them. Black women easily get degraded for using protective styles like braids or wigs. Fine! But for the black women who wear their tight curls with shorter hair, there isn’t a difference. Our short hair just isn’t appealing to many and often causes masculinization. Texturism is so prevalent throughout our community that it’s hard for us to feel comfortable with our natural hair if we don’t have the length or looser curl pattern for it; perm-focused companies are thriving because they gain their wealth from our insecurities. Many black women are terrified of cutting their hair off simply because they equate length to their feminity.

Colorism is another problem within the community. As a light-skin, I’ve never dealt with colorism firsthand, so this isn’t my personal experience, although it doesn’t take being in a first-person perspective to see how dark-skin women are treated in the media by people and even other dark-skin men, even going as far to being compared to animals? It’s one thing when other races criticize black women, but for it to be internalized is disgusting. You don’t know what your words could do to someone until you scroll through your TikTok feed and see dark-skin women bleaching their skins. Skin bleaching for cosmetic reasons shouldn’t exist; it’s a shame what products people would make for money.

Black women often tone police themself simply to avoid fitting the “angry black women” stereotype. Someone has to restrict themself from expressing their anger because they’re afraid of being masculinized. Black women don’t even have to yell to be deemed as a threat, getting told to remain calm when they already are?

It is embarrassing how masculized black women are and how many have faced their own experiences so young. I’ve faced it more presently with boys much younger than me; it’s gross how access to the media so early poisons minds and teaches young boys to dehumanize black women. Young kids should be using managed screen time so that when they’re online on their own, they don’t spend time ruining their digital footprint with cyberbullying as a tween. Hopefully, one day it will change, but it’s only gone downhill from what I’ve seen.