First of all, I respect your point of view as a person of color and I’m saddened if anyone is offended by these “influencers”. (I would say they influence each other more than they do society in general.) I will assume that as a thoughtful person, you would agree that the use of skin lighteners and straightening processes by people born with what I think is absolutely beautiful hair is equivalent? Or not, you can disagree, as you are in a different position than I am. I feel that in this day and age, blackface is commonly agreed to be denigrating or insulting. White men and women have been darkening their skin as long as I can remember, with the sun and with products that darken it. As far as I recall, I have been seeing beauty shops aimed at (and operated by) black women offering numerous treatments to change their hair and skin. While I wouldn’t do it, as someone born with red hair and freckles, the sun is not my friend, it’s nearly universal to want a tan. Although I am white, I lived with a black family for several months, and as a musician, I’ve known and worked with many Blacks as well. (In fact right now, one of my best friends… oh, never mind!) Cultural adoption has never been the main challenge for any of them.
The question becomes, what exactly are the nefarious effects of this on society?
I would have to conclude that it is like everything else in society: social media is an amplifier and an echo chamber. The feedback effect is only now becoming more obvious to the average person, and hopefully the entire concept will evolve someday. While I regret to agree that the idea that we are a post racial society is far from a reality, much of society had made effective progress. Movies and television are chock full of brilliant black actors (and directors, for that matter) that we’d never have seen when I was growing up. No doubt the talent and evident beauty of many influences white people more than anything on Insta.
In the meantime, I am of the opinion stated and supported in my own writing: Cultural Adoption is not Appropriation.
