A few hours of walking a day ain’t never a shabby way to play. We spent a couple of these hours at The Global Village where Omar ate his way through the world, sa7teen 3ala albu!

I was stunned by the realization that traditional Arab beauty is seen in the faces of few and now very far between. The plastic surgery, make-up, spider lashes, and coloured contacts are absolutely mind-boggling.

Arab women? We are stunning, why in the WORLD are so many of you running from your faces, into the arms of some Playboy stamp of Western approval? Arabs have always traditionally left this to Lebanon, where you see beauty, but replicated on the faces of every. Single. Broad. Because they have the same noses, cheekbones, lips, etc. you name it. The running joke being ‘this is this year’s model’ (as in model #, not fashion model).

But here? Man. What a disappointment.

Am I so naive to let this disappoint me?

Look. I am a fierce advocate for a woman’s right to do anything she chooses with her body. But don’t sell this kind of shit to me as some form of advancement or as liberation. Even within the constant pressure on women to look younger younger and younger still (I’m looking directly at you mfs, who have ever pursued and/or bedded women days older than your 20-something-year-old daughters; you are literally stomach turning losers), I won’t accept that we – women – are without choice to turn away from what White men are selling us as beauty.

100% White men. Sit your ass down if you don’t know the history of this; go learn and come back, because I have neither the time nor the patience to teach or entertain your ignorance. White men (and the White women benefiting) selling this to all women and men, and my God how this plays out most especially on the bodies and minds of men of colour (frothing at the grotesque bit over lighter skinned women), and women of colour (slicing their faces to finer features). Here, I am seeing this everywhere I turn and it is awful.

Arab males have a particular thing for White women, by the way. Something I take very personally. I would like to tell you that they are good women, except that’s never the case is it? These women are what we squarely know as White Trash, only with a different accent. They lead our men around by their dicks, and our men kiss their feet, grateful that these White Girls would ever look at them, so low is the Arab male’s opinion of themselves. And frankly, like begets like; in this case, it is trash begets trash, w Allah ma3ahum.

I will end on the full recognition that I am light-skinned and meet a definite beauty standard. It is also not lost on me that I have benefited from this very thing.

I. Have. Benefited. Full stop.

But my looks are never where I place my energy. They are not, nor will they ever be the thing which sustains me, or anyone in my orbit. You wouldn’t be here if this were the case, and we both know it.

Today, I am grateful for:
1. My entire family’s sense of humour. We are, as the Arabs say, very light blooded.
2. That though I have benefited from the existing beauty standard, my face has never been the thing which has kept people around, and it is most definitely the last thing which people remember about me.
3. The ability to walk without assistance. AlhamduliLah.

Comments closed.