Beauty is in the eye of the coloniser.

And 500 subscribers???

In the early 19th century, Sarah Baartman, a south African woman was taken to Europe by the white men to be displayed in “freak shows.” She was made to perform various degrading actions, and all legal efforts to challenge her exploitation failed. Then she was taken to France, she was handed to Georges Cuvier, a French scientist that studied her body in ways that was deeply dehumanising.

Why did all this happen? Because she had big bumbum. Sarah experienced racism, misogyny, and colonial exploitation because she had big bumbum, but today, after the “kardashian wave,” only big bumbum matters tomorrow.

Hello, my wonderful newsletter audience. If you’re new here, hi. My name is Najwa, and I write whatever goes on in my head, fictional or not. Do well to subscribe to my newsletter, so you’ll get notified when I send out the next one!

If you’re a returning subscriber, no hi for you today.

I don’t know who first said beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but I have a feeling that “the beholder” in question was wearing a powdered wig and drafting colonial policies.

Sarah Baartman was ridiculed for her body in the 19th century, but today, those same features are praised—on the right people. The same society that mocked and dehumanized her now spends billions on surgery, fillers, and squat challenges to achieve the aesthetic. It’s funny, in a way.

The day I heard that people were buying whitening creams to use on their children’s skins to make them lighter, I screamed.

I opened Tiktok this morning, and the first video I saw was a beautiful black girl talking about her ‘“clean girl aesthetic” and how it included shaving her nose hair. I had to drop my phone and hit the Frank Ocean post (tiktok brainrot language) and re-evaluate my values for a moment. WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU’RE SHAVING YOUR NOSE HAIR FOR CLEAN GIRL AESTHETIC? How do you even shave your nose hair?

And then she proceeded to talk about how her husband, Connor, enjoys it blah blah blah. Mehn.

IT GETS TO A POINT!

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I could go on and on about this, but i’m still fighting for my lifee. But that aside, guess who has 500 subscribers? This girl! I’m saying a big, fat thank you to all 500 of you. When I have plenty money, I’ll buy biscuit for all of you.

This is day 10 of my 12 days of newsletters challenge. Thank you for reading my newsletter to the end, I luh you!