YOUR SAY: Please, don’t buy my daughter a Barbie doll

My daughter is turning one at the end of this month, and even if this sounds “un-African”, I would like to state that I will not accept Barbie dolls as gifts on her birthday.

I have nothing against Barbie dolls per se, I just have a problem with the things Barbie will tell my daughter about her looks.

Perhaps the following tale about my daughter’s first days on earth will make this a little easier to digest. She was hardly two days old when a visitor remarked:

“She is such a beauty…I hope she remains light-skinned.”

I was too tired from 12 hours of labour to respond sufficiently to this statement, but I have had a year of recovery, and I would like to break down all the things that were wrong with this warped comment, if only for the sake of my daughter’s self-esteem, especially now that I am fully aware that “untinted” women like Verah Sidika are teenage girls’ idols.

During my pregnancy, my only prayer was to have a healthy baby. Having watched my mother struggle to care for my older sister who was sickly, and who later died from sickle-cell anaemia related complications, I spent many nights fervently praying for a healthy child.

My wish was granted. Her cry was fiery. She seemed terribly displeased at her entry into the world, and with good reason, I came to find out two days later.

As I held her in my arms, I marvelled at my small beautiful miracle. I have not stopped marvelling ever since.

TEMPORARILY STUNNED

But a comment from one of my visitors in hospital temporarily stunned me and led me to the conclusion that we black people, are our own worst enemies.

Here is how I should have responded to my hospital visitor:

“That is the least of my concerns. Why not comment on her good health, her delightful dimples, and her glorious full head of hair? Would you have preferred that I hand her back to the nurses had she turned out to be dark-skinned?”

I should have stared hard at the visitor and asked her never to repeat that statement in front of my child ever again.

As my daughter turns one this weekend, I will clarify to each invited guest that I will not accept white dolls as presents for her. What will the white dolls tell her about her own looks? That she has to be blonde, blue-eyed and button-nosed to be pretty, for sure.

I would like her to grow up with the assurance that there is nothing wrong with her skin colour, even though the world might see it differently. If my guests cannot find black dolls that look like her, then I will suggest they buy her books, or trucks, or pretty dresses, items that will delight her but not set her on the path of questioning her skin colour and aspiring to “untint”.

I believe the term, black beauty is limiting. Why can’t we simply call dark-skinned people beautiful? Calling someone black beauty is like saying, “She is beautiful for a black person.”

People, Lupita was named the world’s most beautiful woman, not the world’s most beautiful black woman