These days you really have to be very careful about what kind of jokes you make on social media.
One instagram page learned that the hard way. After the the_virgin_hair_boutique_cc made a very sensitive joke about the skin colour of women, Lioness stepped in and let the page admins know it wasn’t a thing to joke about.
The page which is followed by over 40 thousand people and sells different kinds of weaves and wigs to women across Namibia was quickly humbled by the rapper after the joke set her off. The page posted a meme that was a bit too much for Lioness to handle. “Valentine is for light skin girls, the rest of you should wait for black friday,” they shared on their instagram page.
After they posted the meme, Lioness called the page out for their distasteful joke. “This is absolutely revolting when the majority of your customers are dark skinned,” responded Lioness.
Soon enough the admin of the Instagram page slide into Lioness DMs telling her it was just a “joke” and a lighthearted moment. Of course Lioness wasn’t having. “I’m not the one to be played with,” she said.
And Lioness wasn’t done yet, she was ready to let her hands fly at anybody who thought the joke was funny:
After Lioness cancelled the page, they probably had a bit of backlash and apologised. Lioness categorically demanded they apologise and just not remove the joke from their status update. They apologised.
There’s a lot of things we can joke about, but colourism is not it. It is something that seperates a lot of people and it is very discriminatory. Women and men are both affected by colourism. A lighter complexion provides certain privileges for light skinned individuals and preferential treatment that would not be afforded to darker people.
Next time watch what you say on social media!
*Colourism: Is prejudice or discrimination against individuals with a dark skin tone, typically among people of the same ethnic or racial group.
