Who was Sara Baartman?
Now, that is a name every black girl/woman should know! Sara ‘Saartjie’ Baartman was a South African slave/servant girl that was carted away to England in the early 1800s to be shown as an exotic bird from the ‘Dark Continent’. Her dark skin and ‘unusual sized’ buttocks became a source of wonder and fascination for the Europeans who had never seen a naked black woman up front. The “Hottentot Venus”, as she was named, was kept in a cage and dressed up to look like a ‘savage’ with just a covering over her genitalia due to her insistence to cover that area. She was also made to prance, growl like an animal and shake her romp for the viewing pleasure of the paying London public.
Long and short of the story- she was a huge sensation, made a lot of money her “guardians” and even started a fashion trend among the European women. Below on the left is a drawing of how The Hottentot Venus was paraded on stage. People were fascinated by her bum and for an extra fee were allowed to touch it to see that it was real. The picture on the right is that of the fashion trend her bum began. In the late 1800s, after her death, the addition of back cushions underneath the clothes of the female gentry became the rave. Suddenly large rear ends became desirably by the very same people who thought a woman with a big behind was less than human!
For Sara, it didn't end so well. When the Europeans got tired of her, she was tossed out of ‘polite society’ leaving the abandoned former ‘freak show attraction’ to dull her pain with alcohol and support herself through prostitution. She died at 25 from an unknown disease.
The kicker, however, was the fact that her body was claimed by a scientist who made a caste of her body, pickled her brain and genitalia and put them on display at a science exhibition center in France. His findings, from his dissection of the remains of Sara, were that the “species” from which the Hottentot Venus originated were less than human. This erroneous deduction further gave credence to Colonialism and the belief that the Caucasoid race was by far superior to the Negroid race.
Sigh...Now before you hiss and start yapping about how I am all about race, please just hear me out. Yes- in ignorance or even malice and greed, a lot of wrongs have been done to the black race and that's horrible. It was the past and we cannot do anything about it. What we CAN do is to never forget where we are coming from. As a Christian, I am a strong believer that one of the reasons why the Bible begins with a history lesson is because God expects us to learn from the mistakes of those that have gone before us. Apparently, God does not necessarily agree with the saying, “experience is the best teacher”.
History, they say, keeps repeating itself and nothing really is new under the sun. Even now, we still our sisters displaying their wares and the “badest bitch in the block” is the one with the biggest romp. Our bodies, just like it was for Sara, are still objects of fascination, fetishism and commercialism. Oh, and there are some willing to pay extra to have a clever surgeon specially craft their bodies to look like slimmer versions of the Hottentot Venus.
K-Michelle from Love and Hip-Hop, Atlanta. Hip-Hop Queen, Nicki Minaj Amber Rose, Hip-Hop Personality
But asides, the entire circus that surrounds the Black woman’s rear end, there was another sinister phenomenon that reared its head and slipped into the way she began to view herself. A couple of friends and I were arguing the other day about the origin of the negativity that surrounds the concept of beauty for Black women worldwide and some of the things the ladies said made sense. They opined that in the old days back in Africa, our foremothers felt glorious about themselves and likewise the men folk worshipped our bodies. But somewhere along the line, something slipped in and changed the way we began to perceive ourselves.
We traced this back to slavery days especially when ‘strangely colored children’ started running around the plantations- obvious results of the Slave masters paying unwanted nightly visits to the female slave quarters.
It only then made sense that been forced to constantly see the fruits of their husband’s infidelities, the wives of these Slave Masters had to find ways to discourage the husbands from visiting these women who they felt were stealing their husbands from them. Ignoring the fact that these slave women were being raped by these same Slave Master husbands, they chose to punish these unfortunate slave women by launching several campaigns to distort the way society (and eventually the slave women themselves) viewed them- ugly, devious, ‘Jezebels’, dirty and worthless whores.
It only then made sense that been forced to constantly see the fruits of their husband’s infidelities, the wives of these Slave Masters had to find ways to discourage the husbands from visiting these women who they felt were stealing their husbands from them. Ignoring the fact that these slave women were being raped by these same Slave Master husbands, they chose to punish these unfortunate slave women by launching several campaigns to distort the way society (and eventually the slave women themselves) viewed them- ugly, devious, ‘Jezebels’, dirty and worthless whores.
It is also interesting how till today, compared to any other race, women of Africa descent still have that worldview about themselves. There is a conditioning going on of the mind of the Black girl/child from the time she is born. For instance, the day that skinny, long-legged, blonde-haired, blue-eyed Barbie doll is placed into her arms, her idea of beauty is instantly distorted. From that time onward to the black girl, the epitome of what a woman should look like is that smiling toy. Hence the need to change our hair texture, bleach our skin, straighten our noses, going on stupid diets or have that coveted skinny body ideal so that we can feel like we belong in the human race. It may all sound ridiculous, especially to someone who is not Black but I know you know exactly what I mean.
Call me a conspiracy theorist and all but at the end of the day, I believe the Devil is the snake behind all this. I have no idea why he hates Black people so much (especially women) but throughout history, he has used women of other races to fight against them especially through mental warfare. In their ignorance, they have also yielded themselves to be his tools. However, I am a firm believer of the prayer Jesus said on the cross,
“Forgive them, Father. For they know not what they do”.
As a Believer/ Christian, I also believe that the real culprit behind the scenes is the Devil. Yes, humans get to choose to hate or love but he is the entity inspiring people to go with the ‘hate’ option. As Nelson Mandela said, hate is something that is learned. Human beings are born loving creatures; it is not a natural state of people to just look at someone and just hate them- something else is instigating that emotion. Therefore, as Christians, we might need to attack it from that angle- the perspective of the spiritual.
Like I said earlier, we can't do anything about the past but we can do something about the present and the future. I, for one, have decided to stop playing the blame/hate game. I have taken it upon myself to make necessary changes to myself because the truth of the matter is you can't give what you don't have. I can't give my 2 daughters a sense of worth if I don't posses one, right?!
So for instance, I have taken it upon myself to begin to love myself. I have chosen to believe that God did not make a mistake making me Black because there is absolutely NOTHING wrong with being Black! I have decided to love my hair, boobs, sumptuous arms, curves, thighs, butt and my skin. I have taken to organizing photo sessions of myself every Sunday after church to just marvel at God's handiwork afterwards! As far as I am concerned, God was showing off when He made me!
And that's one of the reasons I decided to write this. Not only shed some light on historical lessons but to also let women of color know that we can choose to learn from the past and ensure that we and the girl/women coming behind us no longer fall victim of these recurrent self-loathing issues any longer. We can choose to open our mouths and speak words of affirmation to our daughters, mothers, nieces, sisters and friends.
We must kill anything/thought/idea/propaganda/remark that suggests that we are substandard to any other person because of how God made us. If God is for me/you, who can be against us?! We need to get to that place of peaceful understanding that God loves us individually. For instance, get in the habit of saying the following words every morning you wake up:
“God loves me!
God is for me!
I am the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus
He will never leave me nor forsake me!”
Keep saying it till you start to believe it because faith comes by hearing the spoken out loud words from your mouth that originate from the Word of God (my paraphrase of Rom 10:17)
So, sisters, let's not let Sara and all those other women of color die in vain. We should honor the Lord and their memories by ensuring that that pattern of self-loathing will not continue with us. It stops here! We now know who the real enemy is and we refuse to let him have his way with us or our children and future generations any longer.
No more dropping it like its “Hott”!!!
http://www.sahistory.org.za/people/sara-saartjie-baartman
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/14/books/review/Elkins.t.html?_r=1&
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-7bKi5MFWI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gj4x-6UMg9M
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Baartman
