Why The #KylieJennerChallege Is Taking It Too Far

Here’s the deal, It’s not so much that this is us, POC, thinking all white people are against us, and out to get us, because that really isn’t the case a lot of times. But we need to acknowledge the fact that yes; this challenge is blatant racism, and cultural appropriation.

The main problem we face is the fact that as little girls and boys we were made fun of for how we looked, and a big part of that was our facial features, such as being made fun of for how big our lips were. So what this challenge is doing is taking something that POC people were made fun of for constantly, and then glorifying it because a rich white girl all of a sudden made it attractive to have full lips. It’s appropriating something that many POC people were born with and mocked about, just because now it’s “fashionable”.

As a young girl, I was made fun of a lot for how big my lips were, and with terms such as “N***er lipping it”, when your lips are so big they take up the whole area of the straw, or cigarette, or bottle, etc. then yeah, it’s really hard to appreciate the full lips you were given. So to have a 17 year old white girl glorify what POC have been trying to accept for themselves in a matter of a week, is absolutely humiliating, and saddening.

Two years ago Kylie Jenner was a girl with no lips, and no style, but now she is known for appropriating black culture all the time. We let some of the things go with small comments. Such as when she was called out for her blackface stunt, wishing that she could always be this color.

Giuliana Rancic made a comment on the red carpet about Zendaya’s locs saying, “I feel like she smells like patchouli oil, or weed. Maybe weed?” Yet when Kylie Jenner does it, it’s considered a “bold and edgy” new look, yet many POC have to cut off their locs because they aren’t professional enough to attain any work.

How many more times will we look past Kylie Jenner’s cultural appropriation before we realize that this is who the younger generation looks up to, and in many cases, such as the #kyliejennerchallenge, try to imitate?

In short, if your stupid ass is willing to suction cup a mason jar to your face knowing full well that this could result in serious facial damage, instead of going to MAC or Sephora and learning how to make it appear like you have fuller lips, then natural selection is going to weed you out anyway, so maybe it’s for the best.