Blackfishing isn't the worst of our problems
By: Sashawne Smith
Tags: Race, Internet, Culture, Beauty, Digital Life

“Blackfishing” Isn’t the Worst of Our Problems — It’s the Desire for Racial Ambiguity We Need to Address Sashawne Smith Follow Aug 7 · 9 min read

Photo by Sunyu on Unsplash

White people no longer look white.

There I said it and I don’t think I will be the only one to say it.

In the present day, there is a gross misrepresentation of what visually passes as white. This is the result of socialized behaviours such as tanning and body modification through surgery and makeup. You might be saying to yourself, “Woah Woah Woah, race is a social construct, so how is there one way to look white?” To that, I will say, humour me and allow me to provide my own definition, which can be used as a reference point.

“Looking white” for white people in the West – let’s limit it to the UK and the US – would be an appearance that to a certain extent, rings true to a person’s genetics and environment.

Let’s say, a white middle-aged woman gets a nose job, the chances of her still appearing white after it is almost certain. However, if this woman undergoes multiple procedures – temporary and or permanent – alongside that nose job this may no longer be the case. If the woman also tans to a shade that is 6/7 times darker than her darkest summer shade, gets lip injections, and wears her hair in faux locs – the integrity of her whiteness to the observing eye falters. If you were to see her on the street you may at a glance believe her to be mixed race or even black, or in other terms, you may have been black-fished. Congrats.

Originally when the term was coined by Wanna Thompson and became a part of popular culture I engaged with it. Feeling outraged, just as my peers did, by the hoards of women online that were able to modify the way they presented themselves and cohabit black features that had been mocked for years, possibly even by themselves prior. The emergence of discussions about “digital blackface” and the recurrent cases of blackfishing opened up a wormhole that struck a nerve.

Later, I was able to take a step back and reassess this outrage, the way it was directed, and how it was responded to. The outrage that I and many others faced, and still face, is undoubtedly the lingering consequence of trauma paired with the emotional toll of unlearning required to rebuild a black woman’s self-esteem. Labour and trauma that would not exist if we did not have to grow up in a world where ubiquitous whiteness in the beauty industry made black features undesirable. Part of the conversation that I had overlooked was that when a popular voice on social media was labelled a blackfisher, their first line of defence was usually – “I am not trying to be black”, “Why would I want to be black?”, or an indignant “I’m not hurting anyone.”

As a black woman, I could make a large list detailing the impact that black women have had on popular culture despite being largely uncredited, but you’ve read those articles – I hope – and you understand that blackness has been commodified and profited from by non-black people perpetually – again, I hope. Interestingly, even if the accused was apologizing for their online black-fishing and not profusely denying it, lack of intent was always expressed:

“I am so sorry. I have educated myself on the subject but I wanted to let you know that appearing black was never my intention.”

A snarky comment might have been thrown in rebuttal such as “Well, what was your intent??”, leaving the accused scrambling for a deflection because those who partake in blackfishing refuse to admit they don’t know. Or worse, they aren’t self-aware enough to find out when asked.

For most white women there is no merit in achieving perceived blackness because they are aware of the oppression and disenfranchisement that black people face. Women that at one point, may have said “they could never date a black boy” or that black men are not “husband material”. These same heterosexual women have also watched the birth of the “light-skinned princess” – seen first hand the attention, romanticisation, and clout that mixed-race and racially ambiguous women are afforded. They have watched them be celebrated online and offline because of their multi-heritage features and skin tone. Social media pages dedicated to the worldly beauty of mixed-race women (and men) were everywhere in 2014 – 2015. Post after post with comments filled with adoration, compliments, and various combinations of water, fire, and heart-eye cat emojis. By 2018, the “influencer” had been cemented into society, creating an ideal woman for the common one to aspire to – many of which are of dual or mixed heritage.

There is a large population of white women who do not have any desire to appear black but instead harbour desires – that they fail to admit to themselves or others – of achieving racial ambiguity. This desire is born out of the insecurity that they are not enough, or not innately desirable as they are – a far cry from what they were shown and taught in childhood. It is almost to be expected considering the “white fragility” that has become the hot term of the moment. It is hard to admit for the white woman because aside from desires of ambiguity and its privileges, she also juggles pressure to adhere to a body type she doesn’t have and a commercialised standard of beauty that is as consistent as the earth is flat.

It is harder to admit because the conditioning online is indiscernible, happening over several years, and along many fronts. The desire for racial ambiguity is the product of the intersection of several opposing groups of thought. The same women who expressed fear of having a fat ass, or frizz in their hair, or frowned upon large noses and lips, now express an outward desire for mixed children, lip fillers and an “eternal San-Tropez tan”. Influenced by rampant conditioning that mixed or “light-skinned” women and children are superior because they are highly desired by straight men. Without root or cause – in their minds – they decide that they want their future children to inherit that social and cultural capital if they cannot. *cough* The Kardashians. *cough*

But I thought you said blackfishing isn’t the real problem here?

Yes, you’re right, I did say that. My reasoning being, that mixed people are not just those who have one black or one white parent, many children are born of multiple ethnicities and races. These people also have social media accounts and in some instances are praised online solely for this.

Are you trying to say it’s mixed people’s fault?

No, not at all. If anything, mixed people are at a detriment because of this – they not only have to manoeuvre the rocky terrain of “belonging” but also where they lie on the scale of white privilege – if they are willing to acknowledge it, that is.

What I am saying is the reason that colloquial language we use, such as blackfishing, becomes diluted so soon after being popularised is because people continue to stretch the parameters of its original meaning. Including the women who do not meet all the criteria of a quote-on-quote “blackfisher” in these discussions is trivial but it happens because these women actively do what they can to obtain the racial ambiguity that is a mixed person birthright. Most white women aren’t trying to be Black. Or Asian. Or any other ethnic minority but they are content with wielding the desirability of aforementioned groups without the inherent oppression. Beauty, desirability, and aesthetics are all fleeting and so their goal is to swing the pendulum to the side that is most desired at the time and capitalise on that beauty to advance their “pretty privilege”.

This gives way to the swapping out of blackfishing for other types of “fishing” that we have seen more recently. One prevalent example of this is the “fox eye trend” started on TikTok, which is a makeup hack used mainly by white women to appear more racially ambiguous via a “snatched” bone structure. This is done by adopting a beloved feature of the Asian community – upturned or slanted eyes – and detaching its cultural relevance and history. Many have participated in the trend whilst actively ignoring that it was once used as a focal point of racism against East Asian people. Some have even gone as far as silencing vocal pieces from the community which call into question the origins of the trend.

By naming the trend “fox eye”, people have been divorced from the topic of race via dehumanisation. Which not only means that the Asian community does not receive credit for the beauty of their lineage but relinquishes white responsibility to acknowledge this racism. This is quite frankly disappointing because we as a society often bypass how beauty in this day and age could be used as a gateway to repent for the past and relieve racial tension on a social level.

Beauty hacks such as the “fox eye trend”, tanning or whatever the next iteration of repackaged mainstream beauty is, are the reason why the categorization of people – especially online personalities – as white is getting harder. I have witnessed multiple accounts of white women, who indulge in Korean and Japanese culture, use the Facetune app to make themselves appear more native – usually by changing their eyes, nose, and jaw digitally, to appeal to this market and maintain desirability. This is the extreme but it emphasises my point.

These behaviours have a direct effect on the concept of white privilege and how terms like “white-passing” are used within non-white communities. Imagine this, you open your TikTok For You Page and watch a video of a conventionally attractive girl in America, who appears fair-skinned, has light eyes and dark hair. She informs you that she is Pakistani. She does so because she is commonly assumed to be white and this concerns her. Why? It is because the misrepresentation of whiteness online that has led you to this conclusion. Not because she looks like a standard white American or European but instead because white women have continued to shift what is passable as white in the beauty community over into racial ambiguity, with little to no repercussions. Consequently alienating the groups of women that are fairer-skinned but still adorn ethnic features and heritage by subjecting them to the erasure of their visual ethnicity.

Then we might ask – are people within ethnic groups who are considered “white-passing” being considered this way purely because of their fair skin and thus proximity to whiteness? Or are they being considered “white-passing” because white women are altering their features/presentation to appear more ethnic, stretching the limitations of what we believe whiteness to be? And if so, what does this say about the security of white women within their whiteness as the world begins to champion the “other? “ (Online, at least…we aren’t there yet.)

20 years ago we may not have had to make this distinction or have the stimulants to ask these questions. Not because these signs weren’t there but we did not have to open our phones and be questioned or provoked by content constantly. Naturally, the internet has a big part to play in this, as we have access to more opinions and lives than we’ve ever had in history. This is bound to produce change – perhaps this is just the byproduct of our increased communication and the blurring of cultural. borders.

One might also be questioning: Why has creating an ambiguous image become the newest standard for those who should not appear racially ambiguous naturally? What can we do to stop it? Should it be stopped? Is the current influx of POC in the media especially fair-skinned POC affecting what we as a society see as the epitome of beauty? Will this still matter in 70 years when the mixed-race population is even larger? Is this a social issue, a psychological issue, or an economic one?

Most of these have no concrete answers — or at least ones I can express, nonetheless I think that discussions around this subject need to be a lot more nuanced than the ones we are currently having. Not existing solely in keyholes, targeted towards assigning blame or demanding immediate action via emotional response as usual. Instead, I encourage you to become more critical of how anthropological trends intersect with social media influence, how this impacts what is considered desirable and how outward presentation can be manipulated to maintain or achieve maximum desirability.