Ayesha Curry waded into the colorism discussion on “The View” Monday and the results of her talk were less than desirable for her.
The celebrity chef and mom of three opened up on June 21 about what it was like to grow up as the daughter of a Jamaican-Chinese mother and a father who is African-American and Polish.
“Growing up in Toronto, I was Black. I’m a Black woman,” Curry explains on the daytime talk show. “I moved to the South, to North Carolina, right at the start of high school, so at 14, and there it was like … who do you choose? But I always loved every part of me.”
Toronto has a substantial population of Jamaicans. Statistics collected by the Canadian government noted that in 2001, two years before Curry moved away to Charlotte, North Carolina, it was “the fourth largest non-European ethnic group in Canada after the Chinese, East Indian, and Filipino communities.” The 2016 census showed Jamaica was among the common ancestry groups in the city, which counts Little Jamaica as one of its neighborhoods.
Once Curry and her family moved to North Carolina, however, she explained the Black community did not welcome her.
“It seemed like my own community didn’t want to, like, wrap their arms around me and embrace me,” Curry says. “And so that kind of hurt.”
The 2000 census states that the population in Charlotte was 32 percent Black, the highest non-white racial group.
“I just want my community to embrace all shades because we come in so many different shades,” the star went on. “Melanin is not one thing; it comes in so many different shades. I love my melanin.”
However, Curry’s argument was met with criticism online. Twitter users took issue with the Cooking Channel star singling out the Black community and not calling out the Chinese or Polish community for failing to embrace her. It’s not known whether there were any Chinese or Polish people to speak of in Curry’s high school or whether Curry, who identifies as Black, speaks Mandarin or Polish.
“So the disturbing part of this conversation is that they are only focusing on whether the black community is appropriately ‘welcoming.’”
“Did she really frame the extremely racially polarized social structure in NC as something that BLACK PEOPLE are responsible for? Hope to god the Polish and Chinese communities welcome her with open arms despite the unsightly Black backwash at the bottom of her racial cocktail.🙄”
“Where is Ayesha Curry’s energy for the Chinese/Polish communities? Why these lite brights ALWAYS talmbout the black community and how we ‘fail’ to embrace them? Girl sit down.”
“I’m so tired of this light skin plight. Most of the time if a b/w biracial person isn’t embraced by black ppl it’s because they act like they’re better than black ppl.”
