by
Black Girl With Long Hair
Makeup guru Jackie Aina is among a very small number of black woman vloggers with more than 1 million subscribers on YouTube. Rarer still is that she amassed this following as a dark-skinned woman with tightly textured hair (there are persistent complaints that YouTube viewers favor lighter skinned hair and beauty gurus.) While some vloggers preserve their audiences by remaining quiet on controversial topics, Aina has opted to be vocal about issues black women face. This year she has done videos calling out the worst brands for people of color and encouraging people to buy from black-owned beauty brands. On Instagram Aina has posted about cultural appropriation, colorism and police brutality.
In the midst of this her brand has continued to grow, amassing 200,000 followers since August to cross the 1 million mark this month. But one fan’s unsolicited advice is a reminder that many still believe checking one’s identity at the door is the only way to succeed professionally.
“Jackie I love you. But you need to stop talking about race, skin colour, and WOC issues on your channel so much. You can talk about it one [sic] in a while, but not all the time like you do. Or else it will alienate and annoy white girl viewers. Nobody wants to hear about that on Youtube… we already see too much race crap on TV and the news…but Youtube is a chance to escape all that and relax. And you need to reach the white girl audience if you want to go mainstream on YouTube. I can totally see you being the “black Jackyn [sic] Hill”, but you just need to make some improvements. No more race talk, please.”
Jaclyn Hill is a white YouTube beauty vlogger with 3.8 million subscribers.
Aina responded to the comment — left under one of her videos — with a simple “No.”
She posted screenshots of the exchange to Twitter, followed by a screenshot of her 1 million viewers and a picture of herself with an expression that can only be described as “You Mad?”
— La Bronze James (@jackieaina) December 27, 2016
We appreciate Aina for exemplifying that you can excel professionally while embracing your skin and hair, and speaking on issues of justice.
43 Responses
Speaking as a white viewer of hers, I love that she speaks about these topics. It’s helping me to be more aware of what a big problem shade diversity in makeup is, as well as how privileged I am that I can reasonably expect to be able to find a foundation shade in any brand (including black beauty brands such as Black Opal and Black Up!).
AYYYYY she’s a black woman. Period, point blank.
Being a Black youtuber is hard and its important to have people like Jackie who are willing to talk about issues like race; because although youtube is a place to escape, it is also a place to realize the problems that Black youtubers face!!
https://bevseyeview.com/
Amen to Jackie. She is my go to guru. The nerve of the twitter comment about “if you wanna make it mainstream you have to stop alienating your white viewers”. Bitch pls go elsewhere if it bothers you cause from what i understand the issue has not been resolved for us to put it to bed and not talk about it. You go Jackie, i’m your #1 fan.
AYYYYYYY!!!! I didn’t know that either lol!! Naija Represent!!
AYY SHES NIGERIAN!!! Just realised after following her on twitter omg!! And yes, good on her for that clapback!
I love her! Her tutorials are incredible, she has a great sense of humor plus she doesn’t take any BS when it comes to issues of race and under representation.
Why would she or anyone else of color need to be the black version of someone white?
“And you need to reach the white girl audience to go mainstream on YouTube.”
“Mainstream” seems code for “acknowledged positively by white people.” She doesn’t need to reach out to anyone. If they want to watch they can but she has her own audience.
Great. What an audacity.
Been watching her videos since she was lilpumpkinpie.
lmao best response !! Her and Wayne Goss are the only MUA I follow on YT, always creative, professionnal, funny and grounded! And if you look at her comments section you see WW understanding what’s she’s saying and supporting her, so I don’t see where he came from..
I’m a white woman that has followed her on Youtube for the last year. The woman is intelligent and beautiful. I love hearing what she has to say about makeup; I’ve learned a trick or two and she has put me on to several great makeup products & companies. I watched her video “The Worst Beauty Brands EVER For POC!” and found it insightful. She’s 100% right!!! As she notes in the video, I, being a woman of “ivory” toned skin, have never had to worry about makeup brands being far from inclusive in their color range. There is almost always something light enough. But, it seems that is far from true for WOC. Not only is that unfair but it’s bad business. She opened my eyes. As Avi noted below, “please show your white viewers more blackness. Cuz it’s pretty clear we white people don’t have a damn clue.” I hope she keeps speaking up. I think these companies need to keep hearing it! (This is true about a lot of things, not just makeup) I plan to stay subscribed and tuning in!
LOOOVVVEEE!!
How can you tell someone what they need to talk about on their YouTube channel, especially if the advice was unsolicited? If you don’t like what someone is talking about then unsubscribe! Point blank and simple
Ok new favorite person! Black women need a voice too. I’m tired of always being told to basically shut up and take what we get. Black women are gorgeous and we are changing the game! Folks stare at us cause they can’t get enough! She is beautiful and she is being herself! Movies and media always want to portray us as sad, ugly, unhappy, angry, either oversexed or undersecretary, people that can’t get wonderful loving relationships and that are pregnant and living in the ghetto and dancing around for attention.
That’s another reason I like Beyoncé, cause her music motives and basically says you can get what you need and be successful and beautiful while doing it. I once had a guy tell me she was a bad roll model for women cause she portrayed women in a sexual manner that was not Christian do to how she lead men to sin cause of lust on the eyes! I listened to his argument and politely dismissed it. Why should a woman have to tone down her shine to make someone else feel comfortable. Especially when a woman can cover herself head to to except her eyes and some man will still have something to say about how her eyes are to sultry or tempting.
I’m glad she being herself! Love her attitude and her style!
You my lady friend are no longer Black male identified. Your next step is to become a feminist, haha.
Love her. Perfect response. While I don’t always agree on her take on race relations, I 100% appreciate her talking about them.
I’ve never watched her in you tube but may now start just because she is staying true to herself!
Yes please please show your white viewers more blackness. Cuz it’s pretty clear we white people don’t have a damn clue. We need to see more blackness. We need to be deprogrammed.
Love, a white woman.
I love her reply. Hahahaha. Seriously though how can someone even fix their mouths to tell anybody to NOT alienate white women or people! Please. She need to take a seat at the table! Girl bye!
a bitch ass house negro, that’s who, if you didn’t notice it was a black male…………..can’t hang with them types.
I think you’re confused by who wrote the message.
Jaclyn Hill, the one who wrote the message is a white woman.
It was a Black man named Abraham.
The comment seems to be from someone named Abraham he just mentioned Jaclyn
The person who wrote the message referred to Jaclyn Hill i.e “you could be the next Jaclyn Hill if you would just…”
Jaclyn did not write the message.
KEEP IT BLACK MY SISTA
LOVE YA”
How can you tell someone to disregard their race and people alike, AND tell her to become a knock-off, White YouTube? I’m confused.
Is he serious! I just can’t. I don’t watch a lot of YouTube but I’ve been subscribed to Jackie for several years. I enjoy watching her and I love that she is outspoken. We need MORE vloggers like her.
What I think is more frustrating and people are not acknowledging is that this message seemed to be posted by a black male (or at least a non-white male) like seriously? we now live in a society where non-whites are constantly uprooting white individuals who don’t even need uplifting since the whole entire system caters to them already!!!
I’m really just hoping that non-white individual was just a white troll who was disguising him/herself as being black…
He told “Us” this about him..
He comes from a family( he was taught) to suppress his blackness to make other people( white people) feel comfortable. Sadly, there’s tons of black people out there like him.
He black but he Bi-Racial got a white parent so they over look race issues no matter the truth presented, that’s why I can’t rock with them types. They try to play the black brother with me but when it comes to race and standing up for our people, they stay on that massa ish.
He’s biracial. Mixed people are always like this when it comes to black struggles. they stay playing both sides, switching sides and then when actual black issues come up, they run. SMH
I love Jackie! It amazes me how people want people of color to share their emotions and points of view when it comes to things. Some of these beauty brands have been around for decades yet their shades range from marshmallow to snow caps smh.
http://www.urbanprestigeclothing.com
It’s astonishing how people think they have to rights to tell someone how to conduct their business/life. Speak for yourself and mind your manners.
IDU how someone go onto someone elses blog and tries to tell them what to do? Like… who are you?
That’s what the world does to Black women. Everyone and their cousins in law believes they have a say.
Which is why I follow and support her
I love it! Go Jackie! I love her channel and she can talk about whatever she wants. Its her platform.
I have to say that tone he took to tell her to stop addressing racial issues was as if he was her boss. What right does he give himself to tell her how to manage HER own youtube channel? There are limits to people-pleasing, if he wants to close his eyes to these issues then he should unsubscribe and move on…she won’t miss him.
Awww so little white girls will get mad when we talk about issues that we face and how our skin colour effects most things we do everyday. You can start complaining when our skin colour doesn’t effect our lives everyday because we don’t get to choose whether or not we want people to judge us with skin colour in mind. Go listen to Taylor Swift or watch Nikki Tuts you ignorant fuck.There’s heaps of white yts out there. Jackie keep doing your thang gurl!!
yasss
We will see what the future holds for this beauty diva!
http://www.lilyseymour.com