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Now first off, there's nothing wrong with you liking your Paris Hilton, or your Lindsey lohan, or your Britney spears. I get it, you miss the thick TVs, the shows that aired on Disney channel and nickelodeon, the digital cameras, and thick iPhones. honestly, there's nothing wrong with that, and importantly I'm pretty sure almost everyone does.
Y2K is simply an aesthetic gen z and Millenials feel comfort in because it seems as if times were more simple and less toxic with all the things we have today. As fast as the internet runs it's not surprising we have 20 and 16-year-olds having feelings of "nostalgia".
The late '90s and early 2000s are praised so much in today's media because we realize how great our lives were before we let media ruin them. digital phones were just being made and any social media platform was used purely, due to it being so new to the world. We miss it, and it's understandable. As someone who was born in the late 2000's I honestly fear for these new kids who are growing up with social media, but that one is for another entry.
we're here to talk about the colonization of Y2K. Now you may hear this and think to yourself, the colonization? how can an aesthetic be colonized? If you're a person of color, directly speaking from the Hispanic American and African American point of view, you would know how much of a chokehold our culture has on Americans' point of view on Y2K.
A lot of these things you see your fav wearing on TikTok...was worn by our mothers and fathers. and when I say we, I mean POC parents who were teens in America during the 90s and 2000s.
The plaid flannels, the bandannas, the gold hoops, glossy lip gloss. who do you think originated these trends? These came from minorities in the u.s and they are the ones who were commonly seen wearing these things. the worst part is a lot of the things in this Y2K trend that our parents wore ended up stereotyping them as "ghetto".
the long nails, and lashes with the colorful long hair we love to wear in 2022? probably would've been called a hoochie mama if this was 02'.
we all like to laugh about the character Joi from the movie Friday, but I see Joi's aesthetic portrayed a bit normal in today's society so it's kind of crazy to me how she dressed in the movie back then was to be demonstrated as "ghetto".
Not only is a lot of our fashion trends not credited back into our communities but the "it girls" who are just white bratty girls who were stupidly rich, were ignorant toward POC as well. everything from our hair to the baggy clothes and flashy jewelry was labeled as "urban" until a Kardashian did it.
POC women were shammed for the bodies they were born with but congratulated once a white woman paid for it to be shaped like them. mocked us for having big lips but then tell us how attractive our lips our once a Kardashian gets fillers. told us curly hair and brown eyes are ugly, just for all of the Kardashians to give birth to biracial babies and for everyone to love the features brown eyes and curly hair.
Almost seems like everything we did was never good until a white person was doing it, but this is nothing new. We've seen this go on in history for a very long time. It's still exhausting and still, I cant forgive society for how they came up with a way to copy and paste fashion styles from people of color from a few decades ago and advertise them on only white people made by white businesses.
one of my favorite comparisons I like to bring up is Kim k and Nicki Minaj. Nicki got way more hate and bullying for her bodywork she got done and although Kim did as well I feel as if Nicki got lashed way more. Not only because she was a woman, but because she was a black woman and she talks about this a lot in her interviews in the early 2010s.
It seems like a topic that is not talked about enough. The Millenials don't keep up with Gen Z aesthetics so the majority of them aren't aware of these new Gen Z fashion trends.
This aesthetic doesnt automatically make your favorite white y2k influencer racist or a bad person. Nor does it mean that a white person cant dress Y2K just because of the aesthetic influences.
If you like fashion or beauty as much as I do then it's important that you learn the history of it. the right history, not the history written by a white man.
It's cool if you wanna buy your little $2 Y2K top from shein and think of Paris Hilton as a Y2K icon but also think about some of the people of color who had influences on the fashion as well.
and to my people of color who are reading this, don't think your big nose is ugly or maybe the way you do your hair is a bit ghetto or unclean looking. 10-20 years from now, or maybe sooner some big influencer will do it and then everyone will be trying to achieve it. imagine you are permanently to change something just for a fashion trend in the fall of 2022, just for it to become trendy next season.
In all, is Y2K colonized? to a degree, yes. The only thing we can do now is be aware and try to maybe reach out to more Y2K brands that are being owned by POC. Y2k is a beautiful aesthetic but it does have its problems.
(please respect all opinions in the comments)
-no bullying
-no right or wrong opinion (hint, "opinion", not fact)
-no slurs just to be safe
Comments
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THR4SHR
This is an amazing perspective and I'm so glad people are speaking on it
Y2k "icons" are typically portrayed as Britney Spears or Paris Hilton, and sure, their fashion and music were pretty iconic but nobody ever talks about the WOC that they were inspired by, like Megan good and alicia keys popularising Velour tracksuits or Tracee Ellis Rose and Naturi Naughton with camouflage pants.. hell, even bra tops and baggy pants.
These white women weren't the ones who coined all the y2k fashion trends and yet they're all we talk about, and sure, Britney may have coined *some* things but at the end of the day, y2k fashion is primarily built up off of WOC and their fashion. And nobody talks about them
ੈ✩‧₊˚ tutu
ur so right omg.
🌈🦕💖~Grace~💖🦕🌈
FACTSS
bo$$i bae
as a mexican, HEAVYYYYYY on this post.
personally, I think how cool it is how Hispanic Americans and African Americans grew up in similar communities and how our American culture sometimes connects when it comes to fashion and other things but it's still kinda sad how both communities have trouble getting along sometimes.
by Lai; ; Report
Cc<3
i agree with everything you said this was really well said
Ember Ashes
I don't even need to READ This to agree! I was trying to explain that y2k and almost all fashion trends are!
zaika
african americans have had ALOT of influence on pop culture in america, is it that hard to give credit where credit is due?
THISSS
WE BUILT AMERICA ON OUR BACKS
by 🌈🦕💖~Grace~💖🦕🌈; ; Report
yanna
i TOTALLY agree with you and ill write more later cs im in class lol
ILoveDilfs<3
I completely agree, most "trends" are colonized this day, if it started somewhere White people find a way to take it to change it, and call it "new" when it been something for entry, Or they will see something and claim it to be offensive, or doing too much like Garyu fashion. It was made accept and appreciate darker skin tones in the Asian community, sending love to people of color especial us who aren't fair skin. Yet as soon white people see it they miss using the word "blackface" and or they take it and make it something different using it as an excuse to be racist and be darker. In the community, we have a rule of never go darker than three shades of your natural skin any darker and your black facing which if any with a brain knows ASIAN PEOPLE ARN'T SUPPOSE TO BE AS LIGHT AS THEY ARE (but due to beauty stander, skin bleaching and shit sadly exist), so most already have the skin tone they need but white people are called white people for a reason...
Yes, a lot of Asian fashion has input on Y2K as well (I've seen a lot of it in the makeup) ,but I'm honestly not educated on some of their fashion trends in like the early 2000's so I didn't speak much about it. I know that people like Trisha paytas was really into that type of fashion though :/
by Lai; ; Report