Beauty guru Jackie Aina
talks about the importance of diversity in the beauty industry and the progress
she has seen during her 9 years on YouTube.
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a big part of my channel
has always been
empowering women of color
jackie ina
thank you so much for
joining me on
today's video I would go to
makeup
counters and one baby
frantic oh my god
the black roots here who do
we do or
they were just like oh no
we don't have
anything for you or I
wouldn't do that
on your complexion it was
always like
being the other I always
felt like I was
an other box at the makeup
counter and
it was so annoying and so
frustrating
that I was like you know
what I'm just
gonna do this stuff myself
and then I'll
just show people how to do
on you to
apply them directly on my
eyelid
people were like oh my god
like who's
this black girl this
dark-skinned girl
like she wears color she
wears new lips
she wears all the trends
that we never
see on people that look
like us you know
maybe everyone's gonna have
a different
opinion on this but you
have to get to
where you want to be first
before you
can really shake the table
right so I
would talk about it I was
very vocal but
also very mindful I still
want to have a
relationship with brands I
still want to
grow my platform and the
day that I get
untouchable basically is
when you'll
really hear it from me
that's what I
will really like use my
platform in the
way that I really want to
you know don't
appreciate the blatant
erasure of like a
whole spectrum of people
like it doesn't
even look like they try I
believe if
you're gonna for example
critique brands
or you know talk about the
negatives I
think you should also be
uplifting black
owned businesses you know
talking about
other minority-owned
businesses you know
I'm going to be doing a
full face using
a Muslim owned beauty
brands to me it's
like I have to kind of
sandwich the
positive with the negative
because
ultimately that's the goal
is to have
more people and positions
that look like
me you know filling seats
working for
brands becoming influencers
themselves
being voices that need to
be heard
starting businesses I don't
want to call
it everything I don't feel
like I need
to be the attack dog of
every single
incident that takes place
online you
know it's also something
that a lot of
black women can relate to
because people
look to us to kind of be
like the savior
of
everything and it's like
this isn't
something that we can carry
on our backs
all the time like we need
to
collectively as a community
be able to
say look this is not okay
this is wrong with respect
to the
conversation of diversity
this is what's
so ironic about the topic
now because a
lot of people like to say
that I kind of
talk about diversity as
like a marketing
ploy and I'm like if you
only knew five
even a sixth not not that
long ago I was
the one that was being told
don't talk
about that it's too nice
it's too
specific why people can't
relate to that
lighter people can't relate
to that
Asian people can really
exciting these
are the things our brands
will tell me I
was turned down by
management companies
because they wouldn't want
to take on my
brand because they just
didn't see the
vision they didn't see the
visions like
what's this diversity thing
like you
know we're gonna be talking
about my
favorite foundation line
for women of
color last year of course
doesn't want
to talk about than just
that that's not
the only thing that my
platform is about
but the struggles of
colorism don't just
affect the black community
they affect
the line of community they
affect Asian
communities they affect
natives is
something that a lot of
people can
relate to as it relates to
makeup mind
you this is still a makeup
channel so
it's like you know even
though you don't
wear the same foundation as
me it
doesn't mean you can't
enjoy my videos
you can handle the dude
like I don't
think I'm ready for this
jelly now it
does it's crazy seeing now
the people
that look like me are
finally getting a
chance to break those glass
ceilings and
actually grow past a
certain number on
YouTube whereas five years
ago it was
not happening I think that
a lot of the
work and vocalizing that
people of color
have done on YouTube and
social media in
general like I see viral
tweets on
Twitter all the time of
people being
like this is not acceptable
from these
brands you know what these
foundation
shade ranges and just their
diversity
and their brands in general
all it takes
is one Instagram post for a
brand to
show their new launch and
God forbid it
doesn't run darker than
like you know
tan people will come for
them and brands
see that and they've
they've come to
understand like okay like
you can't we
just you know we can't let
the slide
anymore we need to make
more people
visible and I'm not even
just talking
about as it relates to
color I mean this
could also relate to having
Muslims in
your campaign you know I
love what fin C
did with having you know
women actually
in had jobs in their
campaigns seeing
someone that looks like you
is powerful
that to me is a direct
reflection of
like I'm accepted I am
beautiful I'm
worthy of being seen I
actually got
reached out by Jerrod
Blandino who at
the time was the owner of
Too Faced
mouse' best a brand he sat
me down in
the office with like ah his
team and
basically was like we have
not been
doing very good justice to
a particular
community with our
foundations and we
want you to you know expand
the borne
thusly line and like be the
face of it
and I was like wow at that
time no one
had ever done a campaign
like that you
know it really took me
aback because I
think it also reminded me
of those
earlier days in my career
of hearing
that this diversity thing
is gonna get
you nowhere and so it was
kind of like a
full-circle moment for me it's
finally
and I'm so glad that now
the
conversation has gone from
oh don't talk
about I've ever seen thing
anymore to
now like everybody's
stepping it up
s
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