By Maria Padhila
Pretty much if you’ve ever had a pulse at some point in the past hundred years, you’re going to end up with a picture of your boobs on the Internets at some point in your life. Which is why I was not so shocked to see “vintage nude photos” of artist Frida Kahlo online.
Not shocked, no, but certainly WTF. Despite the “vintage” bikini area, which could not have been the artist’s body. There were other sorts of things that were all wrong about it, as well.
(For those who don’t know much about Kahlo: check out her art on Google, first, but also know that she did not have traditional monogamous relationships by a long shot — she was bisexual and she and her husband had lovers during their on-and-off marriage.]
The wrong part was also noted in a fine blog post on Black Girl Dangerous by Mia McKenzie that gives the background and the story as well. So I posted that blog post to my social network, and got a couple likes and a doofy-ass comment from a white guy about how everyone else was a racist except him.
I just spent about 15 minutes looking for that comment, but it was to the effect that the blogger herself is guilty of racism because she assumes “all white men are racists” and “all men have abused women.”
Oh, the weariness. I just felt this 30-year-old déjà vu — do people really still say things like that? I wonder it every time. I’m naïve.