My Personal Clarity on Accountability
If you ask why accountability is relevant to alternative fashion or any niche community you’ll find value in this article so please sit and read with me for a while. I was not always the pink knight. I was not always honest. In fact, you could color my past in varying shades of misinformation and social pressure to be everything that is not who I am. I grew up as a Black kid aiming for the closest proximity to whiteness that I could attain. As a fan of alternative style, a lot of my interests did not align with what was stereotypically Black. It also meant that my circle of friends was mega white. I mean robotics, orchestra, pre-engineering courses, book clubs… I acclimated to being the only Black person in the room fast. I was someone who cherished being a token.
What hurt my youthful years the most was the self-inflicted vulnerability I felt from grasping at whiteness, being accepted as anything but Black. I ruined having a close-knit community and let my falsely cherished ideals dictate how I needed to navigate the world. I was complicit in a cesspool of self-hate.
So, what happened to that girl? Life was not a fairy tale. I did not meet a prince to rescue me from the country of outdated patriarchy. I saved myself. Yes, it took a lot to unlearn behaviors and social concepts, to function [adverb] in a new world. I did not just magic my way into an all-knowing state of being; I made mistakes, learned, and came to understand empathy and use my voice as my own. I shut down colorism, tokenism, and prejudice and realized that the way I define myself is no one else's business but my own. Alternative fashion became another chance for me to self-define my existence. I did not allow myself the whimsical ideals of perfection in aesthetics. Now I am creating a future that the past version of Jade desperately needed.
Why Accountability Matters
It is important to note that nobody is the perfect activist or voice for advocacy. For many advocates, the fight for social change is intertwined with personal feelings, history, and experiences. Unfortunately, a lot of folks in our niche community lose sight of accountability while tackling advocacy. If I acted as the know-it-all without questioning my history of a self-hating Black woman, that would make me a hypocrite. I experienced many events that led to me being more accepting and open to my Blackness. Growth and self-love do not come cheap sometimes. For a long time, I let tokenism be a driving force for my friendships and associations. I did not speak up when people were cruel or made fun of me for being Black. I let it slide. In my youth, I grew up in a space that pushed for me to just blend. It took some internal rewiring and work to get out of a mindset that allowed me to accept that harm without saying anything.
In my late twenties, I am trying to make up for my personal silence in my past. I refuse to let that silence be a marker of who I am. Alternative fashion is impressive because I've found the confidence to be loud and voice through it. I also gave myself space to accept how far I came as Black femme. I accept my personal history. I am working towards a world where marginalized people can feel comfortable being themselves. Lately, this is 100% a personal goal and idea for me to work towards. A couple of months ago, I wrote a short piece in response to a video on problematic influencers. You can find the video below and my response on Jadedisland: Pink Energy: Unfiltered Kawaii Accountability
How can we expect to enact any change if we aren't honest with how we have intentionally or unintentionally harmed another? I learned my silence allowed past friends and associates to continue being racist or homophobic longer because I did not say anything. I let them keep going with their harmful words and ideals and sat idle. Who knows how much harm they've done since then, but I think about how if I had more courage to say anything, I could have helped them be more inclusive or empathetic to others?
Accountability versus Perfectionism
If you’re like me and found that Alternative fashion gives you a voice, or encourages your own form of confidence and personal acceptance then allowing yourself to acknowledge accountability and seek it out is just as important to the style. Perfection is a strain on our society, and often we view it as a status that means we should cut away anything in the means of achieving that status. In fashion, as I learned about the benefits of imperfection both outwardly and inwardly I like that where I am now allowed me to open myself up to growth and changes. Perfectionism tends to induce ideals of toxic positivity and turning away from anything that society views as not perfect. Getting out of this mindset is just another thing I learned through a journey of imperfection, and through alternative style, it got easier to accept.
Unlearning my own problematic behaviors and pushing to be more inclusive and considerate takes work. I am not ashamed to admit that it took me time to learn. My unapologetic self-love is reflected in my personal work. I question what would happen if I had started out with the knowledge I have today and how my world would be brighter if I didn't have a slow start. For one, I've been challenging silence more because I know its harmful impact on communities and social change. It reminds me of the old phrase, "It takes one to know one." My personal experience of complacency and silence led me to witness how harmful my inactions are to those around me.
A long time ago, I wouldn't have batted an eyelash if someone critiqued or commented on my presence in a space, but now I stop and confront those ideals. Even if it's one person at a time, remaining silent in the face of hate does not make the world better. It's scary to take a stance against someone raving and red in the face, but that courage to act makes a difference. The silence was one piece of my history that I needed to address and hold myself accountable for. In the presence of anything or the absence of witnesses, silence is one action that can cause harm.
