The short story “Brownies”, by ZZ Packer, is the story of young Black girls that go away to camp as a part of their Brownie Troop experience. For years young girls in society have had to deal with how the media views them, and what the media says is acceptable. What the media puts out has a big impact on self-esteem, especially when girls are still trying to figure out who they are, and who they want to be. This plays an even bigger role when it comes to race, and how races are viewed. Unfortunately, the media tends to lack positive images of Black people, or my specifically, Black women. White women are often seen on TV, magazines, movies, and billboards being praised for things like their long flowing hair. Because of this, Black girls may
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This is not at all their fault being that outside forces have a bigger effect on your self-esteem than your own personal feelings do. When the girls cross paths with other troopers who more closely fit the mold of what society says you should look like, they instantly became envious. “But those images were as fleeting as cards shuffled in a deck, whereas the ten white girls behind us-- invaders, Arnetta would later call them--were instantly real and memorable, with their long, shampoo-commercial hair, straight as spaghetti from the box. This alone was reason for envy and hatred,” (Packer, 5). The girls were not actually looking at the other troopers, what they were looking at was their hair. They saw something that they so desperately wanted, in someone else’s possession, and this instantly changed almost all of their attitudes. It was almost as if they decided at that moment that they were not going to have fun on their camping trip, or that they could not have fun because these other girls were …show more content…
All they know is what they’ve been taught, and what they’ve seen in the media, and often times the media has more of an effect on what kids think. They automatically connected the other girls’ appearance to what they’ve seen on TV, “with their long, shampoo-commercial hair, straight as spaghetti from the box,” (Packer, 5). It’s also clear that they believe only White girls have long hair, “The only black girl most of us had ever seen with hair that long was Octavia,” (Packer, 5). That do not believe that someone that looks like them could have hair like that because that’s not something that they’ve seen
This is not at all their fault being that outside forces have a bigger effect on your self-esteem than your own personal feelings do. When the girls cross paths with other troopers who more closely fit the mold of what society says you should look like, they instantly became envious. “But those images were as fleeting as cards shuffled in a deck, whereas the ten white girls behind us-- invaders, Arnetta would later call them--were instantly real and memorable, with their long, shampoo-commercial hair, straight as spaghetti from the box. This alone was reason for envy and hatred,” (Packer, 5). The girls were not actually looking at the other troopers, what they were looking at was their hair. They saw something that they so desperately wanted, in someone else’s possession, and this instantly changed almost all of their attitudes. It was almost as if they decided at that moment that they were not going to have fun on their camping trip, or that they could not have fun because these other girls were …show more content…
All they know is what they’ve been taught, and what they’ve seen in the media, and often times the media has more of an effect on what kids think. They automatically connected the other girls’ appearance to what they’ve seen on TV, “with their long, shampoo-commercial hair, straight as spaghetti from the box,” (Packer, 5). It’s also clear that they believe only White girls have long hair, “The only black girl most of us had ever seen with hair that long was Octavia,” (Packer, 5). That do not believe that someone that looks like them could have hair like that because that’s not something that they’ve seen