Member-only story
Pink is Not the Villain
My beef with the diet-red color
What is the very first thing you think about when you think of the color pink? A certain indigestion product, a pop star, or a song perhaps? Since I can remember, the color pink represents a girl, a female, the feminine. Since birth, they put you in a box. Even before that- you are blue for boys or pink for girls at the baby shower.
Societal norms say that I should love pink because I am a girl. But I don’t. It was torturous every time they forced me to put on a pretty pink dress or a pink bow in my hair. I had an adverse reaction every time an article of clothing with that color came anywhere near me. There is nothing particularly off-putting about the color pink. It is like when you get food poisoning and can’t even look at that dish ever again. That is how I felt about pink. It is just a color… just a symbol for the box they would trap me in.
I never wanted to be in that box. So I crowded my closet with dark colors like grey or black. I thought they would be the least like pink. Maybe if you don’t see that color on me, you won’t see me as just a girl. Maybe you see, I can be more than just pretty and soft and vulnerable. I am not your damsel in distress. I am not your property to do with what you want.
