Black Latino/Latina Isn't A Dirty Word

Actress Zoe Saldana repping for Voto Latino back in 2004.Clutch Magazine posted an article recently entitled "Is She Even Black?" in reference to black Latina actresses, models and status climbers like Zoe Saldana, Amber Rose and Sessilee Lopez. I've often heard black people gripe about Saldana in particular (also Rosario Dawson), accusing her of passing or claiming mixed heritage or whatever magical thing people think "Latina" means other than being a descriptor for being from a place in the Americas where people speak Spanish.

More after the jump.

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Week in Pictures IV: Kimora Rolls Out for JC Penney, Rosario and Terrence Get Tispy In Italy

Also this week, Kimora Lee Simmons held a launch for her Fabulosity line at JC Penney. Classy. She was there with her family, including her beaux Djimon Housou and her adorable little girls. Gabrielle Union (I swear, she's everywhere) poses for pics along with the likes of this Mashonda person who is listed as a "singer" but is wearing some impressive shoes.

I've about had it with Kimora and these tight, satin dresses. Homegirl. They are not flattering. Please. Make a move to something, anything else.

And finally some pictures from the Ischia Global Film and Music Festival in Ischia, Italy July 17. On hand were Senor Tre Cool, Terrence Howard and my #1 girl crush Rosario Dawson. As usually, Rosario looked like she put the least amount of effort in her look and Terrence didn't look like he was worth a damn thing, looking all beautiful and weird. Side note: Rosario's boobs look strangely huger that usual. I'm not one of those is she/isn't she pregnant people, but she look like she's at least gained three or four more pounds in her bra.

Week In Pictures I: The Good Naomi and Chris Brown Please Put Your Shirt Back On

This is the Naomi Campbell I like to see. The non-violent, sober, lovely, baby cuddling Naomi Campbell, all smiles as she participates in the Africa Rising music, fashion and arts festival earlier this month. These pictures taken of the festival from July 11 - 13 show black folks at their best. While Naomi and fellow ridiculously beautiful person Tyson Beckford star in the movie of my head called "Two extremely attractive black people make cute faces at adorable Nigerian babies," hip hop/R&B stars from the states rock the crowd.

While Rihanna is Rihanna and Jay-Z is Joe Camel, it is Chris Brown and his sudden need to take his shirt off all the time that's concerning me the most. Put it on, Chris. Put it back on.

Here are the best pics from Africa Rising.

Sigh. Enough beautiful baby cuddling with two of the world's most photogenic people (seriously, they are unnaturally beautiful people and they're like BFFs too. It's too much. Does Tyson hand Naomi the jar of Vaseline she uses to grease her face up before beating some fool down? Does he say, "No, not the new iPhone, girl. Use the Nokia!")

Time for the show and where there is show there is Camel Joe. Rock it.

"Nigeria! Throw up your dynasty signs!"

Usher was also on hand to be Usher. Sweaty. Hardworking. Trying so hard to be sexy, yet still doing nothing for me, Usher. I can get more out of a completely clothed Tyson Beckford with a baby.

I realize that Chris Brown is trying to compete in the Usher Raymond Era (which is the Post-R. Kelly Era. At this point, I think Kells is trying to keep up with Usher rather than the other way around. Did Usher really need Kells on "Same Girl" that bootleg, awful recreation of "The Girl Is Mine?" I think not.) So because the competition from the other shirtless wonders is so hot Chris has to hit the gym and get his 12-year-old boy frame into killer shape. And he can cover that frame in as many tats as he wants, wear as many red stocking caps and make as many hard rock stances. Nothing coming out of his baby mouth sounds hardcore. And I love his duet with Jordin Sparks, "No Air," and that's about as far from hood as you can get with a ballad. Basically, I'm tired of the foolishness, Chris. Everyone can't be Usher Raymond IV. Put your damn shirt on and be Chris Brown.

Quit playing.

Really.

Put that shit away. It's like looking at a "sexy" fetus. It's all kinds of wrong.

Side note: And in case you were worried they'd been kidnapped. Nick and Mariah and Mickey Mouse. Yes. WTF. WTF, indeed. Between this and their trip to Six Flags with the cupcakes I'm THIS CLOSE to guessing their next photo op will be in Branson, Mo. cavorting in Silver Dollar City before hitting up Fantastic Caverns in the Ozarks.

Please. STOP. PLAYING! (Picture from Blog Envy Is the New Black)

Profiles In Sexy: Meagan Good and Henry Simmons

Goodness! It has been too long since I profiled some individuals off my Great Wall of Sexy but here are two people who are so sexy they become obscene.

Great Wall of Sexy alums actors Meagan Good ("It's Good to Be Sexy") and Henry Simmons ("Break Up Sexy") were first round inductees despite their lack of media coverage.

Of Simmons, I wrote:

You know if you broke up with him you'd still have sex with him if he called you out of the blue and was like, "Hey, I was out drinking but I'm too drunk to drive home and I didn't want to wake you or anything but I had no one else to call for a ride." You know he's just saying that to get you to have sex with him one more 'gain, but you are totally getting out of bed to see how quickly you can wipe the drool off our mouth and get your contacts in.

Of Meagan I've written nothing, but that's not because I don't find her sexy. She's like a black Jessica Rabbit. She's incredibly sexy, it's just the Wall is still a work in progress.

I was going to do another "Sexy Versus Sexy" featuring them but that was pointless with these two. Both veer into pornography territory (especially Good) depending on how they're photographed.

I can still remember watching Good in "Eve's Bayou" and thinking she was such a promising young actress. I still think she has that potential, but a boob job will elevate a beautiful girl to black Barbie doll, sexpot status. And she's there.

There's a particular vulgarity in Good's style. It's a good vulgarity. Like the kind that will guarantee that she'll get some kind of work in Hollywood for a long time. But she's almost too hot to play any of the usual roles black women get in film and television. Like best friend of the white woman. Victim. Asexual harridan. And court judge. She's not believable in any of those roles.

If I ran Hollywood I'd put her and Wall of Sexy alum Jill Marie Jones (or alum Zoe Saldana or alum Rosario Dawson) in a film where they played highly intelligent, but sexy, running and gunning hustlers/con artists who seduce and destroy their way across America. The climax would take place in Vegas where they attempt to pull off the ultimate sexy Poker faced robbery/payday. And sure, we know I'd be able to sell a surprising number of tickets to that, but I know it would take convincing of the Hollywood brass that people would show up to watch a well-written and directed action/adventure starring extremely sexy black women who are playing characters who the smartest in the room.

But I know the MEN would show up. (And lesbians.) And I know black women who would enjoy seeing some fierce sisters who were the smartest ladies in the room. And we could put Henry Simmons, Idris Elba (as an obscenely wealthy British business man) and Terrence Howard (as the law man on their trail) as love interests. And the WOMEN (and gays) would totally show up to see that. I know I'd personally stand in line in the rain. So seriously, Hollywood. Green light my film.

We could call it "Gorgeous Black People Who Are Smarter, Sexier and More Interesting Than Everyone Else Win At the End of the Movie." Or "Games People Play," the title of my favorite song by The Alan Parsons Project.

As for Simmons, he is "scoop you up with a spoon and lick it" sexy. He just looks like he taste like mint chocolate chip ice cream. He muscular and ripped and almost as porny as Good. Would the film in the cameras melt if they were ever in a film together making the "me so sexy" face? Would their abs have a contest over who's abs were hotter? Who would seduce who and which would have the hotter love scene? These are things I need to know.

Simmons manages to stay in employed through theater, television and his abs. The last time I saw him he was laying his smoldering hotness on Sophina Brown (also on the Wall of Sexy) on "Shark." But just like Good trolling around in hip hop films with her heaving bosoms, Simmons' skill is rather wasted playing the heavy. What's the point in being that hot and you never get to star in anything?

Taye Diggs, who I absolutely cannot stand and do not find attractive for whatever reason, continually gets to star in TV shows. I don't know why Diggs is more special than Simmons or any of the other hot black men on my Great Wall of Sexy. Why is he forced upon me as the definition of sexy? I often feel like he's being crammed down my throat like Halle Berry has been crammed down my throat before. There are other hot black marginal actors (Allen Payne and Hill Harper to name two). Let someone else slow burn up the screen.

Everybody Likes to Shine Like Diamonds

It's Cartier's Love Charity Bracelet product launch. Or as I would call it, dressin' up for jewelry which happened last Thursday.

That's my kind of party. Someone drapes you in diamonds and you floss for a bit before sitting down for an extremely expensive chicken dinner. And that's my girl, Rosario Dawson, in the spotlight, being Rosario. She's always just the right mix of downtown and uptown. I have a total girl crush on her and the unbelievably scrawny Angelina Jolie as I like my womens crazy with a capital "C." And they're about neck n' neck, mostly because they play a nice mix of sexpots and weirdos on screen. Or a weird sexpot. Like Dawson in "Sin City."

Jolie's the better actress, but Rosario sexier (mostly because she's willing to be a size 4-6 over a size 0-2.)

Eat something, Angie. Sweet Jesus, eat!

Rosario and actress Bridget Moynahan

And here's Kimora Lee rocking a very satin and silky black dress. I'm not feeling it for all sorts of reasons. Like how it's unflattering and accentuates her paunch. And no woman wants to draw attention to that. Thankfully, my Florissant, Mo. homie brought the always delicious Djimon Hounsou with her.

Every thing's better with Hounsou.

Wow. Someone went for intrigue with the eyebrows and got crazy tweezer/waxin' happy on Ashanti. Draped in Cartier she looked a tad ordinary in that tight, stretchy white dress with lace work, making her look like she was holding her breath to keep everything in place.

And I hate the shoes. It's probably just a flower, but it looks like black, fuzzy pompoms from here.

And then JD showed up looking horrible, per usual.

Hideous.

And where JD goeth, so doth Janet, Miss Jackson if your nasty. She's once again wearing all black and she's nixed a dress for a pair of the world's largest pair of black pants. I totally hate her hair color because it does not work at all with her skin tone. There's too much red in it and it's too light. Other than that, she still looks girlishly adorable.

Nicole Richie. Still too thin, resembling a dormouse. Or a desert fox. Or a kangaroo rat. I can't decide. Let's all agree she looks like some kind of rodent. She's wearing what basically looks like a backless yellow-aquamarine-gray pup tent. She makes it work even though it looks like someone wrapped her up in five yards of fabric from Wal-Mart.

Be afraid, very afraid of Fergie's man hands. They're far worse than Paris Hilton's man hands. Much, much worse. So bad I was surprised she put 'em up for these photographs. I've mentioned before that I do not get Fergie. While the Black Eyed Peas' will.i.am can put together some tight beats and hooks and Fergie can somewhat sing she is just unattractive to me. She looks like she'd smell like a pack of Menthol Lights and a tall boy.

And this dress is a terrible, no good, awful, very bad dress. And would someone please let her feet out of prison?

Run, Common! It's a ... oh, wait. That's just Fergie. My bad.

In this picture I try to focus on Eva Mendes, who I like and is very pretty. Her dress and purse are awful and don't do her figure any justice, but standing next to Fergie makes everyone look like a million bucks in contrast.

I'm not a huge fan of Eve. But I am a fan of how she dresses (most of the time). She's developed the reputation for being a hip hop fashionista, often setting the trend. It's still a little weird to see those paw prints on her chest now that she's a mainstream actress and artist. It's like the everlasting symbol of her once hoodrat status. But she's a long ways from the hood now. Why, if it weren't for the paw prints she'd be downright classy.