The Future of Beauty Is Being Built by Black Nerds

We are also highlighting nerds with a more creative bent, like our cover star Doechii who was a hardcore Paramore fan back in middle school. Her love of alternative rock influenced her style, which put off some of her peers. “I remember feeling really anxious all the time. I definitely felt seen, just not the type of attention I wanted. It was just very obvious that I was different or people would make me feel like I was,” she tells writer Lakin Imani Starling. “It was always ‘Why do you talk like that? Why are you wearing that? Why are you doing that?’”

In her TikTok-famous song “Yucky Blucky Fruitcake,” Doechii heralds the power of being a self-described weird girl: “In my black Taylor Chucks, the ones that laced up to my thighs / Lisa Frank lipstick on my eyes.” Those words registered with so many geeks like myself.

For this new Melanin Edit series, we are also taking time to highlight fandoms like Black adults who are obsessed with all things Disney, and cosplayers rallying to show that comic characters can come in all colors (despite how they were drawn). In all these spaces, Black nerds needn’t feel like outsiders — whether it be from the mainstream fans or their own peers. While the jabs of my elementary school classmates hurt back then, now I embrace being a Black nerd. It’s a superpower I didn’t have to encounter radioactive materials to get.