“Black Elitism Isn’t Whitewashing”

A Collection That Sparked Conversation

When Ralph Lauren launched its Oak Bluff collection, the internet responded like it always does… fast, divided, and full of opinions. On the surface, it was a campaign like many others: rich textures, coastal light, cashmere wrapped around legacy. But this time, something shifted. Because the faces in the campaign weren’t just wearing elegance, they embodied Black excellence. And suddenly, that familiar Ralph Lauren dream looked a little more like us.

But with representation comes reflection. And with reflection, sometimes, comes resistance. While many praised the campaign’s beauty and historical nod to Black affluence, others questioned whether it was authentic. Was it performative? Whitewashed? Was this really a celebration, or a sanitization, of Black identity?

These questions aren’t new. But this moment made them loud again.

Why It Hit a Nerve

There’s a reason this campaign struck a chord, and it’s not just because the photos were beautiful. For generations, the public image of Blackness has been flattened. Too often, our stories are reduced to pain, poverty, or rebellion. When luxury brands finally show Black people in spaces of refinement, heritage, and softness, it challenges the narrative we’ve been forced to live inside. We are also often erased from history or not highlighted. So when Black Elitism is highlighted or shown off, it often is assumed that it’s “making black people whitewashed” opposed to acknowledging the very communities that are thriving and have been existing for years.

For some, it feels like liberation. For others, it feels like betrayal. Because for so long, anything aligned with prep schools, yacht clubs, or coastal living was considered “white.” And by extension, Black people who grew up in suburban neighborhoods or elite academic circles were often labeled as “trying to be white”, even when they were simply existing.

But the truth is, Black elitism isn’t a performance. It’s part of our history. It’s real, rooted, and deeply American. Communities like Oak Bluffs have existed for over a century. These are not new, just simply because you haven’t heard of them. These are safe havens where Black families built legacies, passed down wealth, and preserved culture. The problem isn’t the presence of Black affluence. It’s that so many of us were never taught it existed.

Why It Mattered

To me, this campaign wasn’t surprising, it was honestly overdue. I saw the vision because I’ve lived a version of it. I grew up in a world that many people still struggle to believe is a real black experience. I grew up black, suburban, educated, refined. I competed in public speaking competitions, went to writing camps, private schools, leadership trainings, and more. So when Ralph Lauren released this collection, I didn’t question if it was performative. I saw people I know. Families I’ve met. Communities I admire. I saw Morehouse. I saw Spelman. I saw the boarding schools, the charter schools, the churches and summer programs and hometown heroes that have always nurtured Black excellence behind the scenes.

This wasn’t fantasy. It was familiarity.

That’s why it mattered. Because for once, the campaign didn’t flatten us. It didn’t tokenize us. It gave space to a version of Blackness that’s rarely celebrated in the mainstream. It celebrated a version that was steeped in tradition, culture, and generational pride.

Ralph Lauren didn’t just drop a few polished images. They tapped into history. They honored communities like Oak Bluffs, where Black joy and wealth have coexisted for decades. And they didn’t make it look like a costume. They made it look like home, because it is. These are places where Black culture thrives.

This conversation is even more relevant considering the Met’s 2025 theme centering Black dandyism, which was a celebration of style, self-fashioning, and how Black identity has always used clothing as both resistance and reclamation. From Harlem Renaissance tailoring to the prep school polish of HBCUs, we’ve always expressed power through presence. The Oak Bluff collection lives in that same lineage, not just as fashion, but as a reflection of pride.

The Deeper Tension — When We’re Finally Seen

Representation is powerful but it’s also layered. Because when you’ve lived your whole life fighting to be seen, it can be disorienting when the world suddenly turns its gaze toward you. Especially if it highlights a specific pillar of your community that maybe you aren’t familiar with. Our society likes to scrub away affluent Black communities. They tear them down and build new worlds over them and erase the existence of them completely.

That’s part of what made Oak Bluff so complicated for some people. Not because it wasn’t beautiful, but because it was unfamiliar. Suspicious, even. Many of us have been conditioned to question the intentions behind luxury, especially when it’s filtered through the lens of white-owned brands. We wonder: is this genuine? Is this respect, or performance? Are we finally being seen… or simply being styled?

And for those of us who grew up in white-adjacent spaces, the Black girl in the honors program, the one who lived in the suburbs, the one with a soft voice and “white hobbies” like tennis or swimming, we’ve carried the burden of having to prove our Blackness while still defending our lived experience. We've been told we weren’t “real” because our version didn’t fit the stereotype. And so, when the world starts acknowledging that our version exists too? It brings up all of that.

There’s grief in what was denied. There’s pride in what we’ve preserved. And there’s hope in what’s finally being recognized.

The Right to Be Many Things

There is no singular Black experience, and there never has been. We come from cities and coasts, from townhomes and HBCU campuses, from hair salons and Ivy League halls. And every version deserves to be seen without explanation.

Oak Bluff didn’t strip us of our identity. It reminded the world of how expansive it truly is. Black affluence isn’t a betrayal. It’s a right, one that’s been earned, inherited, and embodied across generations, whether or not the world was watching.

We are allowed to be refined. We are allowed to be soft. We are allowed to live in leisure without guilt or suspicion. Black dandyism, Black elitism, Black wealth… they’re not costume. They’re culture.

So no, this wasn’t whitewashing. It was a mirror. One that finally caught the light in a way some of us have been waiting our whole lives to see.