I'm writing this literally from my classroom in the emirate of Abu Dhabi, in Al Ain city. My female students are writing their quizzes as I write, and yes, they are very much covered. Yes, Vitamin D milk is very popular here. The girls here are terrified of the sun and spend zero time outdoors, preferring instead to pay hundreds of dollars for whitening creams.

You know, I've had sex with my partner literally thousands of times, and yes, we still do want to rip our clothes off. Sometimes he and I slide into bed and have lazy, intimate, sleepy, we've-been-together-so-long-that-I-know-you-like-the-back-of-my-hand sex, but even after several years I can hardly keep my hands off him, and him me. Maybe it's because we're still in our twenties, but we are both in great shape (and work to stay that way) and have explosive physical chemistry on top of a phenomenal intellectual and emotional connection. If people are deeply attracted to each other, they'll remain that way as long as they maintain decent physicality and don't completely let themselves go.

Dude, that is so fucking sweet. Your wife is really lucky and I hope my marriage is like that. (Except for the child on an autism scale, of course, but it's even nicer that you two have transcended that.) Good for you for recognizing what is truly valuable, and not being taken in by the freshest slice of cake that comes your way.

Haha! The day my boyfriend prefers making a daily nut soup to wearing a condom is the day I drag him to the shrink.

If your brother was such a stand-up guy, why did he keep picking up these filthy trailer park girls? I've never "accidentally" dated three white trash losers in a row, nor have I ever heard of a guy being "tricked" into numerous pregnancies.

Hey, you know who whitewashes Beyonce? BEYONCE. She colours her hair blonde and straightens it, constantly bleaches her skin (oh please, look at candids compared to her own promo material), wears blue and gray contacts, had a nose job to thin her nose, etc. She does more to whiten herself than L'Oreal ever could.

Right, but the thing is, Beyonce has been bleaching and straightening her hair (or at least wearing long, straight, blonde wigs) for YEARS and always wears light-coloured contacts; lightening her skin in this picture looks somewhat more normal so it doesn't contrast with her otherwise white features.

And "playing with make-up and hair" is one thing; consistently whitifying yourself is another. If I ever do the blonde white-girl equivalent of what Beyonce does, I expect to be made fun of. My background is Norwegian, and I'm naturally blonde with gray-green eyes; I like to change up my look often and sometimes wear light blue contacts and colour my hair a darker brown. It still looks well within my natural range, and no one who doesn't know me is really the wiser.

Were I to slap on a pound of tanner, an Afro wig, and dark brown contacts, my friends (and enemies!) would never, ever let me live it down. Beyonce, and many other black celebrities, straighten and lighten their hair, bleach their skin, wear blue or green contacts, shave down their Af-Am noses, etc. L'Oreal certainly isn't to blame for that.

Yeah, can we please look at why Beyonce is modeling a blonde hair colour to begin with?

The student body of my undergrad alma mater (I'm in my 20s, btw, so this was not so long ago) was about 50% Asian, and most of these students were from mainland China and Hong Kong. As such, there were loads of very pretty Asian girls with many different cool styles and fashions influenced by their home countries' fashion scene. One of the really awful things, though, was the trend towards bleaching their hair. Nothing can ruin beautiful Asian hair (stick straight, thick, black, glossy) like an attempt to go blonde; it always came out some hideous shade of orange, with the hair all fried and damaged. It was like they'd shaved orangutans and made wigs out of the fur! And it of course looked completely unnatural and ridiculous; Beyonce looks no different to me, and neither do Tyra and Janet Jackson and all the other good-looking black women who insist on whitifying their hair and skin.

Beyonce, you. are. black. This isn't news, nor is it groundbreaking that people look best with hair/skin/eyes that generally look like they may have been somewhere in the realm of natural. Otherwise, you look like cheap trannies, to be honest.

"A cheap tranny," rather.

Oh please. Look at pictures of Beyonce pre-Destiny's Child, pre-Crazy in Love, etc. She had much darker skin and beautiful hair. There's nothing wrong with changing your appearance but seriously, black women bleaching their hair blonde look ridiculous.

Would she be as successful with "kinky" hair and darker skin? I don't know, but constantly buying into it and blaming "society" is lame. India.arie is doing alright, and so is Erykah Badu. "I had to change my appearance to be a successful pop star, don't blame me!" Pssssht. Heaven forfend you should try to break the mold.

Beyonce's a talentless twit to begin with, and I can't fathom why anyone would feign so much outrage over something so trivial. Here's a thought; something like 70% of black women in the U.S. are obese, and their HIV-infection rates are skyrocketing. Anyone in the community who's truly up in arms about a L'Oreal advertisement and its perceived harm to black women should perhaps look at more pressing issues.