It’s Not Fair. And It’s Not Lovely
My earliest memory of being handed the notorious glossy pink and white tube with a white-passing South-Asian face plastered upon it, was when I was around eight years old. Tucked away in one of the drawers of my grandmother’s worn out wooden dressing table, the tube is seemingly innocent at first glance. I cannot recall if it was a wedding, a celebratory event or even a funeral; I was just told to apply it if I wanted to look pretty. This wasn’t said to me in a scathing manner, it wasn’t meant to be rude, it wasn’t meant to attack my features in any way or tell me that I was off-putting. No, it just was a thing you did, because others around you did it too. It was just supposed to make you look ‘pretty’.
What was pretty to an eight-year-old? Was it a clear skin, dark brows, healthy sheen, ruddy cheeks or something else entirely? Was it perhaps, fair skin?
Even as a child, it was ingrained into my head that the prettiest, loveliest-looking girls were those with the fairest skin. From the literature that promoted it (eg: Snow White, the Ugly Duckling), to the shows that centred majorly on white, blond women — eurocentric features were the rage. My skin is wheatish, clear and healthy. It was the case then and it is the case now. However, I didn’t think this way when I was eight, or thirteen, or sixteen or even nineteen.
The main protagonist of any teen movie from the early ’90s to late ’00s was always white. It is usually the supporting actors and actresses who were either black or POC. To grow up watching these movies, and the normalized eurocentrism that comes with it; you don’t think that it’s a bad thing. It becomes customary, almost mechanical, to wrap your fist around the dreaded tube and squeeze out the formula and rub it into your skin, hoping that your ethnicity magically changes in a matter of weeks. From plain wheatish to dazzling white in just fifteen days! Or so, the advertisement claims.
In Pakistan, where I’m from — billboards are littered all over the country with famous personalities promoting whitening creams. Within the comfort of their homes, the same people wouldn’t ever dream of applying cheap lotions which includes harmful chemicals such as inorganic mercury and hydroquinone — a skin lightening agent. No, skin-whitening is a fantasy only peddled to the middle-class and below.
Even in every-day colloquial language; to describe the word dark or black has always had a negative connotation. In Urdu, if someone’s complexion looks a tad bit darker, people say “Tumhara rung kharab ho raha hai” (Your complexion is turning bad or spoiling). To describe something that seems off, or suspicious we say “Daal main kuch kala hai”. Transliteration — there is something black in the lentil. It translates to the saying ‘something’s amiss’. For a jinxed situation we say “Uski kaali zaban lag gayi” (His/her ‘black’ tongue caused it). A black cat is seen as a form of bad luck. People rarely get black cats or dogs as pets in the country, as the colour itself is seen as something that signifies malevolent energy. The list is endless if one were to get into it, but we use these comparisons so effortlessly that we don’t even notice when they slip off our tongue. This hatred for anything less than fair is inherited and ingrained into our minds.
An incident comes to mind, which seemed hilarious back then but now contemplating upon it, probably wasn’t. A few years ago, I was working as a Research Assistant at the National University of Science and Technology (NUST)in Pakistan, with a couple of other foreign exchange students. We had designated trips to famous cultural landmarks and tourist sites to integrate into the Pakistani culture. My friends, who stood out because of the foreignness of their pale skin; would be harangued at every stop; people would line up to take selfies with them, the guards at the university gates would salute them, and excuse them from any rules applied to other students. Quoting my German friend “White skin in this country gives you a free pass for almost anything.”
Well, he’s not wrong, that I can say for sure. It is common knowledge within South-Asian communities, that only fair-skinned men and fair-skinned women get ahead in life, sometimes fair-skinned women more than fair-skinned men. A fair-skinned daughter-in-law is seen as a source of pride in most families. Best be known that you will be the apple of your in-laws’ eyes’; if your complexion is anything less than beige. The most attractive girl in the room, the one who stands out the most will the ‘fairest of them all’.
Most people attribute this to the collective colonial hangover, that we all suffer from ever since the British packed up their belongings and fled back home. Although this is somewhat true, it is not entirely the root cause of colourism in South Asia. The British only added more fuel to the burning fire that we lit ages ago.
Brown people have worshipped fair-skin for centuries. In fact, it is all too common to be advised to stay away from going out in the sun, as it only turns the skin darker and “rung kharab ho jata hai”. I recently watched a stand-up, where the comedian harps on about the Indian obsession with fair skin, and the ridiculous notions that come along with it. He puts it very aptly when he says “These people think that if you put a cow out in the sun for too long, it turns into a buffalo”. Obviously, critical thinking and scientific knowledge don’t exist within this realm.
My awakening regarding this matter came about during my freshmen year. While reading into Marxist and feminist theories, I was able to understand that I have only perceived my skin to be passable, because capitalism never allowed me to respect it in the first place. Capitalism, along with and years of colourism, led me to believe that being white/fair-skinned was the best thing one could possibly be.
I spent years worshipping white celebrities, lusting over average looking white personalities, all because I was brainwashed into believing that this is it. It didn’t take me long to unlearn this idea and give a giant middle-finger to such notions. It didn’t take me long to tell off anyone who would tell me my skin needed to be many shades lighter than it already is. Tupac, in all his glorious blackness, said it best in his song ‘Keep Ya Head Up’ — “The darker the flesh then the deeper the roots”. Which stands true to this day. I don’t care if my skin reads out like a rebellious diaspora poem but I am learning to love and grow comfortable in it, with every passing day.
It is not fair, and it is not lovely, and I couldn’t be any happier about it.
