Quintessential White Skin: At What Cost?
As the advent of globalization becomes systematically ingrained into Indonesian society, quintessential beauty is defined by having a milky-white complexion. Your skin colour emerges as a criterion for one’s personal beauty and is permeated into our mindsets which spectates how white skin is a primacy of external validation. This perpetuates the ideology for young people to follow as they emulate a lighter complexion in attempts to fit in a societal standard. Equal representation from Indonesia’s diverse skin colours is a distant dream where systematic colourism is inherent into daily lifestyles, experienced by incalculable Indonesians from adolescence.
Furthermore, the Indonesian media chooses to proliferate the glamorization of white skin, aggressively directing the spotlight to fair-skinned celebrities alongside beauty products which are extensively subsumed by whitening properties. The vision of pale beauty is perpetually ingrained inside cultural norms which resorts to exorbitant and precarious measures. Extortionate fees are paid for whitening pills, abrasive scrubbings and lightening injections. Skin-lightening products are massively produced and consumed daily in the form of a pill, some of them containing illegal substances that have yet undergone medical testing, a fact that remains evaded due to the promise of a “milky glow”.
A skincare commercial generically shows how the usage of face creams can create a “transformation” of women lightening their skin tone by three shades. However, this seemingly harmless advertisement is a prime representation of a blatant societal regiment, externalizing an ingrained message to women on how the determinants of beauty are influenced by your skin colour. As the media attains popularity through its accessibility, this creates an indicator on how young children are exposed to these advertisements, which influences their psychosocial development and emerges as a critical factor on how they perceive their individualized skin colour.
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We should not have to face the burden of sacrificing our personal identity in attempts of attaining our self-worth and satisfying a discriminatory beauty standard. To anyone battling the prejudice of colourism, I encourage you to challenge the stereotypes placed before us. Growing up with the ideology that having fair skin is a determinant for the quality of your life is objectionably loathsome. The absurd pressure of young people having fair skin creates personal barriers for us to fully accept our skin colour. Why do we have to bow before this shallow societal ideology which condemns us for having darker skin?
“Who hasn’t heard the obligatory, ‘You’re pretty for a dark-skin[ned] girl’? Or my personal favourite, ‘I usually don’t date dark-skin[ned] women, but you’re so beautiful.’ … Still, I always knew there were far too many other people who saw my beauty and embraced every part of me with open arms to think twice about what was said.”
— Tika Sumpter, Rolling Out
More families are seen to exacerbate the importance of your skin shade for marriage prospects, representing the ideology that your “marriageability” drastically decreases if you’re far from fair-skinned. This fixation over fair skin leads to women having deep-rooted insecurity on feeling unattractive, but the truth is: your beauty is not measured by your skin colour. It is irrational to have your skin colour as the basis of your relationship as what truly matters is the benevolent factors: your values, the deep connection and the love you have for each other.
In a world filled with diversified cultures, ethnicities and languages which contributes to global mindedness and differing perspectives, it is ironic how society commences us to validate one sole skin colour. The embeddedness of colourism has concorded society to marginalize people who weren’t born with light skin and create a culture which ideates flawlessness to an extent where we lose a part of our identity. But you see, our skin colour should never be a determinant of our marriage prospects. A woman’s purpose is much more than hoping she is fair-skinned enough to be considered worthy and the ideology which states how women should present themselves as fair-skinned to satisfy a blatantly impertinent marriage standard is preposterous.
The psychosocial impact in colour stratification is evident and the generational validation of having light skin should be admonished. The toxic legacy of colourism remains instilled into cultural norms, however, the gorgeous subtleties behind each individualized skin colour shout diversity and the human nature to mimic an air of aristocracy will be slowly diminished as we learn to love and pride our skin colour. The daily levy of living in a racialized society is inexcusably present in workplaces, relationships and daily interactions. It is integrated into our daily consciousness, but it is pivotal to debunk the myth that your worth is measured by your skin colour.
As we learn to establish a culture which celebrates the beauty of our skin colour, we can slowly instil these values for future generations to come. Our daughters, sons and grandchildren will never have to base their self-worth on their skin colour, but instead, they will be immersed in a community which prides on all skin tones. We have to realize that we are more than our physical attributes and that our self-value does not decrease due to societal norms. When we show that we love and pride our identity, we send a vocal message to young people, directing them to disregard the society which condemns them to be insecure about their skin colour.
Having dark skin doesn’t caveat your beauty nor should it be subject to mistreatment. You are worthy of love, passion and happiness, regardless of your skin colour.
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