An image found in a child’s English school book in India
There is an image that forms in your mind when you are asked, ‘What is beautiful?’. This idea is generally influenced from many different directions. Mostly from watching, recognizing and understanding what people want and desire. If this idea is not corrected at a young age, those preconceived notions can have long term effects. Students with dark skin tone in school, surrounded by individuals with lighter skin tone often face excessive bullying which can cause lasting effects on their self-confidence and their idea of self (Katie Hurley, 2018).
Prejudicial bullying such as colour based bullying comes from misguided belief systems that certain groups of people deserve to be treated differently because of their physical appearance. Certain people are singled out if they simply do not adhere to generalized ideas of the ‘beauty standard’ (Gordon, 2020). This causes youngsters, especially to look at themselves the same way that society looks at them. It can take years of learning and understanding for individuals to truly accept themselves as they are. Some are lucky to receive this kind of exposure while others are not as Colourism is extremely integrated into our society and it's hard to escape it, even as adults.
TESTIMONIALS
"I was 8 or 9, when I realized that my skin tone is looked down upon in this country and in my own household sometimes"
Arun's childhood experiences while dealing with colourism from all directions.
"The parents would perceive the dark skin kids to be the naughty kind and the fair kids to be innocent"
As Aditya belongs to an army background, he would move around a lot. This was his experience in new schools.
"I saw how 'fair and thin' was the ideal beauty standard and being not that. There was this constant insecurity"
Anjana talks about growing up in a society that considered only one body-type beautiful
In India, skin colour plays a very integral role in idealised desirability. Washington University’s paper, titled ‘India and Colourism: the finer nuances’ even mentions how gods are not spared from this prejudice. Old temples and old paintings have depicted Lord Krishna and Lord Shiva as dark-skinned, however, new temples have refused to address this and continue to depict them with fair or blue skin (Pattanaik, 2017). When asked about this, sources within the stone sculpting industry have claimed that “no one will want to purchase black coloured sculptures” hence they continue to carve these idols in white stone to encourage the general public to buy from them.
Some old, original paintings depicting the dark skin tone of Lord Krishna and Lord Shiva
Photographs by Naresh Nil challenging India's obsession with fair skin by depicting gods in their original dark complexion
How they are represented in modern art and paintings
In a study conducted, a sample group of 100 individuals, was asked to describe what the word ‘pretty’ means to them. 71% of this group included words like ‘fair’ and ‘light’ in their answer. Within the male demographic, 77.77% concluded being pretty would require an individual to be fair. 63.04% of the females in the same group, agreed. What was truly sad, however, was that their opinions did not change despite their own skin colour being dark, many described themselves as unattractive as well (Mishra, 2015).
Does this explain the obsession with fair-skinned brides and grooms? ‘Fair, tall and slim’ seems to be a common requirement on most matrimonial advertisements, digital or otherwise. To understand why, I asked South Asian Today and Unapologetically brown for their opinion.
Shamila from 'Unapologetically Brown' talks about Shaadi.com, a popular Indian matrimonial website, that has recently removed a category that asked the participants to mention their skin colour on their profiles (Raj Kaur Bilkhu, BBC, 2020).
So no matter how much we wish this prejudice hadn't existed in the first place, it did, it has and it continues to play an integral role in our lives. Companies that are now joining the movement should do so by addressing the initial ignorance and correcting themselves publicly to inspire change from the consumers that support them.
TESTIMONIALS
"I have also been a part of the system. I dated only fair girls for a while..."
Aditya talks about past relationships and how his skin colour defined them.
"I actively dated fair people despite their character because I assumed they might be better people"
Arun too, talks about past relationships and how skin colour played a role in them
"...As if I have control over what I was born with"
Chaitanya's society seemed to constantly belittle her for her skin colour. Especially in matters of marriage, even when she was a child.