The Eastern world still battles colourism and skin lightening is still a thing

The Western beauty industry is beginning to acknowledge deeper skin shades, but the POCs in the East are still learning to love their skin

When Rihanna launched Fenty Beauty in September 2017, London department store Harvey Nichols saw three-hour-long queues. While she’d released a number of products including concealer, contour and blush sticks, what really shook the industry was the Pro Filt’r Foundation. Rihanna had answered prayers of all people of colour by releasing the product in 50 shades, carefully considering undertones and the palest of skin to the deepest.

Rihanna with her product 'Match Stix'. Credits: Wikimedia Commons

The rest of the industry soon followed suit, finally realising there are more than just ten shades of skin. Influencers like Jackie Aina have since collaborated with brands such as Too Faced to expand shade ranges in both foundation and concealer.

As the Western world falls in love with melanin and diversity, the Eastern obsesses over white skin and battles colourism within their communities. In several parts of the world, the notion remains that the fairer the woman, the more beautiful she is and using unsafe products to bleach and lighten their skin has become the norm. In fact, VICE media released a documentary earlier this year about the booming skin lightening industry in India, revealing that the country is responsible for $500m of its worth. According to an article in The Guardian, the global skin lightening industry in 2017 was worth $4.8bn and is projected to grow to $8.9bn by 2027. A World Health Organisation study from 2011, referenced in the article, revealed 61% of Indian women and 77% of Nigerian women regularly use skin lightening creams.

Fair and Lovely skin lightening cream. Credits: www.amazon.co.uk

As well as cream, skin lightening products come in scrubs, pills and injections that slow down melanin production. Many of these products contain two ingredients that are banned in Europe: hydroquinone and mercury. UK regulations mean both ingredients are now limited to prescription only. Dermatologist Dr. Vlada Doktor explains that hydroquinone is the most common known substance to help lighten skin. “It works by preventing formation of melanin or pigment in the skin cells and overtime, it lightens the skin.”

She says hydroquinone is banned from being sold over the counter in the UK due to “concerns of its safety and potential to cause cancer” but it’s still available in the US in a small concentration. “However, there are studies showing potential yellow skin pigmentation called ochronosis from prolonged use of high concentration hydroquinone,” says Dr. Doktor. She also says using hydroquinone is the most effective way of getting faster and significant results, explaining why products containing a high concentration of the substance are of more interest.

Although non-harmful skin whitening creams are legally sold, they’re expensive, leading to the purchase of cheaper and more dangerous ones. Companies who are caught selling products with the banned ingredients can be jailed for up to a year and fined £20,000. However, from personal experience, it’s still easy as anything to walk into any black or Asian shop and pick up a skin whitening face wash.

This issue is extremely prominent in South Asian communities, and girls are told from as young as ten-years-old that they’re ‘too’ dark. “Growing up I had fairly dark skin. Members of my family, mostly aunts, would say I have a darker complexion and I should consider skin lightening products,” says Sabrina Manku, 23 and post-grad student in Leicester but hailing from Toronto. She explains that her parents wouldn’t allow her to play in the sun for too long as they feared she would become darker. “I often faced criticism for my dark skin and there were even points when people wouldn’t believe I was Indian because of my skin tone - I had to prove myself by speaking the language.”

Manku began using popular Indian skin lightening cream ‘Fair and Lovely’ twice a day around age 11. “My family used to travel to India every two years,” she explains, “I would stock pile when I would go there because it wasn’t as popular in Canada at the point.” By the time she reached age 14, the product had made its way to her local supermarket shelves.

After five years of religious use of the cream, Manku noticed “drastic changes”. Her skin tone had lightened by several shades and she stopped using it after she began to receive compliments on her fairness from family members. “I never looked back on skin lightening after that and soon after realised that I had just set a beauty standard in my head that I had to meet.” Manku is now a self-proclaimed “skincare freak” and doesn’t use any products with artificial bleaching in it.

Manku's skin lightening journey age 11, 13 and 17. Credits: Sabrina Manku

“I’ve definitely grown out of the phase of being lighter,” she says, “if I do get tanned, it doesn’t bother me.” Reflecting on her journey, she explains that she wouldn’t like to see anyone go through what she did. “It’s a cult, [it] drags you in,” she says, remembering she would refer to the fairness meter on the back of the packaging to check her progress. For Manku, her skin lightening journey was a blessing, rather than something she regrets. She’s accepted it and it made her more confident, especially after being selected for the Miss India Canada pageant. However it raises the question as to whether her skin tone afforded her any privileges in this competition.

What’s refreshing to know is that there are people fighting the stigma against dark skin and making remarkable progress. Kavitha Emmanuel is the founder of a non-profit organisation called Women of Worth, which holds events and workshops to empower women and adolescent girls in India. In 2009, she launched a campaign called Dark is Beautiful after she found that the topic kept surfacing during their workshop sessions. I ask her why there’s a huge colourism issue in India.

Kavitha Emmanuel, founder of Women of Worth. Credits: www.womenofworth.in

“Definitely the residual effects of colonialism,” she begins, “we do also have a caste system and the general understanding is that people of a lower caste are dark.” She explains that another reason is the rich and poor divide. The wealthy can afford to stay inside in nice homes whereas the poor have to work outside and naturally become darker because of the sun. She also believes the media has a huge part to play in why colourism thrives there. “They’ve taken this bias and endorsed it in the form of entertainment,” she says, “because what we see described as beautiful on screen is always white and fair. The actors portrayed as evil, of a lower caste or poor in movies are those with dark skin.”

When talking about the birth of Dark is Beautiful, she explains that girls as young as 11 and 12 would speak of low self esteem and confidence, due to their skin colour. “They would say “I look ugly because I was told I was ugly from the time was born” and “I'm not good enough”, and so this feeling of them identifying as not worthy enough plays a huge role in their confidence and identity. They retreat into a shell and underperform in life, which reflects in other areas,” she says. In fact, the issue is so prominent that skin colour is the second thing people look at when a baby is born, after gender. Emmanuel says that if a newborn girl is dark-skinned, people say things like “who will marry her?” and “you’ll have to save a lot for her dowry”, already inflicting beauty standards on a girl who can’t even understand what they’re saying.

In light of all this, the campaign has been a huge success and has touched women all of over the country. “When we launched the campaign we used to get a lot of emails from young girls saying the campaign helped them,” Emmanuel says, “we became a platform for them to express struggles and frustrations…they would write to us saying “I’ve use tons of products to make myself whiter because I thought I was ugly and thanks to the campaign, I look at myself differently”.”

At Women of Worth, their work is divided into four streams: advocacy, training, rehabilitation programmes and a mental health programme and these are also done in schools and universities. One of their workshops is titled ‘overcoming skin colour bias’. “We talk about self esteem issues, beauty stereotypes and the pressure to look a certain way,” she says. The workshop aims to instil a confidence in young women by helping them “look beyond those prescribed beauty norms” and the norms of a what a woman should do or look like.

A Dark is Beautiful workshop image. Credits: www.darkisbeautiful.in

Emmanuel details a story in a workshop about a 12th grader who apologised to all people with dark skin whom she’d offended and called names. She says it’s those moments of people being touched and their mindsets being changed that highlight the true impact of the campaign and the work they do.

As a community that’s ostracised, it’s understandable that Easterners feel ashamed of their skin colour and endeavour to lighten it. But there are people dedicating time and effort to chip the stigma away and help everyone feel comfortable in their skin.