WE NEED to stop with our obsession of turning white.
We live in a tropical country where we have tropical weather conditions and it’s so hot that we like to drink tropical juice.
This whiteness obsession makes no sense given our weather conditions. And considering the effects of global warming, our weather just becomes hotter. So, we’ll just get a bit tanner in the process.
I don’t understand why a good chunk of our consumer public would like to spend most of their lives slathering whitening lotion all over their body. I mean, don’t you want to stop doing that at one point in your lives?
I can’t image spending every day of my life taking time rubbing whitening lotion all over me.
It’s like trying to fight a battle where your chances of winning are slim and your enemy just gains strength every day. Days are getting hotter and whitening lotions are getting more expensive.
All things considered, I think we should just spend more time using sunscreen lotion.
A skincare company recently made a huge buzz when they launched their skin whitening campaign and made it seem that women with naturally dark and tanned skin are always at the losing end. “Unfair, ‘di ba?” they said. Their advertising copy added that women with fair skin get better treatment while riding the bus (“Maputi lang, pinaupo na sa bus”).
I tried to check the year we are living in. Yep, 2019.
I thought we’re in an age where we fight discrimination and embrace diversity. But no, this beauty company tells women to conform. It’s like saying: “Aww, you’re dark skinned and you’re probably discriminated by the fairskinned beauty standard. Here, here’s some whitening soap. Scrub this all over you and you’ll be white too. No more discrimination for you! Yay.”
It’s like taking several steps backward.
We need to stop this. I think beauty companies and the general public should stop feeding the narrative that having morena skin is less beautiful than having fair skin. We’re in 2019, for goodness sake.
We need to change narratives. We need to empower people and make people embrace their bodies. We’re not all programed to look the same. Skin tones vary from person to person.
Shouldn’t beauty companies help celebrate beauty and not try to make us feel bad about ourselves so we use their products? Giving us a choice to be white is not helping.
We should celebrate diversity and fight discrimination. Latching on to the fair-skinned beauty narrative is not celebrating beauty. We come with different skin tones and we’re all beautiful.
Remember, whatever our skin tones are, we’re beautiful and no one can tell us otherwise.