Light-skinned actors are in high pursuit for South Asian television, and the daunting nature of this fact is painfully harmful to its viewers, both South Asian and otherwise. By creating a standard for South Asians to class pale skin and whiteness as the ultimate form of beauty, the barest speck of melanin becomes frowned upon in our societies. As a brown adult, I've grown up with this idea of European-centric beauty being the ideal, and that brown skin, by default, is the inferior. Thankfully, I was able to look past this patronising bullshit easily, and learnt to take no notice of comments made by fellow South Asians wishing for lighter skin. Instead, I now feel an incredible sadness when the subject is touched upon, because these people are not only adding to the misguided notion that 'brown is bad', but they're insisting on this phenomenon because years of dislike towards their brown skin has turned into intense self-hatred, for something they have no control over.
I must admit, whilst I’m adamant in my abhorrence for this long-standing attack on brown people within the South Asian community, in a way I struggle to leave the blame solely on our elders. Throughout time, the superiority complex of white people has existed and been made the basis for what beauty is, and how it should appear – centuries of instilling hatred towards people of colour is hardly a new aspect of life, so I understand why there’s been a hyperawareness of appearance. Despite the deep-rooted notion being implanted in our elder’s minds so vividly, I’m easily agitated by relatives or other brown people still giving into this bullshit today. As a child, I would question why aunts and cousins were practically painted white when at weddings. I would question the incessant advertisements for whitening creams showing on the TV, claiming that the contents of the tube will lighten your supposedly distasteful brown skin and grant you a better life. As a child, this was incredibly damaging to see, and I was being sucked into a world of wanting to apply whiteness on myself, to live with lighter skin and feel the supposed immediate gratification from painting myself ten shades lighter. A child of colour should never look into the mirror and be made to feel inferior by the media and societal expectations for not being white skinned. A child should never view their brown skin as a failure of their ancestors, or a future deterrence for love, friendship or success. Once I was in secondary school, I was excessively aware of my brown skin, and avidly shied away from the reality of what I looked like – which makes me feel both anger and sadness for my younger self, because this revolting idea of brown being bad was so deeply embedded in me as a child, and it was constantly built upon by word of mouth and actions of relatives and role models, the media and society itself. Eurocentric beauty was deemed to be the ultimate form of beauty, and questioning it was fruitless. Embracing your own skin was impossible.
I’m proud of every person of colour embracing their skin in our current world. Seeing the spread of various skin tones across social media, with avid self-admiration, gives me hope that children will not have to grow up alongside the idea of darker skin being unappealing and unwanted. It gives me hope that an understanding for how and why Eurocentric features were admired, and how damaging the concept has been for every person of colour, and how we have the utmost right to live freely and proudly in our brown skin.
Whilst progress is being made in significant leaps and bounds, the unavoidable truth that South Asian communities are continuing to present light skin as the utmost intriguing, attractive feature of people is beguiling. To continue siding with something so harmful and bizarre confuses me – have we not grown out of this bullshit? Elements of the media continue to show this idealism in their shows, and this only feeds into our elder’s established idea of beauty, and thus the cycle continues. The latest dramas my parents are constantly watching are full to the brim with light-skinned actors, who are always the protagonists; the lesser-than roles as consistently played by darker-skinned actors. How bemusing and infuriating it is to see a dark-skinned maid serving her light-skinned employers, how fucking insane it is to see modern producers allow this to happen! The shows follow a modern timeline and an assortment of themes that concern our current communities, yet they bend over backwards to show ‘white beauty’ at the forefront, yet incorporating it so subtly (alongside various other manifestations of implied inferiority) so that it goes undetected. The message is always clear: light skin must be at the forefront for our brown community, despite the centuries of racism thrown our way, and this colourism must form as part of our living reality. I call bullshit on this poor exclusivity of dark skin, and I feel shame that this line of media continues to misdirect its viewers, and ultimately the rest of the South Asian community.
I cannot stress enough that these ideas must be broken down. These destructive concepts must be destroyed, before they continue to destroy us, because living in fear because of the colour of our skin is one thing, but to inflict hatred on ourselves because of our skin is simply dehumanising.
I’ve developed a much better attitude to myself and my brown skin, and I encourage others to do the same. Please be proud of who you are and where you come from, and flaunt your skin as it is because that is who you are. Your skin forms an integral part of your identity and its history helps shape you as a person; to allow Eurocentric features that are apparently ‘attractive’ to dictate our self-love and self-representation is bullshit, and those standards ought to be destroyed entirely. Question what you see in media, and observe whether your communities are accurately and effectively represented.
Zack