Case in point: a plethora of (racist) commercials advertising cosmetic products that contain skin lightening agents. Most of them are featuring obviously Caucasian looking models. Unhappy because of your ‘dark’ skin colour? Chill, here’s the solution: use our skin lightening products and you’re not going to be a wall-flower anymore, you’ll be marriage material and you might also get the job of your dreams.
How to make such a commercial (yay, just check the ‘storyline’): cam focused on a girl’s face (she must be Caucasian, so the producer must use some special effects to make her skin look dull and obviously not-white-enough). Then he has to make sure she seems really unhappy because of her skin colour, since no one is aware of her existence and she is just sitting there, in a corner, socially rejected. Give the girl some face cream (or - even better - allow a ‘white’ & ‘successful’ friend to recommend it to her) – but be careful, it must read WHITE on it. The word combination is not very important, use whatever fancies you, but do not forget about the white thingy. Ok, then we get to the point when she uses the cream for the first time and as a consequence - people actually start to look at her… wait, it’s more intense, they stare like a bunch of freaks (men and women; they gasp in amazement when they see the white girl, sheeesh, where did they find women willing to play this part?! The staring&gasping part, I mean! It’s blatant racism), they are able to see that she is there, cause she has become whiter. This must be some miraculous product, so she keeps dabbing her fingers in the cream and spreading it on her face. The whiter she gets, the more attention she receives. Then she meets a guy who cannot take his eyes off her, strangely mesmerized by her white skin. And instead of telling that guy ‘Go away, superficial weirdo, you pervert!!!’ she sheepishly smiles to the cam. Or she shakes hands with her future employer, perfecting the deal, instead of telling him ‘You moron, skin colour has nothing to do with people’s intellectual abilities!’. End of commercial, everybody is happy. Except for the ‘dark’ skinned people, that is. Because they are being spoon-fed the idea that there must be something wrong with them. Shooo, go to get that cream, it will fix all your problems, duuuh!
And these commercials do reach their targets, mark my word for it. I have seen all these products in pharmacies and supermarkets, I’ve heard girls asking about them and I’ve seen people buying such things. I did not know that there’s a whole industry manufacturing products designed to lighten your natural skin colour. Of course I was aware that there are some face creams ‘committed’ to this purpose, but I did not expect to see that they’ve thrown on the market whitening scrub, soap, shower gel and body lotion. And I’ve just narrowed down the essential items most women need to perform their beauty routine. Their ‘whitening’ versions run on the borderline of racism, but (moral aspect put aside) the main problem is rooted in their ingredients, because most of them contain hydroquinone, able to cause irreparable damage to the skin, although they try to underline other components’ efficiency, such as Vitamin C, claiming they are the ones to do the trick. I do not think that these products are here to fill a market demand, because it’s obvious that most of these commercials try to induce the idea that skin colour lightening is on high priority, so that people might achieve what they long for: marriage, job, success and so forth. Don’t bite it, approach this in a safer way: go for an at least 15 SPF sunscreen, avoid sun exposure for the sake of your health and be happy with the skin colour Allah Subhanu Wa Ta’ala gave you!
