We watched Sobaz Benjamin's Film, Race is a Four Letter Word, in class this term. I thought it was so odd that as a child he used skin bleaching cremes to make his skin appear lighter. I had no idea this existed in the slightest but it makes sense given white people tan to be darker. I started to google skin whitening creams and was shocked at what I found.
Vaseline skin lightening lotion...... I'm speechless. I found most sites to be talking about Asia and surrounding countries. Then I found this add....
Vaseline is really supporting this skin lightening craze.
I was reading on a website, that if your skin is lighter then your not judged right away. Your more accepted as a lighter or white skinned person. These individuals are trying to obtain honorary whiteness, to be accepted as white even though your ethically not. There are some health concerns with these cremes, skin becoming so thin that you bruise or it burns your skin. This idea of becoming white to be accepted is a serious problem in our society today. Things like skin whitening creams are not being taken as a problem but more as a solution. In my search for honorary whiteness, I then came across this add.
Live life beautifully, and get Asian eyelid surgery. I can't believe this is happening in our society. I also thinks it ironic that the lady performing the surgery is of Asian decent. I find in our society we try to support being different and culturally diverse, but that's seems to get people no where. So things like this happen, If I can be closer to white then I will be accepted, have privilege and live a better life. Personally, I think it's madness.
My jaw just dropped. I also found it astonishing when Sobaz admitted that he used skin whitening creams. The fact that beauty product companies make business from racism like this makes me disappointed. No one can help the racist global history we have, but nowadays no one should have to go to extremes like whitening creams or "asian eyelid surgery". Be proud of who you are what and what you're ancestors lived through for your freedoms, don't diminish you're heritage. I find that consumer companies thrive off of making their target audience feel bad about themselves and displaying their products as a solution to the problem. But I don't agree with it. People deserve to feel good and proud about themselves not guilty.
ReplyDeleteThe drive for lighter skin could be a symptom of the white gaze talked about by Frantz Fanon is his book Black skin white masks, and how the gaze of white folks cuts and dissects racialized people, we as white people place upon the "other" a string of pre judgements, intentional or not. Fanon talked about the cannnibal, the savage, fear and other things being assigned by a simple glance. These companies seem to be furthing the white gaze and capitalizing upon it
ReplyDeleteI had the very same reaction Gemma had when i saw the first picture. I was in shocked that well known product brand names like Vaseline had been a skin lightening cream. When Sobaz admitted to it i had some idea that skin bleaching/lightening creams must have been hard to come by or something you couldn't find in just any "shoppers".
ReplyDeleteIt doesn't even help that Vaseline doesn't even try to hide it. In the first picture the subtitle of the bottle is "Healthy White skin lightening lotion". I continued to google Vasiline's line of "Healthy white" and it is sold EVERYWHERE. I feel so blind.
But heres what really gets me. While we are appalled at what happens with skin whitening cream, the tanning industry is booming...While we are in the mindset that people of non-North European descent also known as the "visible minority" should be comfortable in their skin and not use said creams, shouldn't this ideology work the other way around as well? Especially when it comes to tanning? Why don't we have the same idea of tanning that we do with skin lightening creams?
I did a presentation on women's body image in the media in my Gender course last semester and upon researching different organizations that promoted healthy images of women, I found out that Dove's parent company "Unilever" sells skin-whitening cream! It's pretty sad to know Vaseline and Dove are apart of this campaign to become whiter, especially when Dove promotes "natural body image" in several of their advertisements. Why not promote the beauty of natural skin colour?
ReplyDeleteThe entire skin-whitening process that was introduced to us this semester by the filmmaker Sobaz and through class discussion was something that I never imagined would exist in our world. The entire section on Critical Whiteness Studies that we covered was an eye-opener for myself and I’m sure for others. I find that your review really connects to McIntosh’s article “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack” and the idea that white privilege exists and that there is a form of power there. I to did a review on this topic. My review is on the commercial by ‘Fair and Lovely’ on skin whitening and the social and cultural aspects that exist in it. http://shannonchatterton.blogspot.ca/2012/12/race-as-social-construct.html
ReplyDelete