It’s always good to know that just as everything in India is undergoing a radical change, everything is still exactly the same. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, see this New York Times Article in the Business Section.

(ps, if you can get over the idea that business is for boring, heartless capitalists, it is hands down the most fascinating section of the newspaper…and WSJ, if you can ignore the editorials, beats every other newspaper by a mile)

I think what appalls me most is that just as Unilever, the owner of Dove products, changes its branding to the preachy “Real Beauty” adverts in the United States, they’re eagerly capitalizing on the increase in disposable income for Indian women by re-peddling age-old prejudices in Indian society regarding skin colour. Because American women deserve “real beauty” but Indian women do not.. And my absolute favourite part is frock-face Ashok Venkatrani’s perspective that protesting the “fair and lovely” ideal is merely misguided Western-style hand-wringing over foreign mores. Because it’s not like Indian women THEMSELVES could ever think “wow, I was born darker and it would be nice if maybe everyone weren’t making me MISERABLE about that fact.” No, it’s just Whitey, making the desi woman think twice about slathering her skin in corrosives like BLEACH. This is what abhors me about the world of marketing-they spin the philosophy of moral relativism in order to impose Western style consumerism. There are so many levels of cheekiness and irony to that, that my head just exploded.  

Statements in the article about how the idealization of fairness is part of the culture, and not just the byproduct of a colonial legacy, irritate the frock out of me. Who cares? Does that make it right? Is it any better to recognize that the idealization of fairness stems back to the conquest of native Dravidian society by the invading Aryan hordes make it any better? Does it change the fact that companies are capitalizing on one of the most self-hating and disgusting parts of desi culture? Actually, to answer my own questions, it makes it WORSE. There is no one to blame but ourselves. 

 

I don’t think it really makes a difference whether or not you can trace the love of white back to the British oppressor colonialist pig-dogs or an ancient Vedic-era conquest. I think what matters is that we stop making Indian women miserable, and blaming them about something determined at the moment that one lone sperm wriggles into one curry-stinking egg. I think that we really ought to recognize that India is a diverse continent and that each and every one of us carries the genetic legacy of being both Dravidian and Aryan and that genetic inter-mingling reflects in the range of our skintones, from extremely dark to extremely fair to somewhere in between. I suggest that rather than attempting to dessicate and flat-out RUIN our skin by trying to defy our genes, we consider wearing better makeup that truly matches our unique colour combos, and doesn’t make us look like freaks (check out upcoming post about how to properly apply Vasanti foundation).

And I suggest, most of all, that Venkatramani, Unilever, L’Oreal, THE BODY SHOP (erstwhile purveyors of “natural goods”) go hang themselves.

 

Yours in Brownness,

 

Monkey in a Suit

 

Post Script:

Incidentally, Hightower brought up the point that just as we’re selling desi women flesh-eating acids to leech out melanin, we’re telling white chicks over here that their white legs are super-duper unattractive and what they really need is a cocktail stew of gods-know-what to justify the wearing of skirts and pants. Agreed. I don’t even know when perfectly beautiful alabaster skin turned into “chicken legs”???