I recall that in the past lightness of hue was considered a desirable trait among African-Americans, to the extent that products for skin-bleaching were widely advertised in the 40s and 50s.
I would have thought that this would have gone the way of other old prejudices, but watching some of the rap stars, surrounded by mostly lighter-skinned beauties, and finding hundreds of skin-bleaching products linked in Google, it seems that lighter is still better.
So is it true that the blacker you are the less likely you are to ‘win friends and influence people’, both among African-Americans and Caucasians, or am I reading way too much into this?
Lighter skin is still more desireable. We just had a thread on prejudice within the black community based on skin color a couple of weeks ago. I think **SHAKES ** started it.
Not just among African-Americans. When my daughter and I were working in China, some of the Chinese women on the project tried to encourage her to try some formulations to make her skin more pale. Neither of us are African-Americans, as far as I know, although my mother was Sicilian, and I understand there was some African influence there. I think that the darker skinned people are associated with peasants doing field work.
Indians too - Indian Indians, that is. The moment there’s a successful product anywhere called “Fair and Lovely”, that speaks volumes. There’s even a recently released “Fair and Handsome” cream that made me wince when I saw the advert. But apparently people want it. :rolleyes:
Lightness might be desireable to some African-Americans but there are interesting exceptions.
For example: There is a suburb of Mobile, Alabama (Africatown … some refer to the area as Plateau) that was settled by survivors from one of the last slave ships (the Clotilde) that came to the USA. I’m sure there are exceptions but this group takes the opposite view when it comes to lightness.
And there are well-known African-Americans that certainly were are not proud of their lightness. Malcolm X was vocal about the subject.
Of course, this interesting stuff. My daughter-in-law regularly risks her health to become as black as possible!
The University of Georgia just released a study that found that light skinned blacks are more likely to be hired than darker blacks, even if the darker skinned blacks are more qualified.
Filipinos, too. If you watch Filipino television, the actors and actresses are whiter than some caucasians! There are entire cosmetic lines devoted to skin-whitening.
My Tongan friend told me when he announced he had a fiance, his mother’s first question was “is she fair-skinned?”
Brazil is the same way too. I guess other than white folks going to tanning salons (or laying on the beach here), lighter skin may have universal appeal?
Evidently not all white people always wanted a George Hamilton tan: From GWTW by Margaret Mitchel, describing Scarlett: “Her eyes were pale green without a touch of hazel, starred with bristly black lashes and slightly tilted at the ends. Above them, her thick black brows slanted upward, cutting a startling oblique line in her magnolia-white skin - that skin so prized by Southern women and so carefully guarded with bonnets, veils and mittens against hot Georgia sun.”