Skin Lightening: Contempt, Hatred, Fear

Abstract

I sat bemused watching ‘This Morning’ in December 2011. There were two Black British women — one Asian, one African Caribbean — talking about why they ‘bleached’ their skins and why they would continue. Both women placed skin-bleaching within the preference for lighter skin and contempt for darker skin within British society in general and within the employment market in particular. Although they spoke openly about anti-Black racism’s preference for whiteness and discrimination based on skin colour — colourism — the discussion was contained by the show’s presenters within the taken for granted discourse of ‘individual preference for whiteness’ and ‘self-hatred if darker-skinned’. Encouraging the audience to think through individual Black pathology and Black communal and global hatred of darker skin denied the need to talk about the racism of colonialism and enslavement which cemented the value of lighter skin within the Global North West; the existence of racism and colourism as part of structural inequality; that what we should note is that skin lightening is practised by women and men around the globe; and skin lightening is a big money earner for many multinational beauty companies based in the USA and Europe. Skin lightening is so normalized that you can buy these products in the world’s marketplace, Amazon, including creams for lightening armpits, inner thighs, elbows, knees, face, anus and vagina as well as lightening pills.