Skin products
by Scoop Shachtman, 25 September 2007
One of Hollywood’s biggest film stars is being criticized by white campaigners for promoting a skin-tanning cream - a product that is now on the shelves of British shops.
The 40-second advertisement from the USA starts like so many others promoting razors or hair dye - but it’s an ad with a very big difference.
There’s a man who has no luck with the girls. He has markedly more pallid skin than his friends and the girl he is after. In a depiction of a Hollywood blockbuster set, one of the biggest heart throbs of US cinema, Tom Cruise, hands over a cream to the hapless chap, along with some mild admonishment.
Within a few weeks, the young man has much darker skin and is more confident.
[…]
Or is that different to this? And if so why?
Tuesday 25 September 2007 at 20:37
The future’s beige.
Tuesday 25 September 2007 at 20:53
The future’s liver spots.
Tuesday 25 September 2007 at 21:08
He needs a phenomenal goofy overbite and a cut-off market denim with red two stripe sleeves like his mate.
Everyone knows the laydeez love that kind of thing.
Tuesday 25 September 2007 at 22:40
The problem with those skin whitening creams is that they totally fuck your skin up. They make it paper-thin.
Here’s an interesting thing to think about. Euro-phile Arabs spent their time getting tans and making sure they look like they can afford to take long holidays in Italy and the Med. Psuedo-religious Saudis spend their time inside/covered up, making sure they look like they don’t have to work.
Japanese women taking walks in the UK with umbrellas, large-brimmed hats and gloves to avoid getting any tan. Japanese surf dudes lying on beaches and getting baked, just so that everyone knows they’re bums who surf, surf and only surf.
It’s the politics of tanning.
Shah Rukh Khan isn’t the Tom Cruise of Indian films. He’s something much worse. And sadly the laydeez love Shah Rukh.
Wednesday 26 September 2007 at 9:58
One of the heroines of a Jane Austen novel gets told off for walking outside in the sun; which will spoil her pale complexion.
Whiteness in skin colour in South Asia seems to have something to do with having the pale skin of the Mughul ruling class.
Wednesday 26 September 2007 at 11:24
Aren’t there similar issues in the US black population? As I understand it paler black people in slavery were chosen for domestic use as servants, while darker black people were used for more manual labour. This has lead to a similar cultural leaning towards paler skin being seen as desirable.
I can see how the carrying over of such prejudices into the modern day can be seen as a bad thing, a sort of racist legacy, but if the motivations of those lightening their skin is not motivated by the same reasons, then I fail to see why the personal preferences of what shade a person wants to appear should be a problem to anyone else.
Except for David Dickinson of course. He should be locked up in a dark room.
Wednesday 26 September 2007 at 17:02
“He should be locked up in a dark room”: So he can illuminate it with his skin? It would be a saving on the elctricity bill.
Wednesday 26 September 2007 at 17:56
do you have an online source for that tom cruise ad (eg a video clip, or any angry grunts from the “white campaigners”)? i’d be interested.
Wednesday 26 September 2007 at 19:03
I think this is the advert:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jQCR02Unqhg
Wednesday 26 September 2007 at 19:34
nope. that’s a talk show clip of tom vs psychiatry. i did try google, youtube etc, but I wondered if “Scoop” had a link.
Wednesday 26 September 2007 at 20:36
I think you’ll find the link is in the post.
Wednesday 26 September 2007 at 23:12
once again, nope. the only link in the post is to a bbc story about a fair and lovely ad featuring shah rukh khan.
Thursday 27 September 2007 at 6:06
Dave says ‘i did try google, youtube etc, but I wondered if “Scoop” had a link.’
What an imbecile. Get a dictionary and look up the word ‘parody’. Preferably before you begin your degree in ‘Development and Environmental Economics’.
Friday 28 September 2007 at 13:47
The reason why it feels different to me is this: I spent three months working in Dehra Dun in India and I remember talking to a boy about who the pretty girls were. There was one girl who I, and all the other westerners thought was really pretty, but none of the indian boys would accept this. She was from south india and very dark skinned. This alone made her by definition far uglier than lots of plainer, paler girls. The paleness issue is huge in India and leads to huge discrimination especially against people from the south and the poor. In Britain, yes a lot of people would like to be more tanned, but it has no associations with class or region and is not considered dogmatically more attractive. I know as many people who find pale skin attractive as tanned. So if the cruiser was to sell tanning lotion it wouldn’t reinforce serious social prejudices. Which is why it’s not the same in my view.
Saturday 29 September 2007 at 17:35
A copy of the adjudication of the Advertising Standards Authority on Roop Amrit fairness cream, a cockamamie mix of mystical herbs which, the adverts promised, would help users gain jobs in multinational companies, and overcome the shame of un-wheatish skin:
http://www.asa.org.uk/asa/adjudications/Public/TF_ADJ_42879.htm
Quite disappointed that Shah Rukh Khan (himself quuite dark, once upon a time) would get involved in something like this.
The fairness obsession waaaay predates the Mughals and probably has links to the earliest bigotry of caste. Khan opting to call his son Aryan doesn’t exactly help this.
I’ve seen stories of people having cranial surgery to change their head shape to make them more employable.