We are racists and sexists! High time we moved on from our presumed notions of beauty. I am not a very fair complexioned girl, but I am not under-confident or even conscious of that. My skin color is fine. I am neither wheatish. But whatever I am, I am happy with it. I neither have sharp features, nor perfect hair, but I am absolutely happy with my appearance. Yes, there was this time when I was low on confidence. I felt I was not beautiful because I did not fit into the popular idea of beauty. I have so many marks on my face, I have a hazy skin texture, I don’t have perfect hair, I don’t have attractive features and neither a very fair complexion to overcome all the ‘flaws’. But now, I am more than satisfied with what I look like. I look wonderful the way I am. I don’t feel the need to have perfect hair that I can let loose any time, neither do I feel the need to have a better skin texture. I am comfortable in my skin and I am satisfied.
There are hundreds of girls out there who I am sure feel like I used to feel once. And this in not their fault. It is certainly a fault of our society. Since childhood, we are brought up with misogynist ideas like, “you are a girl, you must take care of how you look, you must be attractive, you must see how your skin is, even if you don’t have good features try to cover up with a good make up, dressing etc” and so on. We are never free of this all our lives. We have to get married and for that ‘looking pretty’ is so damn essential. Why? Nobody can answer that though. It is just how the world is meant to be and we have constantly adapted to it without raising questions. Leave apart questioning, we didn’t even bother to think.
Beauty is so much associated with being fair. We have to be fair. That is beauty. All the fairness cream ads that show how a woman is absolutely under-confident and unworthy of going among people until she puts so and so cream and becomes extremely fair and consequently beautiful. Just ban these ads! What a waste of money and efforts. (And these models who agree to do such ads, you women, what is wrong with you?)
We believe that a woman who is not fair skinned is not beautiful, she is under-confident and she needs to be fair to be in a crowd and be appreciated for what she looks like. Why? I firmly believe what I look like should be my choice. If I want to look fair, I will try these creams, if I don’t I won’t. Why do you have to promote this concept of fair is beautiful? And the worst part is no one raises objections! We talk of feminism, women empowerment and ending patriarchy but we forget to notice these fundamental issues. Women are made to feel small and unworthy for what she looks like. Until she is fair, she is a misfit in the society is such a ridiculous concept altogether.
These ads that have been encouraging such a concept of how a woman must look like need to be noticed now. It’s high time we started a movement and got these ads off the media. They are sexist. They are an element that poison our minds with distorted notions of what a woman must look like.