Via the News Tab, mutineer Dari points us at FT coverage of Shah Rukh Khan’s ad for Fair and Handsome skin cream –
Shah Rukh Khan, Bollywood’s biggest star and corporate India’s most ubiquitous brand ambassador, is coming under pressure to abandon his controversial endorsement of a men’s skin-lightening cream.
Strong enough for a wheatish woman but made for a man…
Television commercials for Fair and Handsome, airing in August, show Mr Khan (or “SRK”) lauding a product that many see as entrenching discrimination based on skin colour by encouraging people to bleach themselves a lighter hue.
…Mr Khan urges a dark-complexioned and depressed-looking young man, struggling to attract female attention, to stop using skin-lightening products designed for women.
“Why are you secretly using a cream for girls?” Mr Khan asks. “Their skin is soft. Yours is rough and tough.” Several shades whiter and visibly more self-confident by the end of the 40-second commercial, the young man duly snares the girl of his dreams.
The commercial, of course, is up for all to see on YouTube –
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Now is it me or does the pseudo-blackfaced dude in the commercial remind anyone of the lead in that paragon of awful 80s movies, Soul Man?
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A few weeks of Fair & Handsome away from… Alex P Keaton? |
As with the rapidly-becoming-infamous 1000+ comments “Is Dating White Right?” post a few weeks ago, a topic like this is a veritable lightning rod… So, perhaps I should just step out of the way and let the bullets fly.
I will however, point mutineer’s at Manish’s nearly-as-infamous original post on Fair & Handsome from a few years ago. At 200+ comments, it was one of the most trafficked posts of its time. However, many of us remember it more for its, dare I say, eyebrow-raising concluding note. 
Sometimes I get the impression that SRK isn’t very discerning on what he shills–I mean, he sort of appears on billboards for EVERYTHING in India. But this is a commercial, so he had to make a conscious decision beyond just holding a bottle and flashing his pearly whites. Maybe it’s “I’m not only a spokesman…I’m also a client.”
besides the obvious messed-up-ness of fairness creams, i also like that us women apparently only get ‘aam’ (ordinary) fairness creams, which are insufficient for the men.
do desi grls like fair guys? I thought tall was the requirement for guys. i didnt realize pale was important too…
boys, it’s time to put away your sun umbrella ((ella ella eh eh eh).
if tall and pale arae desireable, seems more efficient to find a nice white guy, then try to synthesize one out of a desi guy.
I guess this is one of the steps to becoming a desi ‘metrosexual,’ due to urbanization and all?
I personally don’t have a skin color preference–it’s more about facial features, and kind of about height (i’m fairly short so probably 99.9% of guys are taller than me) and about how fit they keep themselves, how they present themselves, etc.
I would guess a lot of desh-raised women would prefer light-skinned husbands though, because it leads to higher chances that their children will also be light-skinned. (This is assuming that desh-raised women have the light skin = superior mentality, which I think is much more likely if you were raised there since that mentality is so much more prevalent there than among the diaspora, that I know of at least). It’s all about the children!
How is this not the most racist commercial on the planet right now?
Ok time to interject a different note in the conversation: While I agree that :1) ads for Fair and Lovely and now F& H are absolutely loathsome and deservedly mocked 2) there is a prevalence of preference for fair skin across India, I wonder if everyone who buys these creams does this under the illusion that it will actually change the color of your skin.From my experience in the des , the pollution on the roads plays havoc on your skin specially if you drive a two -wheeler.I wonder if at least some % age of the people who buy this product do it to restore their “original skin color and not to change it completely.
Again this is not a defence of this product or preference for fair skin etc – just a passing thought
He’s definitely playing to a perceived ‘base’ audience.
Have any Southie actors jumped on the lightening-product bandwagon?
I can’t imagine a Rajni-helmed, “Dark and Date-Less” cosmetics campaign would be feasible.
Puli – I prefer tall over pale. I have a strong aversion to pasty white legs. I love darker skin, it just gives you a healthy glow.
On a side note, I hate it when caucasion people say to me “Oh, I got so tan, I was as dark as you!”
NO, NO, NO if you were that dark you would be one large cancerous melanoma.
We could easily quantify this by examining the profiles in an Indian dating/matrimony site. My gut feel is that many Indian women living in India have a preference for lighter skinned men all other things (e.g. earning potential)being equal. I hear that it can be difficult getting a nice apartment or getting admission into exclusive social clubs as an affluent dark skinned man in India…is this true?. I can’t say that I have seen it among women raised here in the US
Louiecypher, I would love to know where you heard that…
Whatever happened to tall, dark and handsome?!
9/11. (I’ve ALWAYS wanted to give the glib, conservative one-word answer to any question).
runa, i think most people would actually buy it for lightening purposes, rather than for re-balancing. also, the aim of the campaigns is to make people fairer, not to give them back their original complexion. though i think a product along the lines you mentioned would be good for people – to protect against sun and pollution. that’s something that can be marketed without necessarily hinting at the dark vs fair divide (though i’m pretty sure the ad execs would seize on this angle as well).
i think superstar should endorse a ‘dark, filthy rich, and world famous’ campaign.
personally, i like dark skin (desi or not). it’s not my preference per se, but i certainly notice darker-skinned men more immediately than their lighter counterparts. but in my experience, it hasn’t played any part as to whom i actually end up dating.
Muralimannered: Not as far as I know, but I get the feeling Tollywood is still not catering to womens’ tastes when it comes to selecting male leads in the way that Bollywood does. I know there is demand for such products, but any endorsement by a Tamil actor would attract serious anger from all of the Dravidian political parties
There’s some odd color language in Telugu that I noticed: When it seems to someone that you got lighter (I really don’t think this is the case, perhaps when your complexion is clearer they perceive it as lighter?), they say that ‘rangu vocchindhi’ (you got some color). And if you got darker, ‘rangu poyindhi’ (the color left you). I’ve had this said to me when I visited India, and it doesn’t make much sense to me. Can Telugu speakers confirm/explain?; is this true in other languages as well?
Also, my mother is convinced that there’s something in the water in New York that makes me darker when I’m here and lighter when I’m in India (even though I’m out in the sun more often in India). Um, anyone else’s mothers think like this?
Finally, is anyone else willing to admit that their families/communities are color-ist? My parents have always made comments about skin color; I’ve gotten used to them. Just the other day, my mother said: “wow you look light today [nala]. did you take a shower today?” (yes yes I’m a college student, I’m allowed to be a total slob k?) Is there anyone here, though, who always tells off/educates their parents/relatives/aunties & uncles about not being colorist?
I think testosterone naturally darkens skin, so you would expect women to want a man to be darker relative to the average of the population?
there should be stupidity enhancing products on the market. an entire industry that promotes an ideal of being dumber than the next person as sexually desirable. that might be interesting…
maybe when your arround whyte people u look dark. when your around dark skinned desis you look light?
i jsut ignore them. the tastes of a 113 year old auntie barely registers on my radar in my mate selection.
Welcome to reality shows.
Where can I order this cream ASAP? I hope SAMSCLUB/COSTCO get this product so I can get a bargain.
do they make dumber people look sexually desirable due to theri supidity?
@Nala
Your reply should be: “Rangu paduddi” (Comical dialogue in a Telugu movie for – blood will flow, exact translation impossible :))..
I’ve heard the same thing in Malayalam. It sounds backwards to me- if one was getting darker, wouldn’t their ‘color’ be increasing?
well color decreasing sounds “ugly” color increasing sounds “pretty and healthy”. people think that dark = “uglyer”. therefore, color increasing = light.
once, one of my aunties introduced me to a grl who was “so pretty and fair”. her only noticable physical feature was pale skin. want at all attractive in any way, but pale, so all good.
I don’t want to get into the discussion regarding how many desis are afflicted with colorism (nice word, nala)…there’s a more serious problem here that brings out the libertarian in me.
What does bother me is that all and sundry are attacking ShahRukh because he does not conform to others’ notion of what constitutes egalitarian when it comes to physical attributes of people. Sure, maybe you don’t think that in the sixtieth year of Indian independance it is not correct to continue to extend preference of fair skin over dark one. Noble idea indeed, and more power to you. But by asking/demanding that others accept your moral code for personal preferences, you are taking the first step towards fascism. What next, a lawsuit against Khan? A ban on these products?
loucypher said: >> any endorsement by a Tamil actor would attract serious anger from all of the Dravidian political parties
See, a common trait in India is that people try solving social issues by punishment instead of reward. Why don’t these Dravidian political parties have award ceremonies for producers/directors of movies with dark skinned leads? Would’nt that be more encouraging than to punish those who don’t?
Folks who are against such products and attitudes should probably try to bring change in their own families/friends before they embark upon saving the world. When they do, they’ll find that attitudes don’t change because you want them to, but because the underlying cause has been removed. More incidents of economic success among desis will slowly erode the fascination with such products, as the potential for self-hatred is gradually reduced.
M. Nam
I’d like to bastardize Morgan Freeman’s character in Lean On Me, “I don’t have to do nothin’ but stay dark’n date-less…and die!!!”
i think hes another guy hustling for a buck. more power to him….
setting up my own fascist state was my planned retirement activity
i recommend baazi.com, now ebay.in 🙂
Criticizing SRK on a blog is the first step toward fascism? That’s a wee bit extreme, don’t you think?
this stuff cant be healthy…
Why don’t these Dravidian political parties have award ceremonies for producers/directors of movies with dark skinned leads?
Reminds me of Chris Rock’s joke:
“a nr wants credit for something that you’re supposed to do, something that a normal black man just does, a nr will say ‘I take care of my kids’, what do you want a cookie?”
how about rewarding producres and directors that choose good actors, in fact, how about rewarding an industry that makes a film about more than some girls dancing in the forest.
its a slippery slope. first step sepia mutiny. next step the world ruled by puli’s iron fist.
yes. ia gree. more s0ft c0re prn coming out of south india.
this is so f’ed up and ridiculous it’s funny. did you see how SRK lit a match off of the dude’s face? aaah!
As long as you make sure the trains run on time, Puli.
everything will run on time..i mean EVERYTHING. manditory synchronised $ex for all
forests are so 1980s – nightclubs within a set are the in thing now 🙂
Look at all the brown people on the planet. Having brown skin is no barrier to getting laid on planet earth. And I doubt 500 million guys that look like me in India spend much of their time bemoaning their brown complexion. When everyone around you is brown, how much anxiety can one tv commercial produce? What’s tough is being the one brown guy in an all white work, school, or living environment.
and suddently showing whyte peple dancing in the background in australia or swizerland or something. thats key.
this is not as easy as it sounds, puli – will we be assigned partners if we lack one?
oh yes. this will be a logistical nightmare, but my adminstration will be up to the task. you will be asigned one at the next meetup.
MoorNam: I’m certainly not suggesting that SRK should not be able to flog this product, it’s strange where you see the emergence of fascism. I do agree that head on confrontation of this pathology won’t work. The economic ascendancy of South India will probably do more than anything else to convey “Black is Beautiful”
makes mental note to attend next meetup
I just saw the commercial. The girls are really hot in it. I’d go light for them, if my Axe body spray didn’t do the trick.
LOL
BTW how many of you light skinned ones have experienced “reverse discrimination” from fellow brownies for supposedly not having a healthy glow?
well..the issue in india is that some people are slightly browner than other people. it is then rubbed in the face of the slightly browner poeple. also decreases your marriage market value. a different game out there.