I recently read, with no small measure of demurral, an op-ed penned by Joy-Tendai Kangere about the wrongdoings of fake tan users.
Wearing fake tan in my opinion can look a bit silly, but I think people should be allowed to do it if they want.
After all they’re not harming anyone except themselves, and maybe their bedsheets.
But is it true that, “hopping on a sunbed or slapping on fake tan reinforces racism and self-hatred”?
I remember a colleague in a previous life used to be keen on her tan. Some days she would arrive late and wouldn’t have had the time to match her face to her bronzed body.
I can’t help but remember her as looking like a teletubby – Po to be specific. A ruddy body with a pale face sticking out like a beacon, paired with hands stained brown beyond recognition. Her body was a tricolour to the fraught nature of keeping up with all that.
But was her love of tanning products problematic? Was she committing the cardinal sin of ‘cultural appropriation’? Are people like her reinforcing racism?
The idea that, as Kangere puts it, “People can choose when they want to look white, and when they do not without having to experience the trauma that is faced by black and brown people” is somewhat confusing.
Trauma? Does having darker skin cause trauma? It hasn’t traumatised my Pakistani relatives. In fact none of my close friends and family who have darker complexions than indigenous Europeans feel traumatised by their skin colour. I don’t think most of them spend a whole lot of time thinking about their skin colour – let alone viewing it as some kind of impediment to perceived beauty as Kangere seems to assert:
“black features – such as dark skin, big lips, wide noses, and afro hair – are often used to justify the idea that black people are not beautiful, are inferior or even subhuman.” she says.
Kangere says tanning became popular “in the 1920s when Coco Chanel caught too much sun on a Mediterranean cruise”. Is Coco Chanel partly responsible for popularising decades of cultural appropriation and reinforcing racism? Or did people just think she looked beautiful and all aglow after getting a nice bit of sun on her holidays?
Let us not forget that white people do have a natural ability to tan…it’s just not super sunny in northern Europe so it makes more sense to use the fake stuff. Also sunburn can be extremely painful as I discovered after neglecting to put on enough lotion last time I visited Jeju island.
Also the assertion that people can change their racial look by modifying their skin colour, or trying to ‘appropriate’ another race’s features is just absurd. Case in point Racheal Dolezal who masqueraded as a half African American, even becoming a professor of African studies at Eastern Washington University, for years before being found out to have been born a pale strawberry blonde girl with freckles.
Or the Japanese woman who now goes by the name Vanilla-chan who has spent over 100,000 on cosmetic procedures to look like a French doll. Well, to be frank she doesn’t look like she’s French yet – or a doll. She looks like an Asian woman who’s had a shed load of cosmetic surgery.
Oli London is another example of someone attempting to physically morphe into another race. The British internet-personality has had multiple surgeries to make himself look ‘Korean’ – spoiler alert he hasn’t achieved his goal – My feeling is that the majority of Korean people don’t really care. They’d probably just have a giggle, feel sorry for him, and move on with their lives.
This whole argument about cultural appropriation seems so….petty to me. I once met a Japanese man who imported Aran jumpers in Japan. I remember my exact thoughts being ‘Oh lovely’ and having warm fuzzy feelings about Japanese people being kept toasty by our native geansai during the cool winters.
The thing is that human nature – you know that thing we all have in common – practically dictates that we desire and aspire towards things that we do not naturally possess. Add marketing to the mix and BOOM: we get our multi-billion dollar cosmetic industry.
Is dying your hair red culturally appropriating the unique heritage of Ireland and Scotland?
Is darkening and expanding your eyebrows to look like Cara Delevingne actually appropriating the racial features of people from the Indian Subcontinent?
I think this whole argument is part of that pearl-clutching ‘how dare you’ outrage trend that has been going on for a few years now. People are encouraged to fence themselves into ever narrowing boxes – ironically for the purpose of inclusivity.
Isn’t it weird that the very people who see nationalism as the new ‘N’ word are the ones who often seem to espouse a kind of cultural puritanicalism? The kind that become incensed if non-Mexicans wear Sombreros to taco-night. They seem to love finding new ways to control what people should and should not do – ironically – with their own bodies.
I don’t really know a whole lot about Joy-Tendai Kangere, so my comments are not directly aimed at her, but I find this whole thing quite bizarre. A lot of people on the left of the political aisle act like cultures shouldn’t naturally bleed into one another, and yet many of them don’t believe in borders?
I’ve never understood the outrage that surrounds people of other races wearing dreadlocks for example. Although I did find it slightly ‘confusing’ to see Korean girls wearing du rags on nights out in Seoul.
On St. Patrick’s Day half the world can be seen wearing Leprechaun hats, many with fake ginger beards attached. Not to mention that there is reason to believe ginger people are an endangered species, but I’m not sure if this is seen as problematic?
As a mixed race person I think a huge amount of this pettiness comes from ethnic minority groups living in western countries. Japanese people – to a large extent – appreciate when foreigners recognize the beauty of their traditional clothing and artistry – and by golly there is much to appreciate!
Having travelled quite a lot and had the great opportunity to meet people from all around the world I have very rarely, if ever, come across anyone offended by people liking or wanting to try something that is associated with their culture – in fact I’d say the opposite is true.
My final point is this – I highly doubt Irish girls (or anyone for that matter) who use fake tan are actively trying to look like they’re from a different race or nationality, and the idea that they are is frankly kind of silly….
In an ideal world we’d all be perfectly happy with the way we were made, and fake tan, skin lightening products, heck even makeup and hair dye might not be a thing, but an ideal world, this is not.
If going through a heap of trouble to keep your tan topped up is what counts as racism or culturally problematic behaviour today, I’d say we’ve come a long way.