Asian skin culture

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I don't get this
He made a strawman-progressive joke comment about beauty standards being narrow-minded so I responded with this funny and presumably photoshopped strawman-progressive picture that suggests beauty standards are inherently perpetuated by, among other things, "white supremacy".
I don't see what's not to get, unless you haven't read the thread up to now.
 
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Apparently it's part of white supremacy, too!

I believe the topic is skin color, not obesity, obviously two incredibly different things. I consider the former something of a toxic mentality, and the latter, which can lead to some extraordinarily ignorant behavior in it's own right, is also understandably problematic in any society.
 
He made a strawman-progressive joke comment about beauty standards being narrow-minded so I responded with this funny and presumably photoshopped strawman-progressive picture that suggests beauty standards are inherently part of "white supremacy".
I don't see what's not to get, unless you haven't read the thread up to now.
wait wut? since when are rigid beauty standards a positive? is this is what you're implying because I don't agree.
 
White people want to be tanned/darker, dark people want to be lighter. In ye olden times in China it was considered attractive to be pale and chubby since it meant you were wealthy/not a starving peasant. Now that it is easy to get fat everyone wants to be skinny and pale. No one is happy with themselves, grass is always greener on the other side.

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Thailand's prime minister is kinda dark-skinned, must be low class~

You can get way darker thais than that.
 
don't be accusing white supremacy, they had nothing to do with any of this.


I will say this though. Under the 'standards' of beauty, some standards are pushed harder than others to become expectations.
 
There's so many umbrellas being used during a sunny day which I never saw before to protect skin.
From what I heard people using those are worried about UV. Using a sun cream even on short walks in summer has more to do with preventing skin cancer than staying whiter.
 
This is so obvious watching women's golf. Almost all the Asian player wear long sleeves and long pants, some sort of heavy sun block on their faces. The US annd Euro players will be in short shorts and sleeveless shirts.

Of course, if you look at female women golf pros who now are in their 50s or 60s, perhaps the Asians are doing it right....

Here is what I'm talking about:

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Girl on the right has on a skirt, but still long sleeves.

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Lexi Thompson

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Michelle Wie, US born


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Juli Inkster - she's 55
 
The same thing can be said about "Pure" vs. "Mixed" ethnicities in asia. The closer you are to a mix (ex. Filipino and another ethnicity) the higher chances at succeeding economically and socially.

I'm pure Filipino and it sucks that almost everyone desires for whiter skin and mixed ethnicity to get better at life but that's the nature of the game.

Eh... I don't really think that's the case for East Asia.
 
Good thing you rpovided evii- oh wait just another child.

You are right with your south korean info, but there are dark south koreans and those are the ones immediately identified and complained about by japanese people as being the ones that cause crime etc.

IN anycase, you didn't actually read my point.
I did, you messed up. Next time remember that a little tour in Asia doesn't make you any kind of authority.
 
This was a good documentary on skin color in India I found fascinating
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TT7x1BIEhY0

My wife is half Chinese and she said growing up she was never allowed to stay out in the sun to keep her skin fair, and her mother still tries to convince our daughters to keep their skin light.

It does not automatically follow though that white people are considered beautiful, many of my (wife side) relatives tell me they find pink/pale skin funny and weird and they still can't believe my wife fell in love with me.
 
This was a good documentary on skin color in India I found fascinating
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TT7x1BIEhY0

My wife is half Chinese and she said growing up she was never allowed to stay out in the sun to keep her skin fair, and her mother still tries to convince our daughters to keep their skin light.

It does not automatically follow though that white people are considered beautiful, many of my (wife side) relatives tell me they find pink/pale skin funny and weird and they still can't believe my wife fell in love with me.

thanks for the doco link. it's fascinating!

yeah my mom does same with me too. always bothering me to put whitening products on and blathering about how i am wasting away my 'whiteness'... she always says stuff like god forbid i would be mistaken as a 'maid' if my skin gets any darker and stuff like that >____>;;;;;;

and yeah, the pink tone is usually what we call 'sausage white' (maybe local slang) and isn't much prized. the tone that is desired is the alabaster one, which ideally should bring out the stark contrast against the silky smooth straight black hair. or something.

people are SUPER weeeeeeeiiirdddd when we are consumed by image-oriented superficialism.
 
Bit off topic but since we're talking about trendy asian behaviors, why the hell a lot of asians use those air pollution masks in places with no pollution, at all?
Nearly everywhere on Earth is polluted. Certainly every place that humans habitate.
 
Serious question, but why is tanning valued when in general, lighter skin is preferred?
Imo the perception is like:
Lighter skin: Sophisticated, elegant
Darker skin: sporty, sexy

Kind of matters what your going for. That's why in spite of all the cries of 'classism' here, its really mostly a beauty standard that applies just to women.
 
Imo the perception is like:
Lighter skin: Sophisticated, elegant
Darker skin: sporty, sexy

Kind of matters what your going for. That's why in spite of all the cries of 'classism' here, its really mostly a beauty standard that applies just to women.

yep, guys arent subjected to the same scrutiny. its okayer for guys to be olive toned, etc.
 
Yeah generally speaking, women suffer way more pressure to adhere to the physical "ideal."

Though, my mom did sorta mention my ex was a little dark and short (we're both Chinese, but he was a few shades darker and my height)... and I'm not sure it was a strictly ordinary observation.

yeah, same experience here bunbuns. the stigma is still there for dudes too, like one of my dude friends here from HK (who's super sheltered and rich >___>;;;;;) thought another friend was a person from less 'reputable' stock because he's darker.... >___>;;;;;

but i think women feels the pressure tenfold

blehness
 
I was out in Ginza during Golden Week today, so it was packed.

And I looked around at the shopping being done i.e. money being spent and the skin colours.

It followed the same kind of pattern as Thailand, just not as obvious.
 
From living in and being of Japanese decent,
I've always felt it was about having healthy looking skin.

The sun not touching it, preserves the skin better.
Heck my 80 year old Japanese grandmother had pretty smooth skin.

Having leathery looking skin isn't a feature that's desirable.
I think many who have leathery skin, weren't goin for that look on purpose.

Still, people most likely enjoyed themselves on the path to leathery skin.
Plus, you only live once.
 
I did, you messed up. Next time remember that a little tour in Asia doesn't make you any kind of authority.

How can I mess up with what I saw directly? It's ok to be wrong. Look seems on google you get similar stories. But of course you can't be wrong so you won't look.
 
So I've been in Asia for the last 4 months. A bunch of different countries, currently Tokyo.

One of the things that has been shocking to me is how much importance skin colour has here. Especially for women, but also for men. Almost every cosmetic store (or even convenience store with a small makeup area) is full of skin whitening products. There's so many umbrellas being used during a sunny day which I never saw before to protect skin. I met a girl that does modelling and she basically said that the first consideration for models is what your skin colour is. The next will be your physical attributes. It was a different perspective for me.

But unfortunately it doesn't seem to just be a beauty thing either. People's impression there can be based on your skin colour.

It's almost like a class system based on your skin, because according to what I was told by some people if your skin is darker it means your family may have come from a farming or low socioeconomic background, so you are considered a lower class then a someone with a whiter skin.

And it does seem to match with what you normally see. Especially in countries like Thailand where the people in formal clothing going into office buildings tended to all be whiter skinned while people in the lower socio-economic jobs tended to be darker skinned. So maybe it is a class system, which is so silly as how can you control your skin genetics.

I am a pale guy. I'm 1 step above vampire lol. I hate wasting time tanning when I can be working or socializing and I'm also worried about skin cancer, so try to use sunblock whenever I'm at the beach. I got constant compliments on my skin colour more then anything else here, it's a weird thing to be complimented on, especially coming from the West where a good tan tends to be more sought after.

What are your thoughts on this?

Also I'm not sure if this is a thing in every Asian country, but it was in Japan, Hong Kong, China, and Thailand. I wasn't looking for it in Singapore so not sure there.

It varies by nationality and also where they're dwelling. I'm half white and asian and a lot of older asian women who are recent immigrants (30+) always compliment me on my fair skin. I use moisturizer after every shower and try not to get too much sun. Asian women and girls who grew up here in the US couldn't care less. I also never met a Japanese person who cared - though I guess that's because they're largely light skinned anyways.
 
Asians aspired for fairer skin long before they encountered any Caucasians, just saying to negate any colonial fantasies
 
A friend of mine stopped by earlier while I was watching Taeyeon's "I" on Youtube and he was legit shocked; it made me think of this thread. I guess he was never really exposed to real Asian culture and he didn't know that Asians in Asia favored light skin or even had it. He only saw the Asians they show on US TV which are usually fairly dark-skinned and most of the time completely interchangeable regardless of their origins. He also thought she was "like 19" when Taeyeon is actually 27. Asians often have rounder, softer faces which make them appear more youthful to begin with; pair that with the lack of sun damage and they really can look a lot younger than they are. I mean look at what the sun did to that 55 year-old golfer from a few posts up; she looks more like 75 if I were guessing.
 
If I had 1 wish it would be to make everyone brown.

What a really strange thing to say. You didn't say "the same color", you instead specifically chose "brown". Are you "brown"? Do you think "brown" people are better than others for some reason? And in any case if you wanted all people to be the same color thinking that it would somehow prevent conflicts, then you're sadly mistaken. Tutsi vs Hutu, Sunni vs Shiite and so forth; men have shown throughout History that they don't need to look different to find reasons to fight each other.

Personally I like the various ethnicities and skin tones found on our planet. If everybody looked the same it would be pretty boring I'd wager.
 
Boss★Moogle;203723367 said:
What a really strange thing to say. You didn't say "the same color", you instead specifically chose "brown". Are you "brown"? Do you think "brown" people are better than others for some reason? And in any case if you wanted all people to be the same color thinking that it would somehow prevent conflicts, then you're sadly mistaken. Tutsi vs Hutu, Sunni vs Shiite and so forth; men have shown throughout History that they don't need to look different to find reasons to fight each other.

Personally I like the various ethnicities and skin tones found on our planet. If everybody looked the same it would be pretty boring I'd wager.

you chose a poor first example, tutsi vs hutu 'differences':

The Tutsi, or originally Cushite, people migrated to Rwanda from the southern Ethiopian highlands, and were much taller and thinner in physique than the Bantu or Twa...

After World War I, Belgium was given control over Rwanda. The Belgians increased the divide between the Hutus and Tutsis through the use of the eugenics, which was rather popular at the time (i.e. Nazi Germany). Skull measurements showing larger brain size, greater height, and lighter skin tones all reaffirmed the Tutsis’ superiority over the Hutus, by providing proof of their apparent greater purity and closer ancestry to Europeans.
 
Asians aspired for fairer skin long before they encountered any Caucasians, just saying to negate any colonial fantasies

is it possible that it has also changed into something more? Cultural domination of the east by the west isn't an imaginary thing. They just decided to do it with coca-cola bottles instead of MK-81s.

I mean, protecting your fair skin if you are fair is one thing. but the idea that you have to be fair to get ahead, where did that come from?
 
was definitely weird for me seeing most of the women using umbrellas in blistering sunshine when I visited china. Although I actually started doing it myself some days because it was so hot and I burn very easily.

Most on my chinese friends though actually don't care, one of them was telling me today she is looking forward to getting a tan this summer.
 
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