There is absolutely a value system based on color of skin. It is impacted by dominating definitions of beauty. Here, I’m not discussing whether “Asian girls are hotter than White girls” or “Latino guys are better looking than Black guys.” Here, I’m talking about the essentially random valuation we put upon people within our racial groups, based on the shades of their skin, not based on their ethnic identity.

I most closely know the issue of skin color hierarchies in two contexts: Dark and Light.

Orange you glad? American tanorexia.
In today’s gossip blog culture, the word “tanorexic” is thrown around a lot by fabulous men and women who wish to refer to their marked orange-ness with a bit of tongue-in-cheek don’t-care-but-I-do attitude. As far as I can tell, it’s a primarily American thing, very blogger-making-fun-of-Hollywood-while-instilling-inconsequential-word-into-standard-American-lexicon. When I say it’s a primarily American thing, I also mean that it applies to those of biologically fairer skin tones. I mostly hear stuff like “Oh my God, I need to tan,” from Caucasian and Asian acquaintances. It’s a melanin thing. I don’t think I’ve ever heard a Black person say anything relating to needing or wanting to tan.

The orange movement seems to stem from America’s hot spots for trends. The two that come most to mind are Hollywood and South Beach, where the regions’ reputations are for beaches and overall leisurely lifestyles. The tanorexic culture communicates status through skin color. One could argue that they’re trying to imitate jet-setting lifestyles, as if their tans are from being sunkissed by the golden rays on St. Tropez, and not just from lying on the beds at the tanning salon on Melrose. Even if it wasn’t a “I live lavishly and travel to regions along the equator all the time” thing, it’s an “I’m exotic” thing.

Tanorexia has been a very beachy standard of beauty for decades long before the word came along. And it’s just that, some random group of people’s agreed-upon standard of beauty. (Worth a side note, I finally got around to starting Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point.) This specific beauty in hue was started by dwellers in regions that got just the right amount of attention to become a more or less larger, national trend. Darker is better.

Life Overseas: Pure white light.
Anywhere you go, the standard of beauty in that region is relative to its people. It’s based upon the faces and features it’s seen, which explains why one region’s preference is typically not the same as another’s from halfway around the world. Of course globalization has changed this, but I don’t have time to get into that. Maybe later, okay? Rain check.

In the summer before college I was flown off to Shanghai, China, where I was supposed to get immersed in Mandarin and come back a competent and confident fluent speaker. The second I landed, I was smacked in the face with eight weeks of culture shock. Gender treatment was different, air quality was different, being part of a truly dominant racial majority was different, and standards of beauty were different.

Shopping was also different. Generally any time you go shopping outdoors, you can haggle prices. Department stores have the usual non-haggle system, but prices were still cheaper. (This was also 2002, when U.S. dollar c

onversions were actually worth something, albeit only somewhat.) I picked up some cool things that give me the ability to respond “Oh, I got it in China…” when people coo over them, but the one thing I really wanted to bring home with me from all that shopping was an image.

I have distinct memories of rows and rows of whitening agents displaying themselves in designated impulse buy areas where self-tanners would be in American malls. Whitening powders, lotions, tonics, and pills. No such brown bottles as Banana Boat or instant tans. We’re dealing with a whole different world of skin color value. Lighter is better.

Deeper into lighter being better.
A lot of Ethnic Studies critics like to say that other races are trying to lighten their skin because they’re trying to be White, but that’s nearly entirely neglecting the cultural values already in place by those cultures.

Shanghai’s obsession with clear, light skin isn’t as simple as white/light being totally devoid of pimples, blemishes, or other irregularities. Ironically, it communicates in the same way the tanorexic movement does. In numerous cultures, girls with lighter skin tones were perceived as rich. They didn’t have to go outside because they didn’t do farmwork. Since they didn’t do work, it was also implied that their skin would be soft. Light also meant pure, rooted to times when virginity was so important before marriage. *cough* BristHole *cough* Feminine expectations all around!

With African Americans, skin color has taken a couple of different routes, thanks to history. As a probable result of interracial relationships and the privileges afforded to those offspring, some people value lighter skin. (See Cane River. Or Beyonce.) On the other end of the spectrum, the Black Power movement also created a camp of aesthetic thought that Black is Beautiful. Should go without saying, but Black is Beautiful is more of a celebration of color and individuality, whereas the tanorexic movement is more about status. (Other races? I don’t have a lot of experience to speak upon.)

It’s a bit of a trip to think that some people use their skin color as a way to communicate class or status. Not everyone has the biological malleability to “go” light or dark. It’s a really strange form of access because it is at once natural and exclusive. It’s a standard situation of individuals not being dealt the same cards. Since the reality is that people pass judgments on you based on your skin color, it turns into a situation of not starting out on a level playing field.

Editor’s Note: I just started contributing to the new minority issues media blog, That Minority Thing. As of this writing, they have quite a few typos on their site, so please, just give them the benefit of the doubt – “They’re in ‘beta.’”