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The roots of the fairness fetish in South Asia can be traced back to a number of historical periods, though none are definitive. Vaid (2009) explores several possibilities – the British colonial presence in India; the upper class Aryan (Caucasian) invaders from Central Asia; and the mention of caste and culture (the same word in Sanskrit – varna) in Hindu Vedic texts – as being at the root of reinforcing an association between fair skin and social status.
Whatever its roots, in South and Southeast Asia and now increasingly in Africa, beauty is equated with fair skin. In media messages everywhere, light-skinned women and men are poised as the standard of beauty, success and happiness.
This study examines the evolution of television advertisements for fairness creams in Bangladesh over a 20-year period (1988 to 2008), specifically those of Anglo-Dutch multinational corporation Unilever’s Fair & Lovely (F&L), which is the market leader in that country. It begins with the assumption that fairness cream advertisements are racist, sexist and misleading in their messages with regards to the health implications of the product. It then explores the issue of how, despite being so, these adverts continue to run, and how these products continue to be popular among consumers and profitable to the producers. A close look at the advertisements – which apparently change with the times – as well as at the actions taken by F&L and Unilever over the decades, reveal how the company, in order to counter criticism about the possible negative health implications of its product and the racist and sexist overtones of its commercials, has created an illusion of the cream and an image of the brand/company as being a means of empowerment for women.