'Just being white, you will win'

[QueEx]

Thai beauty ad: 'Just being white, you will win'


By Wilfred Chan, CNN

Fri January 8, 2016





(CNN)It's hard to imagine anything more blatant than this.

A new Thai beauty ad claiming white skin is the key to success has unleashed a storm of criticism in Thailand, especially online, where people complain the ad perpetuates damaging, racist ideas.

"Just being white, you will win," says Cris Horwang, a smiling pale-skinned actress, in the 50-second spot by Seoul Secret, a Thai beauty company.

Without the advertised pill, "the whiteness I have invested in, will just vanish," she warns.

Next to her, another actress looks despondent as her skin is digitally altered to turn black.


Horwang promises that the product, called Snowz, "will help you not to return to being dark."

"Eternally white, I am confident," she adds.


On Friday evening, Seoul Secret pulled the video from its online platforms and issued a statement.

"(We) would like to apologize for the mistake and claim full responsibility for this incident. Our company did not have any intention to convey discriminatory or racist messages," it said.

"What we intended to convey was that self-improvement in terms of personality, appearance, skills, and professionality (sic) is crucial."


'Really ugly'


Skin whitening products are popular in many Asian countries including Thailand.

Yet that didn't stop viewers from reacting with repulsion.

"I think it's really ugly -- I couldn't believe this kind of ad is still coming out in Thailand," Yukti Mukdawijitra, a professor of sociology and anthropology at Thailand's Thammasat University, told CNN.

Mukdawijitra said the ad reflected a pattern of racism that's existed in Thailand for "centuries," in which lighter-colored skin has been seen as a marker of privilege and status within the multi-ethnic society.

But this has been compounded by the influence of the West.

"Thai society wants to be a part of international society, so ideas of beauty are transferred from the West to Thailand as well.

"Those who look Western, those who are white, those who have bodies that look like Westerners', become preferable — in a way, people in Thailand internalize a colonial attitude into themselves."

More than a harmless aesthetic preference, this kind of thinking exacerbates social inequality, he said.

"It's fine that you prefer white colors, but it doesn't makes sense to prefer being white."

Online, commenters echoed the indignation.

"I have finished watching it. It is not ok," read a comment on a Pantip, a popular Thai internet forum. "They forced us to suck this twisted logic. Created the wrong value. Promoted the madness in being white."


SOURCE: http://www.cnn.com/2016/01/08/asia/thai-racist-white-beauty-ad/index.html

 

[muckraker10021]

White Supremacy, White Power — the implementation of a hierarchical caste system based on skin color (melanin content)

Melanin is a complex polymer derived from the amino acid tyrosine. Melanin is responsible for determining skin and hair colour and is present in the skin to varying degrees, depending on how much a population has been exposed to the sun historically. READ: THIS​

started in the 15th century (1400's). It was "legitimized" and sanctioned by the Catholic church's leader, the Pope and it continues worldwide now in this 21st century.



Beginning in the fifteenth century, (1400's) Europeans began to see the world through race—colored glasses. At first, their priests and Popes justified the new worldview as God’s law revealed to (White) Christians. By the 18th century their scientists used their racial lenses to construct racial categories for human beings, with distinct hierarchies based on religion, ethnicity and skin color. European slave—owners in the colonies created a whole legal system based on race. And by the 19th century, (1800's) politicians asserted that ‘race’ was the reason Europeans and European—Americans (Whites) deserved to run the world.

Race as a biological concept was created in 15th century Spain by the Spanish Inquisition, in 1492,
just as Columbus was sailing the ocean blue —— and getting lost —— the Christian kingdom of
Ferdinand and Isabella succeeded in driving out the Moors (African and Arab Muslims) who had
ruled the Iberian Peninsula since 721 A.D.

Under Moorish rule, Spain had been the center of European culture. The Moors built 11
universities, thousands of book stores, hot and cold running water perfumed with roses, and a
system of public baths for poor as well as rich. Moorish cities were centers of trade with Africa and
Asia. Jewish people flourished during the Moorish empire; they had major roles in education and
commerce, and were treated more justly than at any other time in European history.

But the Christian conquest changed all that. The Inquisition demanded that all Muslims and Jews
convert to Christianity or face expulsion from Spain. Many converted but practiced their religions
in secret. So the Inquisition established the infamous practice of "limpieza de sangra" testing the
blood as well as the family tree of Moors and Jews to ferret out non—Christians. One drop of
“dark” blood and you were out!

The tradition of one drop of dark blood lived on in the apartheid South. Until very recently, If you
lived in South Carolina and had 1/16 Black ancestry, you were legally classified as Black. If you
lived in Louisiana, the percentage was 1/32. So crossing state lines could change your ancestry!
Is it a coincidence that Inquisitors did their “racial blood tests” wearing long white robes and
pointed white hoods?


The Invention of the ‘White Race’
In the colonial period, colonial rulers referred to Europeans who came to the colonies as
indentured servants in a variety of ways which differentiated them from African or indigenous people.
They were called “Christians” to distinguish them from indigenous and African “heathens” or “savages.”

They were called “servants” to distinguish them from “slaves.” They were also referred to by their
country of origin (English, Scottish, etc.) to distinguish them from Africans. In early 17th
century Virginia, legal codes relating to the regulation of the working poor of all nationalities,
an African was usually called “a Negro,” followed by a name, while Europeans were simply called by
their first and last names.

Note that these distinctions were made by the rich about the poor. The land owning law makers, who
got their ‘right’ to own land and make laws for the Virginia colony by buying stock in the Virginia
Company, had no need to describe themselves. These stockholders knew who they were.

But in 1691, the colonial legislators created a new legal category:
“whatsoever English or other white man or woman, bond or free, shall intermarry with
a Negro, mulatto, or Indian man or woman, bond or free, he shall within three months be banished from this dominion forever.” ​

Up until this point, the term “white” may have been used in dialogue, but never in law. And when it
was used, it referred only to indentured servants. The 1691 law set several legal precedents that
have profoundly effected the concept of race to this day:

• The first legal use of “white” was used to ban racial intermarriage;
• The law focused the punishment on the “white” lover;
• The law created a racial category, in that it covered all white people, men and women, bond or free;
• The law distinguished “white” from all other inhabitants of the colonies: “Negro,” “mulatto,” and “Indian;”
• The law created a new synonym: English equals white. By implication, when other European
immigrants came to the colonies, they could be included in the new legal category of “white.”

Thus, a small group of colonial slave owners invented the "white race".

(For more info, see Theodore Allen, The Invention of the White Race, Racial Oppression and
Social Control. Vol. 1 and Ii. New York: Verso Books, 1994 and 1997.)

For the very few of you peeps who read non-fiction longer than 300 words, the entire 13 pages that the above is excerpted from is available HERE​