The following is an essay I wrote for an original lit reading for the Washington Literary Society and Debating Union.
I have come to the uncomfortable realization that perhaps the only I can get myself to produce tangible works--or really do anything productive--is to have deadlines imposed on me. I'm trying this new thing where I impose deadlines on myself. We'll see where that goes.
In any case, this tangent is completely unrelated to the peace below, which is basically about my struggle with my color and identity:
I have come to the uncomfortable realization that perhaps the only I can get myself to produce tangible works--or really do anything productive--is to have deadlines imposed on me. I'm trying this new thing where I impose deadlines on myself. We'll see where that goes.
In any case, this tangent is completely unrelated to the peace below, which is basically about my struggle with my color and identity:
Coming to Terms
The other day, my friend informed me that Gandhi was a racist. I stared at her, briefly befuddled.
“Stop joking around here,” I said abruptly, rather annoyed at her outlandish statement.
“No, it’s true,” my friend insisted. “Someone told me that Gandhi was racist against black people!”
“Well, if your sources are that credible…” I smirked, trying to write her statement off. But her assertion really nagged at me; later that night, I Googled “Was Gandhi a racist?” and despaired at the results: 1.89 million in .14 seconds. Reading into the complex history of Gandhi, I discovered that he strove for equality and encouraged peaceful protest—but mainly for Indians. He seemed to regard Africans as “lesser” peoples. Devastated, I was suddenly reminded of my own struggle with racism.
When I was younger, my awareness of my skin color was all positive. I proudly displayed my arm against my friends’ milky-white arms and laughed as they complained about tanning and peeling skin. My skin was a part of my culture, and I loved my Indian identity so much that I used to tell my classmates I was born in India—I was actually born in Maryland. Being simply American was too blasé and just not cultured enough for me. But I remember when my awareness took a negative turn.
I went to India a few summers ago with my father. One day, we decided to go pick up my cousin from school. As my cousin came out of the school gates, I immediately noticed something was wrong with him. He hung his head down low and wordlessly climbed into our rickshaw.
“Vivek, what’s wrong?” I asked gently. He couldn’t hold himself in any longer; he burst out sobbing about how in school today the other boys called him an “ugly crow,” and wouldn’t let him play soccer with them at recess. My father, darker than me, began angrily expounding on racism in India and how he had been ostracized as a child as well. He left friend after friend as they inevitably made disparaging comments about his color. “If you’re too dark, they pretend not to see you,” he finished. I held my cousin close; holding back tears myself, I noted how dark I was—and for the first time in my life, I was upset with what I saw.
Obsession with light skin is so extreme and overt in India that many people use a skin-lightening cream called Fair and Lovely. The advertising campaign for the cream features depressed, dark-skinned (and sometimes pockmarked) women who cannot seem to get the attention of the men they’re interested in, or even get basic respect in society. They lack self-confidence, and to rectify this problem, they turn to Fair and Lovely. Over the next few weeks, their quality of life increases exponentially with the lightness of their skin. The product is now sold in over 30 countries worldwide, including across the Middle East and in Africa. It promises to reverse “sun-exposure related darkening, oily, and rough appearance.” So, to translate, being dark-skinned means to be a dirty, unkempt, unconfident and inadequate person.
There is a pervasive undertone in Indian society that being light-skinned is a prerequisite for beauty and attractiveness that Fair and Lovely has taken advantage of and reinforced. Mothers tell their children not to play out in the sun too long and get too dark. Indian matrimonial ads highlight women’s “wheatish” complexions alongside their educational qualifications. Indian actors and models are dazzlingly light-skinned, with few exceptions…I came to the awful realization recently that when I was younger, my mother bought me Fair and Lovely to use. I didn’t think much of it; I suppose I thought it had to do more with health and wellness rather than complexion-alteration. And that’s the problem. Racism in India is not addressed as “racism” by fellow Indians. It is more of a subtle way of life.
Being dark-skinned is not only unattractive, it is usually representative of one’s social status in India. The darkest-skinned in Indian society are generally given the status of “untouchable.” Although the caste system has technically been illegalized, people still know what caste they belong to. For example, I am a Brahmin. It has always baffled me that, although I am so dark, I belong to the “highest” caste. Despite my family’s upper-middle-class standing and levels of education, I still feel inadequate when out in public. I realize it’s irrelevant, illogical, and backwards of me to feel this way, but in India, my caste gives me a sense of validation that lessens my qualms about my darkness.
I really do love going to India, but whenever I’m there, my awareness of my skin color always lurks in the back of my mind. It’s a horrible and frustrating sense of inadequacy, and I can logically tell myself that this is ridiculous and that I should define myself solely by the content of my character. But sometimes my head can’t reason with my heart, and facing constant overtures of racism really decrease my feelings of self-worth.
This is why reading about Gandhi’s racism bothered me so deeply. I made elementary-school projects about Gandhi-ji, and I was proud to have him represent the face of India. His wise, kindly old face graces the cover of every single rupee note and coin. His name is constantly evoked by Indian politicians and even in Bollywood movies. But really, Gandhi also measured the value of people by an arbitrary characteristic like ethnicity. His idea for peaceful protest was great, and radical, sure, but he has been blown up and put on a pedestal by the Indian government and the rest of the world. Peaceful protest leaders around the world like Martin Luther King, Junior looked to Gandhi’s example, probably unaware of that Gandhi viewed Africans as an inferior class of people. As a chocolate-colored Indian who has struggled with racism, it pierces me especially deeply that the father of India held such racist views himself.
I am still grappling with my own conceptions of race and identity. I am still proud of being Indian and having a “culture,” but I won’t let myself get bogged down by traditions and social norms when they conflict with ideas of what I know is right. I will try to confront these issues head on. Rather than seething quietly when my relatives admire a person’s “wheatish complexion,” I will question their reasoning and try to facilitate conversation. Because that’s really the only way such a deep rooted issue can be approached. The Indian government and other promotional organizations refrain from acknowledging Gandhi’s extremely paradoxical inconsistencies in character, and shroud him in cloak of grandeur. They only serve to exacerbate the problem of “subtle” racism by refusing to even recognize it, and by refusing to recognize Gandhi’s flaws, make life more difficult for a large number of citizens who share my complexion.
I don’t know how, but somehow I have got to speak up about color issues in India. This will be a difficult task for me, as I am sometimes even uncomfortable discussing the issue with my relatives. I don’t want them to look at me differently and wonder if I am constantly undermining and second-guessing myself because of my color, because that is not true. I don’t want to be seen as weak, whiny, or oversensitive. I in return do not want to make others uncomfortable discussing the topic. But I’ve got to. I need to stop biting my tongue and start talking, start trying to dig out the reasons for these deep-rooted issues. I know one thing: I want to save future generations from racism.
Note: My cousin just sent me this article about a movie due to come out this winter, titled "Dark Girls." Highlights some of the issues I raised; seems like it's going to be a good movie! http://vimeo.com/24155797
