A conversation last night kept me up until dawn…that and the LSATs that I’m probably going flunk. My girlfriend keeps telling me one simply cannot ‘fail’ the test, we will see.

One of my good friend, Lu, was given a sample of whitening cream by a beauty assistant of a cosmetic shop. Lu is a Caucasian beauty who teaches at an international school in Bangkok. Her skin’s default color is white. At her tannest, I am at least two shades darker than she is. Clearly, the woman does not need any more whitening than genetically provided.

Whitening cream, or rather being ‘white’ aka pale skinned, is a big thing over here in Thailand, a country which is five degrees above the equator and exposed to sunshine 365 days a year. If your skin scores very close to white on the color chart, the more you can feel rightfully beautiful about yourself. A stereotypical t.v. commercial usually narrates a story of a beautiful honey skinned girl looking defeated when comparing her skin to the other, sometimes less attractive, girl whose skin is almost translucent when coming in contact with the sun. Her paper skin friend then proceeds to reveal her ‘secret’ which is a whitening cream. After using it, the insecure beauty blooms into a fluorescent light bulb. She checks herself out in the mirror and reveres at her q-tip white skin. As she is walking with her friend, giggling at nothing in particular down the street, guys turn their heads and are awe struck by how beautiful she is. The scene is blurred and fades.

Such is a norm for whitening cream product in Thailand ever since I could remember. We have been told by asshole advertisers that our natural skin is not good enough. In fact, to have this color of skin is actually downright ugly regardless of how well structured your face, how proportionate your body, or whether you are a kindhearted person. If you are tan, then you are fucked. But all hope is not lost they say before handing you a whitening cream. They convince you that if you buy the product, you will feel just like that pretty girl in the commercial. They promise you a life of eternal bliss in a flowing pink dress followed by a train of superficial and equally vain men. The irony is that this scheme works like magic.

Associating pale skin with being beautiful has become the norm. A friend of mine, whose face and body are as alluring as Venus herself, told a story of a guy she liked back in college. They were good friends at Law School. She was attracted to him, but was too shy to make a move. Some time after, he confessed he had feelings for her, but he was ashamed to walk with her as his girlfriend because of her skin color, which is tan and envied by most of our foreign friends who live in Thailand due precisely to its summery appeal. As a testament to Thai education, her almost lover was a graduate of class 2010 of the best university in Thailand.

There is a saying among Thai men describing qualities they look for in a girlfriend. Literally, it says; white, beautiful, Chinese-looking, voluptuous (exclusively refers to breasts and butts). Two of these preconditions resonate the importance of being pale skinned. Chinese looking women are greatly appreciated for their smooth pale skin first, and their tiny physiques second. If one can have a girl who ticks all the boxes by his side, his ego would be rubbed the right way and he would walk with his head held high.

Being pale skinned is an appearance thing, as well as a status thing. Looking back, dark skin was greatly associated with slaves or workers. This is due to the nature of the work slaves and laborers do, and the fact that most of people who can afford labor in Bangkok were minority Chinese, or of Chinese descent. Consequently, it implies that if your skin is dark, chances are you are probably not very rich. And being rich means having more opportunities and access to the fancy world of the conceited and the prejudice.

It is mind blowing to think that one would use the other’s skin color as a parameter for so many things; beauty, financial status, educational background, and, in some cases, even character. What we are, to others, are not usually what we do, but rather how we look. Too often of times, this society treats fellow humans in accordance to their skin color and value their efforts to be somebody else.