Filipina Beauty: The “White Skin” Standard (Part 2)

Author's Note: This article was reposted in the GMA News Online website. You may read the post, here. This is the second part of the article, make sure you read the first part, here).

  In the past, beauty used to be a rare find. Now, it’s different. Everywhere we look, we can find beautiful faces. Our narcissistic and image-conscious culture is further amplified; thanks to the television, Facebook, and the ever-reliablePhotoshop. Now all of us can receive jackets from Willie Revillame.

Clearly, beauty has its benefits. It makes one attractive to the opposite sex. It sells magazines. It gets high TV ratings. Beautiful people lure us into a purchase. Nothing sells better than an impossibly gorgeous face.

I am not amenable on how Pinoys mock Binay's complexion.
She doesn't deserve the position because of her inexperience; not because of her color.

 Beauty can win pageants. It can make the masses vote for someone undeserving. It makes one famous. And could even be a ticket to win a political seat.

But the sad thing is, the Pinoy’s fascination with the standard of ‘unattainable’ beauty makes everyone miserable and discontented. In a country where majority are genetically influenced by our brown Malay forefathers, for some, scouring and scrubbing their colors off seem not enough. Our well-off ladies go a notch higher in attaining beauty through bleaching and other surgical operations.

 

Rhinoplasty, skin bleaching, facelift, breast lift, face peel, tummy tuck, and what-have-you -  just to make themselves happy about their appearance. For me, it seems that they are fixing parts of themselves that were never broken in the first place. But maybe it’s human nature. It’s that part of us that can’t seem to be satisfied with things we have.

But now it makes me wonder: with the grand slam win of the Philippines by winning all the international beauty pageants, does it change our perception towards those we call “black beauties”? Because most of these beauty titlists don’t possess the mestiza looks our society prefers. I don’t know. But one thing is sure though, in some ways, our international pageant wins let us realize that foreigners appreciate the natural beauty of our Malay race; which we fail to do so.

I’m no fashion-slash-beauty police but I guess we just have to be comfortable in your own skin instead of trying to change it. Indeed, it is a personal issue but hopefully Filipinas would learn to love and accept things as they are. For one, our brown complexion is a beautiful hue of hide without blemishes and freckles unlike with those of the whites. Our flat noses come in handy, too. Especially for boxing where we don’t get broken noses. (Maybe that makes us good boxers? I still have to ask Manny Pacquiao on that).

I believe we don’t need to look foreign to be considered beautiful. That’s why I commend Pinays who are content with their skin color or their noses. My mom, I believe, is an example. She may not be a title holder but I have always admired her strength, kindness, dedication, and compassion. She is not fair-skinned but she has the qualities that last a lifetime.

My Mama Grace.

This may be a cheesy way of ending an article, but the truth is we have to focus on the more important things. True beauty is not skin-deep; it is timeless, and it doesn’t expire.