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Indian Legion presents to you Voice of The Wild, an...
“Beauty is in the skin! Take care of it, oil it, clean it, scrub it, perfume it, and put on your best clothes, even if there is no special occasion, and you'll feel like a queen. If society is hard on you, fight back by pampering your skin. Skin is political.”
― Fatima Mernissi
Skin is one of the most important and enigmatic parts of our body, not only because it protects the all of us but also because it is one of the five sense organ and in the society of today, it’s our identity.
According to biology, the skin is composed of three different layers viz., the epidermis (the outermost layer), dermis (the middle one) and subcutis (the base layer). The epidermis consists mainly of cells called keratinocytes which also builds the hair and nail.
The epidermis also contains the defensive Langerhans cells that activate the immune system of the body. The dermis contains collagen and elastin that gives the organ strength and elasticity. The blood vessels and the nervous system present there do their wonderful job of temperature regulation and reception-sensing respectively. The dermis also contains various glands. The subcutis contains the layer of fats that acts as the fuel reserve during a shortage of energy.
And this biology applies to every human being walking on the planet, irrespective of their colour, caste, creed, religion, region and every sort of categorization that comes in our mind. It is an integral part of our living system.
The colour differentiation in the skin of a human is due to melanin, a pigment produced in the epidermis to protect us from the sun's potentially cancer-causing ultraviolet (UV) rays. Dark-skinned people produce more numerous and deeper-coloured melanin particles than white-skinned people, and it is again nature’s perfection and protection that the people descendant of the northern latitudes are usually fair-skinned and that of the equatorial zone, where the regions are more susceptible to sunlight are dark-skinned.
Now tell me, when we are created with the utmost care in the soft hands of Mother Nature, who are we to fight amongst ourselves? Who are we to outcast another being just due to the colour of our skin?
According to Wikipedia, “Discrimination based on skin colour, also known as colourism or shadeism, is a form of prejudice or discrimination in which people who are usually members of the same race are treated differently based on the social implications which come with the cultural meanings which are attached to skin colour.”
Several meta-analyses on this global topic have recovered that 90% of the countries still go through the faith of colour racism, were of course the lighter shades are considered to be beautiful.
The young adults and teen girls are more prone to these racial bullies conducted in both private and public places and the irony is the society is in the dilemma of beauty within the whites while making black a trend.
Walking down the lanes of history, we can see that the European colonization in Northern Africa and Native American has created a system of racial hierarchy and race-based ideology. This structure of domination has earned the privilege of whites over the black. There was a time when the intensity of the labour was dependent on the colour of the slave.
This colour thing has had a powerful effect in the fields of politics, economy, arts, science, education, business, law and every field you can think of.
This simple organ meant for our protection has created havoc in the pages of past: Apartheid, Black is beautiful, Black Lives Matter, Black nationalism, Black Power, Black Power movement, Colonial mentality, Ethnic penalty, Italian Fascism, Racism and Racial Laws, Nazism and race, Orientalism, Racial fetishism, Racial hierarchy, Sino centrism, Tanorexia, Völkisch movement, White Australia policy, Racial transformation of Michael Jackson and Yellow Peril to name a few.
We need to understand that it is just a stupid, selfish fight on the grounds of colour. All colours are beautiful and are needed to complete a beautiful picture. Your skin is beautiful, not a paper. Don’t hurt it. Don’t cut it. Wear it like your crowns, for you are the queen of your own world. Stand tall and proud of it. Take care of it, nourish it. Wear it. Decorate it. You are beautiful the way you are. Let’s celebrate this 2021 by taking pride in colours. After all, they are our colours.
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