Onumba.com, USA ——— It is a common convention in Igbo society to highlight a woman’s light-skin color first and foremost as the pillar of her beauty and elegance. Then the other attributes would follow. I have never fully understood the reason for that.
But growing up in Igbo culture, it was often generally underscored as the basis for a woman’s pulchritude. 
Odi ocha! Translation. She is light-skinned.
Odi oji. Translation. She is dark-skinned.
Here’s the kicker, though. Being dark-skinned is rarely, perhaps never the foremost attribute that describes a woman who is pretty and elegant. But it is not pointedly used to knock it, either. Let’s just say, in these weird calculations, it is often left alone. Phrased a bit differently. A dark-skinned woman could be drop dead gorgeous, but rarely would her skin color be credited for that.
Taken together, none of this stuff should really matter, quite frankly, but unfortunately, it appears that eons of colonial indoctrination, post-colonial psychological ravages and the media’s bombardment of images in commercials (in subtle ways) promoting the supremacy of white skin ——- have converged to nourish the masochist belief that being light-skinned is a Black woman’s straightest path to the epitome of beauty. But that’s a crock of baloney. Slice it any kind of way, this practice is an embodiment of colossal vanity wrapped up in a mindless pursuit of ersatz look.
Why they bleach
Check this out. This memorable encounter encapsulates the dizzying height of the foolishness feeding this god-awful practice. One African woman recently laid bare her repertoire of ignorance saying, among other outrageous utterances, that she bleaches her skin to “gain confidence in herself.” Let that sink in for a moment. If that’s not super unhinged, I don’t know what is. Of course, and sadly, it is a sentiment shared by the entire community of Nigerian skin bleachers. Try wrapping your mind around the connotation of that sentiment on the flip side. It essentially peddles the notion that our God endowed dark-skin is a curse and a butcher of confidence. Now, convey that same message to your 15-year-old daughter, and let me know how that’s working out for you.
Numbers don’t cap
Statistics show that “77” percent of Nigerian women indulge in skin bleaching supposedly to look more attractive. But forget statistics for now. To allay a possible pushback from some who might question the validity of that figure, the truth is that the ubiquity of anecdotal evidence easily bears that out with statistics only serving to confirm it.
Then there’s the other truth. Morphing into pale yellow does not make Nigerian women more attractive as they seem to ignorantly believe. That is straight up delusion with a generous sprinkle of childishness on steroid. It is a monumental farce. Please, understand me. Sure, it does a great job lightening your skin, but has anyone ever told you that beauty is much more than just skin color? Please ma’am, your skin color is not to blame for your unattractive appearance and therefore quit treating the wrong disease. Get it for a change. Heck —- If anything, women who bleach their skin take on a cheap and phony look quicker than you can say “brand new second-hand girl.” Mgbeke, so to speak. All it does, quite frankly, is swap your appearance from elegant and sophisticated black to tacky and tasteless pale yellow. The cold hard truth is that it does not enhance your look. Sorry to burst your little bubble.
Skin bleaching is a fool’s errand
So, dig this. Skin bleaching is the quickest pathway for Nigerian women to wreck their natural beauty, mess up their vibe, ruin their built-in glow, peel off their elegance and shatter their innate sophistication. In short, it is a grand potpourri of pure vanity, physical annihilation and a heap of insult on the Black race. The foolishness rooted in this opprobrious practice is staggeringly insulting to our forefathers and foremothers out of which we emerged.
Let’s look at it from another dimension. Skin bleaching is tantamount to shouting in the public: I hate my skin; therefore, I hate my race. I hate who I am. But the truth is, beauty can be found in all skin colors, and no race, ethnicity or region has a monopoly of it. And then there’s the depressing matter of these women often looking like an ugly jambalaya of fading colors, visible indication of gaps in the application of the cream. At a quick glance, it would look as though it was evenly applied. That is until you look closer, particularly at the fingers and back of the ear, to realize that these women look darker than coal.
A look at the logic of it
But if you are still not convinced, this might help. If we adopt your belief to be true that being light-skinned unleashes the attractive look in you, then logically, it must also be true that all white women, all light-skinned women who are not white, all of them, are attractive. You really don’t believe that, do you?. Now, are you beginning to embrace just how juvenile, absurd and illogical that sounds? The truth is, a concourse of Caucasian women is obviously not beautiful, yet they look whiter than an Idaho picket fence. A little caveat, though, beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
There’s enough blame to go around
True, some are quick to fault the media for this deepening mess. The twin evil of colonialism and slavery are on the hook as well. But while some of that argument deserve some merit, for the most part, however, it is a hogwash, because at the end of the day, ‘it is not what they call you that matters, but what you answer to.’
