India debates skin-tone bias as beauty companies alter advertisements
(WorldNews India)

Throughout the years she was growing up in southern India, Christy Jennifer, a producer with a media house in the city of Chennai, was traumatised by episodes of prejudice. As she walked through school corridors, classmates pointed at her darker skin and teased her, she said. Even friends and family members told her never to wear black. She said she was constantly advised on which skin lightening cream to use as if the remedy to this deep-seated social bias lay in a plastic bottle. “Every day, my dignity and self-esteem were reduced to the colour of my skin,” she said. “I felt a worthless piece of flesh.” Colourism, the bias against people of darker skin tones, has vexed India for a long...