I’m not in the best of moods today and I have this irresistible urge to lash out at something. I think I will just go ahead and slam this commercial that runs constantly on Arabic satellite channels. It is a well-crafted ad for a lotion that makes women "fair" and "lovely."
I personally think this ad should be banned due to its racist nature. Arab Women activists — if they really care — should follow in the footsteps of their counterparts in India and get this advertisement banned forever.
For those who have not seen the ad, here is the gist of it: A women who is ‘not that white’ decides to become "fair and lovely" by applying this lotion to her face. After she becomes "lovely" she gets a job as an interviewer on an Arabic satellite channel. The ad concludes with the woman’s mom shedding tears of joy as she watches her daughter on TV.
The theme song of this outrageous piece of advertisement sings "achieve your dream on your own." I’m assuming the dream in this case is to become white enough to get a job as a TV presenter at one of the major Arabic networks. If this is not racist I don’t know what is. I guess it goes back to the mentality found among many in the region: "fair" is beautiful.
In this part of the globe, fair women are always the best candidates for marriage and fair babies are always cuter than their darker kin. In a nutshell, if you are dark, you are cursed. I know this sounds outrageous but sadly enough this attitude is widespread. Let’s ban this ad!
Yalla girls let’s get the ball rolling. Lina, I will be waiting for your draft:)
Lina,
its still good to write one to the company letting them know that 1) you will never buy their products and why and 2) letting them know exactly what you are doing about that. It wont change them, but at least we can say we warned them that we were taking action.
Ok Natasha and Linda 🙂 let’s get started with it… I like the idea of sending to MBC, I’m not sure we can send one to the company that produces “Fair and Lovely” because I think we’re up against the whole concept of the product, they can’t agree to change the commercials because what else would they say about this lotion??
I’ll try to write a draft for the complaint this week, if anyone has specific ideas please do share them… and let’s get the contact info of the station we want to send to and make sure it gets to the right person…
And all you writers out there… yeah let’s start sending letters to local newspaper editors!! I’m not sure we can mobilize a large enough number… but what do we have to lose? 🙂 we’re spending a lot of time writing and blogging anyways ;p
OMG. Funny enough, while i was washing the dishes, my parents were watching MBC and this commercial comes on. The commercial showed though a darker woman in an art class, etc etc etc and someone painted her face because shes fair.
Okay, this is how we do it guys. First, you write a letter to the comapny of Fair and Lovely itself and tell them how you feel. Then to MBC stating you will boycott their channles until the ad is taken of their channel. Then you send letters to the other advertisers who advertise on MBC and you tell them you will boycott MBC, thus these advertisers may stop advertising with MBC and this puts additional pressure on MBC to drop Fair and Lovely. But this cycle/effect can only happen if enough people do it.
Then, enough letters to the editor should be written to your local newspapers about the product and how it is racist and i do think unhealthy. If there are enough letters written, maybe other people who have this ad may drop it or may take the whole issue on as a story. But like i said, enough letters have to be written for this to take place.
Lina,
We can start by complaining to the networks that run these ads like MBC. I’m sure we can find their contact info on their websites.
Unfortunately, this is not the only add or phenomenon that takes a discriminatory nature. When I pointed out in other posts to the fact that religion should not be on your personal ID in Jordan, no body wanted to comment. Even in some job applications. As they say, beauty is in the eyes of the beholder; if all Jordanians view a beautiful women as being blond, blue eyed ..etc, so be it. This is the criteria. That puts most of Jordanian females on the other side of the spectrum. But, as they say also; beauty is a skin deep. As for my own personal criteria; one day I will run my own add.
I can’t stand Arabic TV ads at all, god they’re cheesy! We had ART back in the early 90s, they kept playing some crappy ads for Pizza Hut and Pringles. And some weird amphibious car with the driver in a dishdasha. It was the one time you’d actually thank the Islamic Republic for its clampdown on Western triteness.
Yea Lina, let’s do it! Not just the fair and lovely company but the advertisers who created this “advert”…so, how to go about it?
Brian, go crawl back in your hole. That sentiment is not appreciated here, regardless of what you do with your eye –> 😉 <-- or where you put your tongue.
Hah! You’re just saying that because you’re dark and ugly! You’ll feel different when you get your face fixed! 😉
:p