London: Asians with Darker skin tones are more likely to experience bias, even from their own families, according to a study by the King’s College London.
The research by London college revealed that People of colour, including South Asians and Blacks, with darker skin in the UK were sometimes stigmatised by their own parents, siblings and other relatives.
The study by King's College says that within families children with lighter skin were often favoured, while those with darker tones were subjected to insults and bullying.
Almost half of the 33 people, aged 19-60, who were interviewed said that they had witnessed the prejudice, or had been the target sometimes.
People of colour with light skin spoke about being favoured within their families. A 33-year-old woman said she was given a lot of privileges in her family for having lighter skin.
A 31-year-old South Asian woman told Phoenix, who led the study.
"I have a few friends who are dark-skinned and Asian and they attribute as one of the reasons they’re not married to their skin color because the traditional way of arranged marriages is your mum would get a call from the groom’s mom and one of the first questions they ask is What is your daughter’s skin color?"
Another 43-year-old South Asian woman said, "Being younger, one of the biggest issues I had was with my mum always going on about how it's better to be fairer, 'you'll only find a boy if you're fairer and you're only beautiful if you're fair'. And I think that really got to me. How do you interpret that when you're a young child?"
'Black' and 'ugly' were common slangs used by the family members as insults, said the research, which was conducted as part of the UK skin shade study.
A 31-year-old woman of Pakistan's ethnicity told Aisha Phoenix that extended families would ask questions like, 'How come your sister is so much lighter (skin tone) than you?...Do you not scrub your skin properly in the shower?'
Phoenix said that some families produced prejudices common in wider society, so that darker skin was imbued with negativity.
People of Colour with dark skin can be subjected to prejudice and discrimination from both members of their own families and society at large.
"The internalised colourism within some families contributes to the prejudice. However, some families resist colourism and work to instil positive ideas about dark skin or all skin shades," said Phoenix, Lecturer in Social Justice, School of Education, Communication & Society, King's College London.
(With IANS inputs)
