Why is the light /pale skin seen as more attractive and desirable in society?

[Anonymous]

Why are people more obsessed and attracted towards light /pale/white/fair skin... and that's why people with darker/tanned skin tone feel insecure and even they try to achieve lighter skin.

Personally I find women with darker/tanned skin tone more sexy, attractive and charming...

[ZXCwWRQWz]

In lots of parts of Asia like here in Japan, it was considered historically attractive for women to not only be pale but kind of chubby. I think it's because the people with darker skin were the ones working out in the fields with farmer tans. The fancy aristocratic ones lived in their comfy shelters and didn't go out much.

I think that trend has long since reversed though. It's like bread. To my understanding, white bread used to be like rich people's food and considered most desirable. Nowadays whole wheat bread is more expensive and considered more desirable.

[KingslayerC]

What people selected for marriage wasn't necessarily what made them sexually turned on though. Guarantee those rich people were banging the skinny maid girls and farmer boys way more often.

[ZXCwWRQWz]

@KingslayerC I wonder about that! Definitely I would prefer a farmer girl to a plump girl without a tan. But my ideas of health are tuned now to slim and athletic and not shy of the sun. Is that so immalleable from a sociological standpoint? For example, nowadays Japanese like dark-skinned women just as much as light-skinned, but it took a while with fashions like ganguro until that became considered widely attractive:

[ZXCwWRQWz]

@KingslayerC Especially at my age, concepts of beauty seem incredibly malleable. For example, when I was growing up, the most beautiful women were typically the tallest with such long legs and arms and dainty hands. Nowadays, it seems like so many prefer the shortest with thick butts and huge breasts.

[KingslayerC]

Lmao this reminds me of the yomambo (sp?) girls back when I was in Tokyo in the 2000s. Totally didn't do it for me, but all the Japanese guys wanted them. Definitely a culture phenomenon.

And yeah about your ideas of health, I'm sure your idea is pretty dead on in terms of life expectancy. Pale, heavy women are definitely not outliving tan, fit women. And they're definitely not as fertile. So I think your brain is doing the right thing for you.

[KingslayerC]

Ah haha yeah I think there's gotta be some biological reasoning behind this. Like our brain is trying to make sure we diversify our DNA so it changes what we are attracted to over time. Mine def has change too. Never certain things, like heavy weight, or masculinity, but definitely with race, skin color, height, breasts, butt, etc...

[ZXCwWRQWz]

@KingslayerC A lot of my ideas of beauty seem to be converging (and expanding in some ways) towards what seems to align with health. For example, I find athletic women increasingly attractive but maybe not so much to the point of having ab veins popping out and traps thicker than mine. Those women usually struggle with fertility to my understanding given such low body fat. But there's a sweet spot.

I also wonder a bit about genetics. For example, I think most East Asians don't like such enormous butts and thighs. But I encountered a paper suggesting that women with larger butts and thighs (as well as breasts) tend to be more fertile, but they looked predominantly at white, black, and Hispanic women IIRC. I sometimes think Asian women might be a bit different since lots of Asian women can be extremely fertile with small butts and narrow hips even having 5+ babies while maintaining very slim and lean body.

[ZXCwWRQWz]

@KingslayerC I'm not sure that the idea that the hourglass figure is the most fertile is as applicable as it is to the way Asian bodies distribute body fat, e. g.

[KingslayerC]

Yeah these are great points. And it only makes sense that signs of fertility would have evolved differently along with the evolution of races. They were, after all, facing substantially different challenges in terms of climate, food and living threats. Never thought about it before, so it's a lot to wrap my head around...

[EaterPeter]

I would pick this one

[Asker]

Dark ones?

[EaterPeter]

The one in pic.

[Asker]

You prefer darker skin tone compared to paler?

[EaterPeter]

If woman looks good then who cares about skin tone

[EaterPeter]

Thanks for MHO!

[Thatpearl26]

I don’t think one is more desirable. Maybe a few decades ago. However everyone has their preferences so everyone is essentially desired. As a Latina I don’t feel insecure of my skin color. I’m to busy worrying over more important matters.

[Asker]

What's your skin tone?

[Thatpearl26]

Brown. However I increasingly become tanner since my skin is vulnerable to the sun.

[Asker]

Anywhere as brown as the woman in pic above?

[Thatpearl26]

Nope, but I’m more than halfway there.

[Asker]

That's not that dark then

[KingslayerC]

Marketing surveys point towards light brown skin the most. Super tanned white girls and light skinned black girls. Or latinas and Asians. That's why 99% of white women in film/TV are tanned af.

[Asker]

White women are tanned on tv?

[KingslayerC]

Oh yeah. It's pretty much a requirement. Fortunately spray tanning has taken over, but tanning beds used to be on set with film studios. I grew up with a personal trainer for Hollywood films. They turn the white girls as brown as possible and the black girls as brown as possible too. Makeup and airbrushing goes into it of course. You'd be shocked at how pale the celebrities would look without it. Guys too, but it's not as important.

[humanearth]

Who knows, I believe it has a lot to do with advertising in the 1950s, It was basically white only on TV back then and things never changed

This is only my theory, not fact

[Asker]

Ok maybe.
How do you feel about dark skin especially on women?

[humanearth]

Honestly, I like it

[gothbxtch]

colorism and racism.