*Photo from Women's Health How Face Filters on Instagram, Facetune Affect Mental Health

 

With the boom of social media filters, it might come as a surprise to some that filters can be fatphobic or racist. However, as argued earlier, these current issues stem from a long line of problematic actions and attitudes built up over time. Leah Donnella (2019), an editor for Code Switch an NPR podcast, brings to light how current societal beauty standards are based on one somewhat universally agreed upon standard. That standard is the "type of white femininity that's only accessible to a select few."

 

We must travel back in time to early Greco-Roman times up through the 1940's back to today to fully understand where filter biases have stemmed from.

 

In Greco-Roman times, outer beauty was not the main focus, but rather the beauty of the soul (Defino, 2020). It was the standard in Egyptian, Greek, and Roman cultures that light skin equaled being of a higher class because of the implications of work that followed. Those with darker skin most often spent more time in the sun working, suggesting they needed to work from not having money to begin with.

 

In the 15th century, in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, the idea that "nothing is better than white" was introduced (Defino, 2020) as a result of evangelism from White Europeans' belief that blond hair, blue eyes, and fair skin was a physical representation of "the light of God". A similar effect can be seen during slavery in the United States in the 1800s. Even after abolishment of slavery, the"legacy of whiteness" (Defino, 2020) lived on.

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For example, in 1844 Scottish publisher Robert Chambers wrote and released his Vestiges of the Natural History of Mankind. In this work, Chambers makes a case that each race represents a different stage of human evolution with whites being the most evolved. This was followed up in 1865, when a French anthropologist Paul Broca came up with the “table chromatique” for classifying skin color.

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Progressing into the 1900s, white supremacy remained prevalent in visible mediums further influencing societal beauty standards. For example, it took until 1940 for the Miss America pageant to change the wording of eligibility for their participants from "of good health and of the white race" (Donnella, 2019) to a more inclusive definition.

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Furthermore, beauty filters aren’t the first time that whiteness has been privileged by a technology a decade later. A decade later, in the 1950s, the advertising and photography world was introduced to Kodak Shirley. She was a white female Kodak employee who was used as the image that allowed photo labs to calibrate photos that needed to be developed (Del Barco, 2014). If Shirley's skin tone and coloring looked good in the lighting, the image was being developed well (Del Barco, 2014).

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A few years later, many people began to complain how darker skinned individuals or any others whose skin was not white was being over or under exposed in photos because the color calibration did not match up (Del Barco, 2014). By using Shirley, whether intention or unintentional, Kodak was saying "white is normal" (Ewart, 2020).

 

Despite complaints from customers with multi-ethnic group photos turning out less than correct, it was not these complaints but rather complaints from chocolate and furniture companies that helped establish the necessary change (Ewart, 2020). These companies were struggling to tell the difference between milk and dark chocolate and dark colored furniture in their advertising (Ewart, 2020). In the 1980s and 90s, Kodak finally created the mulitracial Shirley card with an Asian, white, and Black woman to give a fuller range of colors represented (Ewart, 2020).

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Notions of beauty rooted in white supremacy and colonization have continued into today's cosmetic industry in its offer of skin whitening creams that tend to be especially popular in countries with people known for their darker skin. It remains this way because many marginalized people who push back against the standards of whiteness are not give the due respect or denied the access to larger platforms in which to share their thoughts to be taken seriously to begin productive changes. While there have been efforts within the beauty industry to focus on expanding things like ranges of foundation colors for individuals of darker skin tones or including those of different sexual orientations and genders within advertising for brands, the dominant tendency, as evidenced by beauty filters, is perfect poreless porcelain white skin.

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Defino in her article How White Supremacy and Capitalism Influence Beauty Standards summarizes well the way in which this colonizer mindset has negatively influenced the cosmetic world. Defino emphasizes that capitalism has followed what colonialism began in taking advantage of insecurities from being treated as less than (2020). Beauty brands do the same, targeting individuals, insecurities about their bodies with natural fat rolls, dark spots, discoloration, wrinkles, and so many more for the sole factor of making money (Defino, 2020).

 

Although these white and unattainable beauty standards creates a divide between races and individuals in general, they can also be used by some for increased agency. People are more often willing to trust or talk with "more beautiful" people, allowing access to certain spaces or increased power (Donnella, 2019). Applying makeup, getting cosmetic surgery, using filters, etc. may feel empowering and a way to get ahead in society for certain individuals, and especially so for those who are already closer to normative beauty standards by virtue of their race, class, gender identity, or body type.

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Donnella speaks to the beckoning call of the beauty industry to be who you are not. Within anyone's beauty routine, they are either consciously or unconsciously choosing to believe the idea that something of them needs changing. Whether it be the shininess or texture of your hair or the curl of your eyelashes, the beauty industry banks on individuals believing how they are naturally is not enough, leading them to pay into this industry as well. This consequently leads to a mindset of you will "be more beautiful if you spend time and money to make yourself different" (2019).

 

Laverne Cox is a Black transgender woman who feels empowered by using products and services offered within the beauty world. However, bell hooks is a long time Black feminist and social activist who stands for abolishing and not leaning into those practices. Below is a conversation between the women about feminism and beauty standards where each speaks their position on the issue. Where should one draw the line on standards of beauty when some are empowered while others are shut out and hurt by them? Check out 11:00-14:00 and 22:10-25:20 

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