Sometimes, our reaction to what we see in the mirror tells us more about ourselves than our physical reflection.
This week, ex-West Indian cricketer Daren Sammy posted this video, expressing surprise and disappointment after having found out that a common nickname he was given while playing in the IPL was derogatory and discriminatory. Eagle-eyed internet lurkers quickly fished out an Instagram post from Ishant Sharma - Sammy's teammate at that time - where he had used the very same word in the caption - kalu.
If you go through the replies to this post, or the tweet he put out later that day, you will see a bunch of Indians jumping in defence of that word, citing the incredibly common usage in large parts of the country. They aren’t totally wrong. Having spent 20 years in Delhi, I can attest to the fact that the word is a throwaway jab between adults and kids. Dark-skinned people are subjected to derivates of the word kaala so much, they have little choice but to get used to it. Cricketer Abhinav Mukund had tweeted a note in 2017 about the systemic condescension towards his skin color and how he had to grow a thicker skin to not let that affect his craft. Another pattern in those replies is that not one of them have denied that the word is used specifically for dark-skinned people.
This screenshot is from Nagraj Gollapudi’s interview with Sammy yesterday. When the affected community doesn’t consider it as endearing and banter, all conjecture stops there.
Just the last week, Yuvraj Singh was in the news for casually using the word bhangi - also a commonly used slur, but with casteist implications - during an online video conversation. Yuvraj’s statement after being called out, using a generally unapologetic tone, implying that he was sorry if he had offended someone, was a clearer reflection of the problem.
When we point fingers towards a Yuvraj Singh or an Ishant Sharma, we are only partly recognising the larger picture. Yes, they should’ve known better and must be called out for their actions, but a person is a product of his culture. It is debatable whether either Yuvraj or Ishant meant to harm, but a discriminatory vocabulary goes a long way in normalising perspectives. It was once normal in the US to use the n-word for black people.
Yuvraj’s response, the reaction to Sammy’s tweet, and the defensive justification for a way of speaking that is inherently discriminatory and based on condescension towards a specific skin colour, should tell you the scale of our desensitisation.
Before we start throwing stones at the global injustice towards black people, we may need to have a look within our own glass house to understand why using a derogatory slur for a dark-skinned person is considered normal.
Neither is our obsession with fair skin recent, nor is it an urban phenomenon. The conditioning has been running deep for centuries, from the time we started looking at our invaders - all Western and light-skinned - as a superior race. As mentioned in the video, there is a word in Sanskrit that literally refers to a light-skinned person as someone who has not been touched by the sun, and is hence, pure. I even have a friend who was nicknamed a synonym of dark by her own family because she was born with darker skin than is common in her part of India.
All that conditioning has led to a point in history where, on our television screens, and on social media, our biggest icons sell us fairness creams and tell us that we’d be left inadequate if we don’t get with the programme. But would they be selling us those creams if there wasn’t a demand for it? Can we really lay the blame on our stars alone? The skin-lightening market in Asia-Pacific stands at over $13 billion. It is very common to see matrimonial sections in our newspapers rife with demands for fair-skinned partners. In that video above, you would see Nandita Das, one of our finest actors in recent times, narrating her story of being asked to lighten her skin whenever she was playing a role of an educated, privileged woman.
Sammy’s video comes at an important time, when the entire world is being urged to open a dialogue, or at the very least, introspect, about discrimination. If we turn our backs towards this chance to evolve, we will be complicit in justifying a discriminatory world. What Hasan Minhaj said in his video holds as true for India as it does for immigrant Asians in the west.
So, how do we drive change? Like any cultural shift, this isn’t an overnight effort, but Sammy and Yuvraj’s incidents have given us a prompt. Unlearning a lexicon will take time, maybe generations, but it is a step towards progress. Because we are a culture obsessed with icons, the need to learn and improve may have to osmose from the top. As ridiculous as it sounds, it needs to be drilled into our collective psyche that discrimination, even in our vocabularies, is not okay.
When our biggest stars refuse to sell fairness products and actively speak up against them, the everyday Joe will pay attention. Instead of pimple-removal creams, if they sell the concept of equality, they might become catalysts for positive change. There also has to be an internal sensitisation effort at all levels, from schools to workplaces and even public-facing industries. For example, when young cricketers get into the national team setup or something like the IPL, we may need to define the boundaries in clear, bold lines. Ishant’s Instagram post is an opportunity to identify a gap and plug it.
This, however, doesn’t excuse the common man from tackling prejudices. Cultural change is a collective effort. We all need to learn and improve, because it’s 2020 and we are still having a conversation that should’ve ended half a century ago.