Bianca Gonzalez on being morena: ‘Hindi kami kawawa’

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Bianca Gonzalez on being morena: ‘Hindi kami kawawa’

Rob Reyes

The host talks about taking pride in her dark skin, saying, 'Maganda ang kulay namin'

MANILA, Philippines – In the wake of another skin whitening brand releasing an ad that has angered the public, host Bianca Gonzalez took to Twitter to share her thoughts.

On Saturday, April 13, an ad by glutathione brand Glutamax went viral for all the wrong reasons. In a series of graphics, the ad encouraged darker-skinned people to take their product so they can whiten their skin and be on the receiving end of the supposed advantage that fairer-skinned people get over darker-skinned people.

Bianca posted on Twitter on the same day, and while she didn’t mention the ad or the brand, she spoke about how being morena (dark-skinned) should not invite pity.

“Just a note from a Filipina with brown skin since birth: There is no problem at all sa mga gustong magpaputi (with wanting to whiten one’s skin),” she said.

“The problem is when whitening brands make us look ‘kaawa-awa’ dahil lang maitim kami. Kasi, hindi po kami kawawa, maganda ang kulay namin,” she continued.

(The problem is when whitening brands make us look “pitiful” because we’re dark. Because we’re not pitiful, our complexion is beautiful.)


 

She went on to share how she grew up loving her skin because of dark-skinned women like Angel Aquino and Tweetie de Leon who were proud of their skin color.

“I did not need to compare myself to fair-skinned girls. It need not be a ‘battle’ of maitim versus maputi (dark versus fair),” she said.


 

She also spoke about her two morena daughters Lucia and Carmen, and how she will teach them to be proud of their own skin.

“When they grow up, choice nila kung magpapa-tan or magpapaputi sila (it’s their choice if they want to tan or whiten their skin). But what I will teach them is that being brown is not something ‘shameful,’ and being brown is not something that makes them less beautiful than others,” she said.


 

The Glutamax ad Bianca was presumably responding to is the second ad from a skin whitening brand to cause a stir among netizens in the past few weeks.

Earlier in April, whitening brand SkinWhite also released an ad campaign appearing to empower morenas with the hashtag #DarkorwhiteisBeautiful. But it got criticized for apparently putting blackface on its models. – Rappler.com

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