Rotaract member Fatima Lodhi lends color to conversations about beauty.
When Fatima Lodhi was a schoolgirl in Pakistan, her classmates called her names; in high school, they told her she needed a makeover. In college, they threatened to paint her white. In a country where the color of people’s skin spans the spectrum from light honey to deep brown, 25-year-old Lodhi has felt the sting of “colorism,” a bias against dark-skinned people that exists in varying degrees throughout South Asia. Most often faced by women, this widespread preference for pale skin causes social stigmatization and can lead to job discrimination. “This society considers the color of my skin ugly,” Lodhi says matter-of-factly. In 2013, she decided to fight back. Her campaign, “Dark Is Divine,” aims to change people’s thinking. She has created a Facebook page, reached out to the press, held seminars, and counseled women and girls on the importance of inner beauty. She’s also addressing the root of the problem by drafting guidelines for teaching schoolchildren about respect for diversity, and challenging advertising agencies to stop sending the message that dark-skinned women will find happiness only if they use whitening products. Lodhi says the campaign has helped make people aware that colorism is a problem, but changing attitudes is another matter. “It’s going to take a lot of time because discrimination is so ingrained,” says Lodhi, a past president of the Rotaract Club of Islamabad Metropolitan who now chairs the women’s empowerment committee in her district. “But the looks of a person shouldn’t matter. Beauty is not color-bound.” – Heather Maher