Here's a subject. An Indian-descended girl at a work lunch was saying how she hated summer

as it made her skin darker, and she preferred it lighter. She then went on to explain in quite strong terms how she hated dark skin, and how she didn't like her boyfriend at first who was from India because he had very dark skin.

Sitting next to her, with much darker skin, was another Indian-descended woman, and a Jamaican-descended woman with very dark skin indeed. :- I don't know what they thought of this outburst / expression of aesthetic preferences as to try and avoid hearing any more of it I concentrated on intensifying the discussion I was having with my Macedonian colleague about the history, politics and conflicts in the former Yugoslavia.

Anyway, can it be racist if an English Sikh rails about hating brown skin? Has anyone else experienced this?

that my trip was taking me on to Kerala.

"Those people from the south!" he cried, face distorted with disgust. "They're so dark!" And then, with a mournful shake of the head, "And they eat so much riiiice!"

I didn't care to point out to him that he was, even as he spoke, shovelling rice into his yap hole at a rate of knots.

I think you'll find that whole skin colour business matters, if anything, even more to your effnicks.

I had the joy recently of sharing a table with a very drunk african who said he didnt want to sit with the opposite table as it was "full of mulatos and cane cutters".

I quite like the fact that just about everyone is capable of utterly vile racism. I know it's not the sort of equality people had in mind but..

at te hong kong office the chinks put a face mask on in the office when the indian delivery bloke came in .. :yikes: and wouldnt touch him..get too close , wouldpile the boxes on a table for him then move away

The african one, well that's much more complex.

That's without delving into the intra-island racism of the west indies.

Lighter skin is deemed more acceptable (by other Indians)and more likely to be successful. Bonkers imo

looking-down-noses thing but for an educated, middle-class English girl to say this, and in front of black and dark south asian people seemed extraordinary.

I presume it is her personally, rather than some notion of the cultural anti-racism here not applying itself to some light-skinned Asian people.