Correcting grammar is racist.

[paulpablo]

lot's of white people go out in the sun and scorch their skin to bronze themselves to look more toned and attractive risking skin cancer and premature agin., they even buy sunbeds or just spray themselves to make themselves look less white.

But I feel like, in ways, they're not doing that to look black or to look like other races. People finding being tanned more attractive is due to affluence.

Superficially, they're doing it just to look like more "exotic" white people. If anything at all, it's perhaps about looking Southern European, which is still white, because for some reason "Mediterranean beauty" is hot right now. That's all too apparent to me, as a Mediterranean person.

On a deeper level, it's because darker skin is becoming more subconsciously associated with being outdoorsy and having a healthy lifestyle (as opposed to being sick and a couch potato). It's the unfortunately misled notion of "a healthy tan". The forced tan itself is obviously very unhealthy, but the lifestyle that might bring on a tan naturally is associated with health and travelling, and that's why it's becoming more attractive in affluent societies. It's a sign of money and having spare time to get out and do things now. White people tanning isn't about self-hate or trying to look "less white", it's a display of having an attractive lifestyle.

This contrasts to many developing countries, where darker sun-tanned skin is still seen as being a impoverished farm labourer's skin.

I think it's actually more simple than that.  It's just because muscle tone is more pronounced in darker skin which is why body builders darken their skin.  But yeh a lot of what you're talking about is probably going on aswell, people see it as a reflection of a healthy lifestyle and so on.

But I don't think dark skinned people are globally changing their bodies because of self hatred either, A lot of time I think it's just to look different, exotic, more attractive or whatever you want to call it.

In the evolution of trends if it works it works, if a guy having a tan gets more attention from females that's what he might do for that specific reason, if a black girl straightens her hair and gets more attention she might do it for that, people curl their hair, tan their skin, lighten their skin, inject their lips with stuff.  Somtimes it might be in order to look like a different race, possibly or possibly not. But I just wouldn't see it as evidence of global white privilege.