Constance Wu is standing up against Asian beauty stereotypes. The 35-year-old actress, who is frequently a pioneer for Asian and Asian-American representation in Hollywood, is switching gears and speaking out on the dangers of skin-lightening creams and the harmful standard the Asian beauty industry often perpetuates.
In an essay for Allure, Wu revealed that she recently traveled to Singapore and Malaysia to shoot her upcoming film, “Crazy Rich Asians.” There, she said she came across multiple skin-care stores advertising skin-lightening products, such as creams and lotions. When she entered these stores, she revealed that she would often be urged by employees to buy skin-lightening products to “whiten” her skin and fade her natural freckles. According to Wu, the Asian culture’s frequent preference for lighter skin stems from an age-old stigma associating dark skin with working-class field laborers. “I?d go into skin-care stores, and there would be all these skin-whitening products. The salesgirls would push whitening products on me and try to fade my freckles,” she wrote. “This comes from an old Asian cultural idea that dark skin signifies being in the fields and working-class.”
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Coming from a family of “Chinese bamboo farmers, Wu isn’t one to deny her heritage. Not only did Wu condemn skin-lightening products, but she also spoke out o...