Follow this link for a slide show of the Miss Authentica Beauty Competition, held recently in Cote D’Ivoire. The idea behind the pageant was to showcase and encourage appreciation of the beauty of natural, non-bleached black African skin. It seems a great cause, especially given that many of the skin-lightening products used on the African continent are apparently carcinogenic (the damaging nature of the attitudes to dark skin themselves seem too obvious to require mention)…and yet, I’m not sure how I feel about the method. It leaves me wondering whether two wrongs make a right. Thoughts?

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