Let’s play a game of tanning bingo. Think back over the conversations you had with friends about their holidays this summer. How many of the following have you heard: ‘Can’t wait to work on my tan!’ ‘I need to sort out a base tan before I go’ ‘My tan lines are going to be ridiculous’. And now we’re in the grey days of September, ‘can’t believe how quickly my tan’s faded,’ ‘I look so tired now my tan has gone,’ and ‘I can’t believe how tanned I was last month – I looked so much better then.’
In the West, we are obsessed with tanning. In fact, a quarter of sun care products launched last year in the UK were self-tanners, and we as a nation spend about £66 million pounds on the golden stuff every year. When the sun peeks out, so begins the annual touting of ‘next-generation’ tanners that don’t smell, or work in milliseconds – along with a veritable media circus around making sure you’re exactly the right shade of bronze.
Brands like Boots know the importance of protecting your skin in the sun. As well as their own sun care range, Soltan, their online tool ‘Sun protection made easy’ helps customers establish the best kind of sun care for their destination and skin type.
Other brands such as NIVEA SUN are committed to protecting their customer’s skin from the sun’s rays with their own sun safe message. ‘Overexposure to the sun’s harmful UV rays prematurely ages the skin, as well as increases the risk of developing skin cancer,’ they told me. ‘NIVEA SUN recommends regularly applying sunscreen with an adequate SPF (sun protection factor) for your skin type, weather conditions and geographical location, as well as seeking shade and covering up, as the most effective way of protecting your skin in the sun.’
I’m of Neapolitan stock, but my complexion is more peaches and cream than demerara sugar. With a sister who can bronze at the merest sight of sun, I’m a lifelong faker. From gradual tans in winter (heaven forfend a white slice of skin peek through my ripped jeans) to spray tans and at-home applications of gloopy, chocolate-hued tanner come summer, it’s safe to say I haven’t seen my real skin for years. With a tan I feel more toned, more attractive, more…expensive. And I’m not the only one – a quick straw poll of my friends revealed similar attitudes.
Sara - 'I grew up obsessed with tanning'
My makeup artist friend Sara originally hails from Syria, and told me, ‘I grew up obsessed with tanning because J.Lo was my idol! Plus, it always made me look better and slimmer to be a bit more bronzed. In Middle Eastern culture there is a general preference for being "fair", so staying out the sun and in more extreme cases, skin bleaching, is a thing but my family were totally indifferent to it. It was never really a topic. When I have a tan, I feel like I can use less makeup and I just look healthier.’
Reena - 'It's very common in Indian culture not to want to tan'
It’s a view echoed by Reena, a friend who comes from an Indian family. ‘It’s very common in Indian culture to not want to tan; having "fair skin" is still seen as desirable while being tanned is the total opposite. It all harks back to colonial days where the British empire invaded India and decided to try and impose Eurocentric beauty standards. I’m lucky that my own family isn’t very traditional and don’t care about skin tone so I was never discouraged from tanning at all. In fact, my mum always liked seeing me with a tan. I love travelling and being tanned, and I always feel better with a tan, much more happy and healthy. Having said that, quite a lot of my peers were told to stay out of the sun when we were younger for fear of getting “too dark”.’
Sabrina - 'The first thing my extended family always comment on his how dark or light you're looking'
Sabrina’s family are from Bangladesh, and she said while there can be a cultural sniffiness towards tanning, ‘Me and my sisters love getting a good tan. The first thing my extended family always comment on is how dark or light you're looking, then your weight. The sorrowed lament over a deeper hue of visage is pretty laughable. But I love it! It puts me in a summer frame of mind and makes me feel more healthy.’
Ify - 'I wish more black people knew they needed to wear sunscreen too'
As for my pal Ify, who’s black British, told me, ‘My family never said much about it – tanning is natural when you've been in the sun. I used Sally Hansen Airbrush Legs in the past to cover up little scars, but I don’t feel healthier or better or anything with a tan. In fact, if anything, I wish more black people knew they needed to wear sunscreen too. It’s a myth that we don’t!’
What is baffling is how easily you can buy a bottle of fake tan when the range of make-up products available for women of colour are still extremely limited. There’s also a stark disconnect between the huge number of self-tanning products available for Caucasian women and how poorly the beauty industry as a whole still caters for Women Of Colour. ‘I’m often told that a brand doesn’t have a shade dark enough for my skin tone,’ says Reena. ‘In contrast every single make-up brand has a plethora of products to help Caucasian women to tan. Why can’t naturally tanned women buy make-up as easy as it is to fake our tan?'
Of course, we all know that the sun is dangerous and while you’d be hard-pressed to find people who still think smoking is cool, people are willing to throw caution to the wind and forsake all their better judgement in the name of a good bronze. But why? Dr Clay Routledge, Professor of Psychology at North Dakota State University told me, ‘When people feel threatened and the threat is pretty abstract, like being told that you may one day in many years get cancer which could be fatal, people often care more about the existential comfort they get from self-esteem than about the safety benefits associated with protecting their skin.’ Self-esteem is the crux of all this. Our brains are basically trying to avoid the fact that we’re mortal AT ALL TIMES.
‘Feeling valued and significant makes us feel more than mortal,’ explains Dr Routledge. ‘It makes us feel like we have meaning that transcends death. Self-esteem is the psychological mechanism that reflects how valued and significant we feel. So people endeavour to conform to and live up to cultural standards of value to attain and maintain self-esteem, which helps protect us from existential concerns about being a fragile organism destined to die and disappear.’
Basically, we live in a rubbish post-Brexit society where terror attacks are rife, natural disasters happen and people get hit by buses every day. And while we know that tanning is like really, really bad for us, when we have a bit of colour and we feel attractive, we feel less vulnerable. We feel more like we fit in, like we’re part of something and like we’re not going to just get swept back into some primordial ooze when we shuffle off the mortal coil. We’re real, we’re here and we matter. Which possibly explains how five women of different ethnic origins could all arrive at a similar standpoint when it comes to tanning: sure, it makes us look like we’ve been in Bora Bora and have cash to splash, or reminds us of a holiday, but it also gives us a spring in our step. Everyone’s different - Ify said she felt about the same regardless of how dark the sun takes her, while Sara chases that J.Lo glow every day. On the other hand, my pal Alice looked vaguely bemused when I asked if she ever fake tanned in summer, 'It’s not really something I think about. I don’t mind being pale and I really like my freckles! I’d be more thinking about whether I can justify buying a new bikini than getting a tan.'
But the upshot? For as long as our society values tanned skin, and associates it with wealth and flashy holidays to Tulum, people will continue to tan because it makes us feel like we fit in, and when we fit in, we’re part of something long-lasting.
If you do want to go darker, we'd recommend going down the bottle route and not the lying-out-in-the-sun route. Self-tanners have come a long way, and as someone who’s tried a LOT, I do recommend all of these and we've chucked in a couple of SPFs just incase. Remember to seek shade between 11am and 3pm because this is when the sun is the most intense and a hat and sunglasses are always a good idea.
Garnier Summer Body Lotion Light Sun-Kissed, £5.49 for 250ml
Soltan Beautiful Bronze Wash Off Instant Bronzing Lotion Medium to Dark, £5.99 for 125ml
Clarins New Sun Care Milk-Lotion Spray UVB 50+, £20 for 150ml
*Don't forget to check out Beauty Hunter; our ace hub for all things beauty related. *
Plus, you can order on boots.com or in store today by 8pm and collect free in store from 12pm tomorrow. See boots.com/ordertodaycollecttomorrow for more info. Monday-Saturday only. Geographical exclusions apply. Subject to availability.
Like this? You might also be interested in:
All The Aeroplane Beauty Essentials To Get For Your Upcoming Flight
Follow Daniela on Twitter @danielakate
This article originally appeared on The Debrief.