Human Behaviour and Cosmetology

While reading the life history of the famous Jamaican reggae star, the late Bob Marley, an incident that occurred between him and a young African girl caught my attention. He was then a centre of attraction with a fanatical fan following who included many young ladies who easily felt attracted to him. In one episode, it is recorded that the daughter of the late central African president Omar Bongo while attending a Bob Marley concert went straight behind the stage and immediately expressed her intention to him. The girl had fallen in love with the then famous musician. Bob Marley is said to have looked at her and told her straight to the face that she is ugly. The remarks came out of his mouth after seeing her, a black woman,  wearing straight hair. Her persistence paid off. After trailing the musician for a while, she earned his attention and Marley even accepted to perform in the central African nation at the invitation of his latest girlfriend. Bob Marley, later on, died of cancer but not before she gave birth to one of his many children.

To the wailers and now their Rastafari movement compatriots, it is apparent that in their view a black man should not alter their naturally curly hair. It should be left to grow naturally without trimming or combing to make it straight. This is significant to them since it also symbolizes freedom and resistance bearing in mind the history of Jamaica, an island nation where many blacks were settled after gaining freedom from the yoke of slavery.

The desire to alter is not only a preserve for the poor and downtrodden in society, it is also a craving the rich and famous have. During an advert stunt performance, the late Michael Jackson an American pop music star fell and had his nose badly injured. As a performing artist, he was already rich and famous at a relatively young age. What caught the attention of everyone worldwide was that after treatment which included plastic surgery to reconstruct his nose, Michael Jackson emerged with a narrower nose thus completely altering his earlier original facial image. He now had a kind of Caucasian look. His plastic surgeon in an interview after his death confirms that what he produced was in strict adherence to instructions given by his patient. There followed repeated denials of having intentionally sought for a different look Michael a visibly black American had his skin start to change becoming lighter by the day. He vehemently denied accusations of using skin lightening chemicals amidst the many accusations from critics claiming that he had a rare skin disease that was taking away his pigmentation. All said and done Michael Jackson never bore the same looks he bore while a young boy.

To the majority, image is everything as such to serve this human need, advancement in science and research has led to many great discoveries around the world of cosmetic surgery. From simple grooming, we have moved on to cosmetology and now the latest to be established is the discovery known as aesthetic science. This branch of medicine has become such a lucrative business that most hospitals in Kenya have established fully equipped clinics to take care of those seeking this service. As of now, because of the hefty charges, it mainly remains a preserve of the affluent. Armed with sufficient finance, one can walk into a hospital and choose which features of their body they wish should be altered. A quick computerized prototype version is generated for confirmation before walking into the operation theatre and the well-trained experts will get the job done. A few days later after recovery, a satisfied client will walk out of the hospital and at the surgeon's knife and other procedures the once DNA determined human physical features will be something else from the original. In recent research published in Forbes magazine, estimates put the value of the global cosmetics industry at about USD 559B in 2019 with projections to hit USD 800B by the year 2025. The leading markets are the USA, China and Japan with their market shares of 20%, 13% and 8% respectively. Its worth in Kenya is estimated to be slightly above Kshs 5.4B.

It is not easy to exactly pinpoint the reasons as to why this has been and will continue going on into the future as we pose out on this phenomenon. Whether driven by a natural human instinct, personality complexes, plain desire for beauty and being handsome, stereotyping of other races, desire for success or public confidence, the phenomena remains a puzzle. Industry experts would be better placed to clearly explain this though basically, we all agree that an image boost gives one the desired confidence and is a motivator. The cases of inferiority and superiority complexes between races feature prominently here sometimes. According to the Cambridge dictionary race refers to one of the main groups to which people are often considered to belong, based on physical characteristics that they are perceived to share such as colour, eye shape etc. Human races are often categorized into Caucasians referred to as the white race, Mongoloids identified as Asians, Negroid, commonly referred to as blacks, then the Australoids. Somewhere along the history of man, colours were introduced for race identification with the objective of social control. Thus the origin of the terms black, white, yellow and red.

One African leader known to shoot straight from the hip is Yoweri Museveni of Uganda. While receiving the 2018 African Continent Pageant winner, who was Ugandan, he asked her to flaunt her African natural hair rather than the ‘Indian wig’ she was wearing then. The head-of-state's statement caused a raucous amongst women groups and other female lobbyists. It became a national debate though later the beauty queen Miss Quinn Abenakyo concurred with her president and promised to revert to her natural hair thus dumping the ‘Indian wig’.

President Yoweri Museveni with Miss. Quinn Abenakyo

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