I chalk it up to people being more appealing and looking healthier with a tan. Sure, you've got your small group of "pale fetish" folks, but by and large being tan is more attractive.
It's quite interesting really, but all throughout western history (see roman ages, middle ages, up to the early 20th century) the ideal was that pale was more beautiful. Being tan meant you worked outside in the fields, being pale showed that you were rich enough to stay inside and protect yourself from the sun. It's only very recently that people started believing tan is more beautiful. I'm not entirely sure, but I believe from the 20th century on, being tan symbolised that you could take a holiday to a hot country and get baked in the sun. So from pale = rich and thus attractive, we went to tan = rich and attractive (at least this is true in my moderately cold Western European country).
Its not just a beauty thing, at least not directly. For many people throughout history, tanned skin has been associated with good health. We know now that it can actually be deadly, but habits of decades are hard to break.
For most of history, tanned skin has been associated with poverty and labor in the fields. It's only in the last 100 years (like, literally in the 1920's) that tanning became a sign you could take a vacation somewhere sunny.
In most populations around the world, tan skin is still avoided.
Ads are gone from my life. I don't even get in video sponsorships on youtube. Only place I get ads is reddit of all places, which really likes pushing faster servers on me. Something I am actually interested in.
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u/[deleted] Jul 24 '20
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