Pale Oriental: When Dulux was racist to Asians so we made a change
As an Asian woman, racism and cultural appropriation are topics I think about a lot. To be completely honest, it was only a few years ago that I even learnt what the term, ‘Cultural appropriation’ meant. Funnily enough, a white guy explained the concept to me. Since then, I’ve been learning to understand what Cultural appropriation means to me. And how more often than not, the experience can be personal and different for each individual.
There are moments of cultural appropriation that make me angry, moments that make me laugh, and moments that don’t bother me at all.
To this day, I still have conversations with friends and people of colour who don’t always agree on what is and isn’t a moment of cultural appropriation. It tends to come down to our own personal experiences.
Back in October, my friend and I went to Bunnings to go look at some paint colours. I was thinking of painting my bedroom yellow. I looked at all the paint cards and one in particular caught my eye – a card with 3 shades of yellow by Dulux. The very last shade was labelled “Pale Oriental.” I stopped for a moment and turned to my friend...
Is this racist or...?
My friend said, “...Yes?”
More than anything, we were just confused. Why did they decide to name a light shade of yellow – Pale Oriental?
I put it on my Instagram story that day and got mixed reactions.
Some Asians agreed that it wasn’t right for that colour to have that name. A couple Asians laughed.
I brought it up with a friend, who then sent it to her friend who works at Dulux. And then I let it go.
Almost exactly 5 months later, I received a message from my friend.
It was an update from Dulux. The heading read: “Some Dulux colour names have changed.”
“After careful review of 5,000 colours, we have decided to modify a number of colour names to make them appropriate for all audiences.”
We were in shock. We’d actually made a change.
In the grand scheme of things, this may be a very minor issue but nevertheless, progress is progress and any small step towards growth is a win for us.
