by Aria Cian

Created on: July 14, 2008   Last Updated: July 21, 2008

"You are so white!"

These four simple words sum up why I, and many others like me, defy all the medical warnings and choose to frequent tanning beds despite the considerable risks. It may be a shallow and vain reason to gamble with my health, but most who have heard this phrase spoken in disgust literally hundreds of times will tell you the same story. Jokes about "glowing in the dark" and being a "ghost" cut deep when you just want to blend in with those around you.

I grew up in tropical climates - the Florida Keys, the Texas Gulf coast, Pensacola, Guam - where locals can always tell the tourists from the residents by the simple color of their skin. It is common knowledge that tourists are either blindingly white or lobster red. In junior high and high school I was often mistaken for a tourist. I was constantly teased, even discriminated against, by my classmates due to the pallid tenor of my skin. Every time we moved to a new place, people actually accused me of lying about where I had moved from because I was "too white" to have lived in perpetual sunshine.

Suffering through years of discrimination, mockery, ridicule, and disdain led me to use tanning beds for the first time. The year before I graduated college, I was living at home while working at an eight month internship. My mother bought herself a membership for a tanning salon near our house and convinced me to join also. I soon learned that with calculated timing and acute patience I could develop a tan to rival those around me. Knowing the associated risks, I told myself it was just temporary and rationalized the potential hazard.

I did not get very dark. I maintained a skin color that is still relatively fair, by Florida standards at least. It was just enough color so that people did not think of me as pasty and ghost-like. It was a natural-looking, nondescript color that you cannot obtain through sunless tanning, which I have tried countless times throughout my life.

When I went back to school everyone raved about how beautiful my skin was. I looked prettier and the tan accentuated my muscles, making me look skinnier and more toned. However, an engineering student's lack of time and money forced me to stop my tanning regimen. As my tan faded, so did the compliments and attention.

Over the years I have oscillated between phases of using tanning booths and avoiding UV exposure. I am usually a very logical and rational person. I know the dangers of using tanning booths. I have seen the effects of sun damage on older fair-skinned individuals. Despite all this, there are times when I fail to care about the dangers that seem so far-off and uncertain. The benefits are immediate, predictable and can be seen by everyone.

Simply put, I use tanning booths to fit in and look more main-stream. A decent tan makes me feel good about myself and confident in my body, and sometimes it feels like that is worth the risk.

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