Darker Skin by Injection!

One of the inexplicable contradictions in race is this: in every known historical era, in every region of the world, lighter skin has been considered preferable to darker skin, and been privileged thereby. Except this one strange anomoly of the past century: the desirability of a tan among white folks. Now comes word from an article in Wired Magazine that a "suntan drug" has been approved for trials by the FDA--ostensibly for medical use (for a few rare conditions)--not for cosmetic use. (Kind of like QT in a syringe, to be applied internally instead of topically, and with less orangish results).

The article (at http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/01/tan.html?npu=1&mbid=yhp --complete with before-and-after photos) says the hype or the risk, depending on how you look at it, is that the drug has the potential to be an abused "lifestyle drug" like Botox or Viagra. In fact, the human-made hormone, called afamelanotide, is already available (illegal in the U.S.) on-line as Melanotan II.

Now here's the REALLY weird part: The drug reportedly appears to have aphrodisiac and erectile function effects as well. Darker skin, more active libido--talk about reinforcing racial sterotypes!

And for a bit more weirdness: the article reports that in "early animal trials, injections of the drug caused a yellow dog's fur to become black and visibly darkened a frog's skin in minutes." Yeah, sounds safe to me. I mean, why not just wallow in a bath of ink the color you wanta be?!