It’s been 11 years, and I still remember the day I decided I was cursed.

I had just started kindergarten, and we were working on self portraits in art class. I rummaged around in my 24-pack Crayola box until I found what I was looking for: the apricot color, worn down to a stub from frequent use. I had barely started scribbling away at my self-portrait when the girl next to me snatched the crayon from my hand.

“What are you doing?” she asked. “That’s not your skin color!”

I stared at her. And then, as I looked at the apricot crayon in my hand, the weight of what she was saying sunk in all at once. Before I realized what I was doing, I was pawing frantically through the crayon box, trying desperately to find a hint of my own skin in its myriad colors, but all I could find was a dirty, tree-trunk brown. I felt abandoned and cursed by the brown-skinned gods. I ended up leaving my face uncolored, and when the teacher hung the portraits up in the hall, my paper-white effigy looked like a ghost. And in some ways, I felt like one — uncertain, uncomfortable in my skin, and invisible.

It’s been 11 years, and I still think that there are some things that you have to be a girl of color to understand. It’s the shame of hairy arms and dark skin in the middle school locker room, the impenetrable wall of melanin separating you from the models you see on TV. It’s the time you watched Snow White on DVR and realized that you were not the fairest of them all — in fact, you were far from it.

I’m not alone in these experiences.

I’m not alone in these experiences. Millions of Indian women face rampant colorism — the problematic concept that darker skin is inherently less desirable — both in India and in America. It takes many forms: for example, the promotion of skin-lightening products, the stigmatization of dark-skinned women, and the fetishization of light-skinned people, all of which can be harmful to our sense of self. And it’s not just a South Asian problem; the color line divides populations of many different places, from East Asia to America. While I’m lucky to have grown up in a family that made me feel beautiful, it was impossible to escape the projections of colorism around me: the fair-skinned models on TV ads and Fair and Lovely skin-lightening creams.

It was entirely by accident that I discovered the #UnfairAndLovely movement on social media, but it changed everything for me. As I scrolled through the images of strong, unapologetic, beautiful dark-skinned women, I felt like I had finally found my color in the crayon box. I felt like I finally belonged. This is why representation is so important — because for the first time, I felt powerful and validated for who I was. For far too long, women of color have been silenced, as much by society as by ourselves. We’re practically invisible in some of the most powerful institutions of society: government, the media, and entertainment, which erases the richly diverse potential of women of color to feel empowered. When you’re told that you’re ugly for too long, you start to believe it. When you’re told you’re powerless, it starts to come true. And when it comes to changing attitudes and learning to embrace yourself, strength in numbers is important.

For far too long, women of color have been silenced, as much by society as by ourselves.

I’m infinitely grateful to the fearless, forward-thinking women of color that are reclaiming their melanin in order to combat colorism worldwide. They’re harnessing the growing platform of social media to launch powerful movements, linking together beautiful dark women with hashtags like #MelaninMagic and #FlexingMyComplexion. #UnfairAndLovely, in particular, is a bold challenge to the reigning “Fair and Lovely” culture that seeks to whitewash women into conformity. In a society that profits off of colored women’s sense of inferiority, a simple hashtag is a powerful symbol. It is a symbol of change.