[sigterm]

This is not true. Even ancient Chinese had a strong preference for light skin tone. My understanding is that darker skin usually means a person is more exposed to sunlight, presumably from farming work, which is an indicator of lower social status.

[smtddr]

That should be specific to a dark brown Chinese person; not to an African American. Since we know the average Chinese person does not have dark brown skin, seeing such a person would make you wonder why that is. e.g., we know dirt/mud is brown and generally shouldn't pick up a hand-full off the ground and eat it... but people still like the image of chocolate deserts. The color red represents danger is an almost universal way(assuming it's because seeing blood is usually a bad sign for all humans and animals)... but people don't look at a red rose that way.

>>This is not true

You can't really claim that America's history & media has nothing to do it. You can debate to what degree, but to dismiss it completely is impossible.

[gwern]

> That should be specific to a dark brown Chinese person; not to an African American.

If the preference were an idealized optimal algorithm, perhaps; but people are adaptation-executers. The simplest rule is 'lighter skin means richer', and so when one runs into an African, it's not necessarily perfect. (Although given how many poor African immigrants there are in China now, I'm not sure that's a bug rather than a feature.)