Today in the dentists' office I heard Christina Aguilera's song "Beautiful." I let my mind wander about my mental happy place, far away from the burring of the drill, the stinging tang of smoke drifting from my mouth, the white-hot "CRACK" as my tooth parted company from my gums. Lectures that never seem to end and dental visits have taught me a mental happy place is a very good thing. Today the thoughts floating around in my happy place weren't too happy.
I thought about Western culture's definition of beauty. It's actually quite narrow but has far-reaching implications. It impacts everyone no matter what their gender, age, country of residence, ethnicity or income is. If you don't fit those narrow parameters it means more than you can't be a model.
Popular media assaults us with images & conflicting messages...anything to make a buck. They have and continue to define for us what beautiful is. Beautiful people have it all -- happiness, sex, love, money, wealth, success, power. In addition, media defines what each of these are or should be. Sex is only between 20-40 year old, white, heterosexual, upper-middle class people who are in excellent shape with great teeth. Beauty is only those between 20-40 years old, white, heterosexual, upper-middle class people who are in excellent shape with flawless skin & great teeth. Success is money, power, fame. Happiness is materialistic gain. If you don't fit these...well, at least your money is still good with us! our products will get you as close as you can. This message appears to be universal; Thailand, Taiwan, Japan, Germany, London, Italy, Spain, Mexico...the images of all that is beautiful, successful, happy, loving are the same. They are of "The Beautiful People": white, 20-40 years old, great skin & teeth, perky breasts, hair on the head not on the back, with lots of disposable income.
The problem is, these images represent a very small, transient minority. The majority spends it's time & effort to become something we're not & chasing those things that media promises to those who are The Beautiful People. Everyone wants to be loved & happy. It's time we quit letting media define what we should be. I don't want media telling me what is beautiful anymore.
It's funny. When I see the so-called Beautiful People in real life, they never seem happy. The one word I'd use to describe their lives is "drama." They bounce from relationship to relationship. They're so worried about what they eat that they never actually taste or even enjoy it. No matter how many things they have, they are never satisfied until they have more; enough is not in their vocabulary. They spend the most time, effort & money chasing beauty but never actually see it in themselves. These are the people with eating disorders, addictions, histories of bad relationships, ulcers, working so many hours they miss their kids growing up. This is happy?! It's funny how The Beautiful People always seem to have the ugliest lives or personalities.
For me, beautiful means something more. It's not just how someone looks but who they are. Beautiful can be found at any age, in any color skin no matter how many wrinkles, zits, freckles, or pounds. Beautiful is any love -- be it heterosexual or homosexual. Beauty can be found in grandmothers, babies, transsexuals, custodians, teachers, homeless. Likewise success isn't monetary or materialistic, but a state of mind...the ability to love oneself & others.
Once I returned from my not-so-happy thoughts while visiting my happy place, I found drying tears on my cheeks. It wasn't solely from the pain of the tooth extraction (tho that had been incredible in nature). It was from the realization of how many people in this world who want to be beautiful but don't realize they already are.
Beauty ends up being the popular idea and trend of it in the environment you live in. It's quite sad actually because how beauty is defined is very narrow in this country.
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The problem is it isn't just in this country; the United States is so influential, our media so pervasive that it's everywhere. I didn't fuily realize that until I went outside of this country. I saw it in Thailand where no one looks like the vast majority of the commercial advertising & music videos are lip synced by people who do meet the Westernized standards of beauty. I also hear about the impact in Asian countries where it is now popular to get their eyes reshaped to resemble that of Westerners so they can finally be "beautiful" or in Japan where women bind their feet to make them small. The impact is devistating; 40% of all college students can expect -- sometime during their undergraduate careers -- to have an eating disorder, suicide attempts & despondency are on the rise, everyone resorts to an easy fix (happy pills) which deal with the symptom but not the root cause and these problems start & increase when other countries begin to industrialize & the Western (US) influence & marketing invade in pursuit of $$.
It's gotten to where I no longer watch TV because I cannot stand the advertising that not only insults the intelligence but tells people they aren't what they "should" be. In the end, advertising is just a symptom of bigger problems. More and more we're looking to outside sources for happiness, love, success & learning to dislike ourselves....it's a self-perpetuating cycle which just keeps getting worse. It's sad because some people who truly are beautiful see only flaws & ugliness & slowly learn to be ashamed of or even hate themselves. It's no longer just a problem of US/Western culture; it's becoming global.
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"Freedom is an expensive thing." ~ Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
They say that beauty is only skin-deep, so I would say that beauty is not something to strive for. Loveliness, on the other hand, is a perfectly acceptable goal. Look at the word itself, loveliness. That is the basis of what true beauty is.
Great blog. I completely agree.
That's pretty sweet, a great way to reframe it. Made me smile which hurt because I just had dental surgery. but was well worth the pain. :-)
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"Freedom is an expensive thing." ~ Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
^-^ Thanks, apparently I come up with little gems like that every once in a blue moon.
LOL. Polish those gems & horde them for those days when no gems are in sight. I'm kinda klutzy, so there are many of those days where what I do are gems of the blackmail variety for others.
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"Freedom is an expensive thing." ~ Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Lol. I know the feeling.
The sad thing is when people don't see themselves as beautiful. We get sucked into those "20-40 white, heterosexual, etc..." stereotypes and then can no longer look at ourselves with pride and respect. Beauty is everywhere, in everyone, it just depends on whether or not you're willing to look for it. But before we can start breaking the current "model" beauty standards, we have to learn to be happy with ourselves.
I agree. One cannot truly be loved nor love someone else until they first love themselves; they will look for that somewhere else, from someone else, but no matter how hard someone else tries or how good they are, they cannot fill that void & will always seem to come up short.
The pursuit of love is universal, something every conscious, living thing (even some plants) aspires for. It seems we as humans expend the most looking for this elusive thing, are willing to put up with extremely abusive situations for the hope of it, but tend to avoid looking in the most obvious place -- ourselves -- because all we can see are our many our "flaws" (i.e. "my butt's too big", "I'm fat", "I'm ugly") and never see ourselves as others do: inherently beautiful.
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"Freedom is an expensive thing." ~ Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
For me, real beauty comes from deep within. It does not matter how nice you look on the outside it is the inside that counts. In addition to that, I also believe that being happy is one significant factor of being beautiful (health is the other factor). Anyway, nice post. Enjoyed reading this.
Stephen
Well I think beauty comes from self love. I love myself, and I accept myself for who I am.
Maybe if we could all learn to love ourselves and see our own beauty, we could really start to see other people's beauty.
Après la pluie le beau temps. ♥
I brought up this point in a comment to a differnt blog but I think it's completely applicable here....I think the reason beauty is so difficult to define...or achieve is b/c of our human flaws...we all suffer from an inferiority complex...we see that people's lives are better than ours...thanks in large part to the media...so we go after what they have...we make ourselves more "beautiful"...but then we find someone else who is even better off and try to emulate them...once we've moved up then there are people below us...these are the "ugly" people which is why there is hatred...if we could just stop feeling like people's lives are so much better than ours...and stop being told by the media that our everyday lives suck...a lot of this could probably be avoided