Unzipped Beauty!
A universal veiw over
brain cells...
By: Anne-Sophie.
When I was pondering on the theme of beauty and the possible curse of it, I was wondering how to approach it. I thought: I’m not a subject to any beauty curse, that doesn’t happen to me. But then I realised that living in other countries gave me tons of experiences with beauty, and its potential bad side effects as well.
In Afghanistan the beauty ideal is tall, blonde and curvy. Fair enough to hit the description of me. And what happened there is that, half my friends were using bleaching creams to lighten their skin, and I somehow symbolised a beauty ideal. Utterly ridiculous is what is.
So what are the ideals? In Jordan I found a couple of interesting things. Dark skinned men with lots of arm-hair have the mojo when combined with luscious big lips. Women ought to have few facial moles here and there, not to forget being blessed with a long neck. Very weird, I never considered my arm-hair particularly sexy even though I’m not a man! In Mali the women are forced fed to get that proper beauty. In Denmark the more you have the pointy shape of a bicycle the hotter you are. Cheap conclusion: no standards, it all matters on the contest and yadayada in the clichés, meaning, the beauty is in the eyes’ of the beholder. That does not circumvent the fact that there are ideals, and you are judged against these on the catwalk of the street.
So what happened then to me in Afghanistan? I wore extremely conservative clothing and became quite strict in my first approach to people to give a serious impression and not seem like the epitome of a Scandinavian doll and to be treated like one.
What’s the fuss about then? Isn’t beauty just a good thing, one that opens doors, allows you access to the wonders of the world, and generally bodes good for your future (as long as you remain beautiful, not to be mentioned). Why would this magazine, that so praises beauty on its covers, even dare to suggest that it could be a bad thing, even a curse?
Wrapping it up, this beauty thing is not really good, at least not only. Those of my girlfriends who have an excess of beauty, and somehow also manage to have more than two brain cells, complain over and over again of not being taken seriously. Of being treated like a shitty –beautiful but also a B-class – object. It is mainly expected of them to look good. And keep quite.
Children, oh no, pardon me for over-talking here, children and women should not be heard, just seen! And in Afghanistan the doll-woman should definitely not be doing her job of teaching men in their 50ies football. Nope we cannot have that, so what does the doll do? Either she doesn’t get the respect which is needed for her job, or she becomes a strict no-bullshit b*tch, completely trashing the beauty ideal, and the expectations coming with it (shush! Keep quite gorgeous).
"... others let frendships come
to a halt, because they, in their
superficial minds, cannot cope
with the attention being sucked
out of the room..."
What about the other side? How do the friends take this over-luck at the beauty counter? It’s not always a dance on roses to be the gorgeous, charming sidekick of the friend, especially not when other friends are less than comfortable with leaving the new girl friend alone with him. Or other friends will let the friendship come to a halt, because they, in their superficial minds, cannot cope with the attention being sucked out of the room, drawn away from their private space, and all tucked on the shoulders of their friend. Ouch that hurt. One less of a friendship, just because of the gorgeousity matter! Not to talk about the acquaintances where she is not really sure if the intentions are real, or more based in the hopes of some of the beauty might rub off, or if not the actual beauty, then at least some of the benefits that come with it.
And what about these benefits, why would most beautiful people not consider themselves cursed? One of the brilliant examples is the fairly beautiful girl who plays the stupid card and just smiles and blinks, pretends to be dumb as she may get something out of that. Because often it seems that girls get extra points for smiling, and shutting up! For boys it comes as well. A pretty face should stay a pretty face, that way they are easier to cope with. A pretty face with an opinion and an intellect seems slightly disturbing. Being lucky both on the inside and the outside somehow stirs our egalitarian ideals.
But every time we let a beauty get away with it, just because of their gorgeousness, we fall in the trap of passing on to the mistakes done or about to. We disfavour and encourage them to keep playing stupid and keep the focuses away from those two brain cells proliferating.
Hep hey! Now I don’t want to sound like the angry middle-aged-saggy-butt-cat loving-woman “beauty is baaad for you”. Not the point.
We could have a few more plastic surgeries, let’s get a little more of those Beiruti fake girlies sipping their lattés, more of them Iranian men with a plaster healing the nose-job jogging around the police on the Tehran streets, a few more beauty-clones with the brain cells hidden in the hand bag. It doesn’t really matter to you if these peeps care more about their looks than their intellect, ‘because their beauty may not be as cute and nice for them as it seems.
I’m all for beauty. Give me more of that, I adore looking at that skanky girl’s sassy legs and that beautiful boy’s backside. I’m just not such a fan when it’s squeezing out the substance. And especially not when I’m expected not to posses any kind substance. In that case – I’m happy I’m not more beautiful.
And what about these benefits, why would most beautiful people not consider themselves cursed? One of the brilliant examples is the fairly beautiful girl who plays the stupid card and just smiles and blinks, pretends to be dumb as she may get something out of that. Because often it seems that girls get extra points for smiling, and shutting up! For boys it comes as well. A pretty face should stay a pretty face, that way they are easier to cope with. A pretty face with an opinion and an intellect seems slightly disturbing. Being lucky both on the inside and the outside somehow stirs our egalitarian ideals.
But every time we let a beauty get away with it, just because of their gorgeousness, we fall in the trap of passing on to the mistakes done or about to. We disfavour and encourage them to keep playing stupid and keep the focuses away from those two brain cells proliferating.
Hep hey! Now I don’t want to sound like the angry middle-aged-saggy-butt-cat loving-woman “beauty is baaad for you”. Not the point.
We could have a few more plastic surgeries, let’s get a little more of those Beiruti fake girlies sipping their lattés, more of them Iranian men with a plaster healing the nose-job jogging around the police on the Tehran streets, a few more beauty-clones with the brain cells hidden in the hand bag. It doesn’t really matter to you if these peeps care more about their looks than their intellect, ‘because their beauty may not be as cute and nice for them as it seems.
I’m all for beauty. Give me more of that, I adore looking at that skanky girl’s sassy legs and that beautiful boy’s backside. I’m just not such a fan when it’s squeezing out the substance. And especially not when I’m expected not to posses any kind substance. In that case – I’m happy I’m not more beautiful.