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Our Sense of Beauty Is "Distorted"?
ege02
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The other day a female friend sent me a link to this website.
For those of you who cannot watch the video, it shows this somewhat good-looking girl get her hair made and make-up put on her face. Then the image is edited in Photoshop (I think) to give her bigger eyes, a longer, slimmer neck, and more slender cheeks. The image ends up in some billboard ad. And then it says something like "no wonder why our sense of beauty is distorted."
In a more general sense, this is what the campaign is about:
They have a point about self-esteem, but I'd like to question two things:
1- The extent of the role beauty plays on a woman's (or man's) self-esteem
2- The extent that our sense and taste for beauty are dictated by fashion magazines and popular culture idols, and whether or not this counts as "distortion" and not just a reflection of natural evolution of human tastes throughout time (more on this later).
Personally I have come to a point in life where I find superficiality to be a turn-off. A lot of my male friends are subscribers of magazines like Maxim and FHM and whatnot just for the purposes of eye-candy (it's not as if the articles in those things are well-written or smart), but, knowing that the women's outside appearance on those magazines is mostly fake usually turns off the "I find her hot" switch for me.
It is probably true that for a lot of people, what is beautiful and what is not is dictated by popular culture. At the same time however, the reproductive needs of humans have evolved (our sense of beauty is basically a mechanism for reproduction). In the old days, stocky women with large hips were thought to be more attractive on average because being stocky meant she had access to good nutrition and thus have a higher survivability rating, and big hips meant she could have a lot of children. Today though, society has changed. Couples in modern societies no longer strive to have twenty-five children, and modern medicine has eliminated many of the earlier concerns for survivability. While this explains why stocky women with large hips are today considered less attractive (even though "asses" and "boobs" are still a primary focus of male attention), it does not explain why athletic and slender women are considered more attractive. Is this where pop culture and fashion comes into play?
Obviously the subject of beauty is pretty broad and the discussion can take many routes, but I'd like to respectfully ask you folks not to turn this into a gender inequality thread because we've had quite a few of them lately as it is.
Thoughts?
For those of you who cannot watch the video, it shows this somewhat good-looking girl get her hair made and make-up put on her face. Then the image is edited in Photoshop (I think) to give her bigger eyes, a longer, slimmer neck, and more slender cheeks. The image ends up in some billboard ad. And then it says something like "no wonder why our sense of beauty is distorted."
In a more general sense, this is what the campaign is about:
Dove Campaign wrote:Low self-esteem is an issue that affects all women regardless of age or ethnicity. It can lead to introversion, a withdrawal from normal life and a waste of potential. At Dove, we believe that it is time to stop this waste by developing a more inclusive definition of beauty.
They have a point about self-esteem, but I'd like to question two things:
1- The extent of the role beauty plays on a woman's (or man's) self-esteem
2- The extent that our sense and taste for beauty are dictated by fashion magazines and popular culture idols, and whether or not this counts as "distortion" and not just a reflection of natural evolution of human tastes throughout time (more on this later).
Personally I have come to a point in life where I find superficiality to be a turn-off. A lot of my male friends are subscribers of magazines like Maxim and FHM and whatnot just for the purposes of eye-candy (it's not as if the articles in those things are well-written or smart), but, knowing that the women's outside appearance on those magazines is mostly fake usually turns off the "I find her hot" switch for me.
It is probably true that for a lot of people, what is beautiful and what is not is dictated by popular culture. At the same time however, the reproductive needs of humans have evolved (our sense of beauty is basically a mechanism for reproduction). In the old days, stocky women with large hips were thought to be more attractive on average because being stocky meant she had access to good nutrition and thus have a higher survivability rating, and big hips meant she could have a lot of children. Today though, society has changed. Couples in modern societies no longer strive to have twenty-five children, and modern medicine has eliminated many of the earlier concerns for survivability. While this explains why stocky women with large hips are today considered less attractive (even though "asses" and "boobs" are still a primary focus of male attention), it does not explain why athletic and slender women are considered more attractive. Is this where pop culture and fashion comes into play?
Obviously the subject of beauty is pretty broad and the discussion can take many routes, but I'd like to respectfully ask you folks not to turn this into a gender inequality thread because we've had quite a few of them lately as it is.
Thoughts?
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I would rather discuss the subject rather than the source. As you said, there is some truth to it.
I dont know, I find girl next door types the most attractive. Though I hate how its ok for girls to be stupid now a days.
Giraffes are very graceful and beautiful creatures.
I know that at my worst moments, things as innocuous as Old Navy clothing commercials could almost bring me to tears. It's cruel, it is, but any campaign against popular culture is ill-fated-- you can't easily move from a standard of beauty to having no standard. I don't think there's a lot of good to a middle ground here, if a compromise is established, the people that are still outside the standard are even more alienated than before. At least now we can unite in uniform "ugliness."
I'm of the group that advocates self-empowering education at a young age, so I think a better approach here than trying to change the popular image is just to take advantage of compulsory education to try and raise more resilient human beings.
It's a shame, it is, and I know first-hand how terribly disconcerting it can be to live in a beauty-centric world like this, but I know that I only got better when I was better with myself-- nothing outside changed.
I (of course) can't speak for every woman. But being someone with a lot of self esteem issue, I know that beauty played a big role for me. I was so used looking at woman in magazine and in the movies, that I really got a distorted image of myself.
I know the "oh I'm so fat" thing is very common, but I know that, at least in my case, I saw myself as an obese girl. but when I look at picture taken in that "fat/obese" phase of my life, I realize I was more than thin. And so, with that fact in mind, I can tell you that media played a big role in my low self-esteem. of course I wasn't mrs. Self-confidence to begin with, but the big factor was the feeling I was "fat and ugly"
The popular culture tendancy nowaday seems to be "oh let's bash thin woman and praise curve!!" wich is really stupid when you see that those curvacious woman are just sticks with some boobs.
I don't think that "beauty" naturally evolved to the model we see right now, mainly cause bashing some body type doesn't sound like evolution to me. I know what you meant about hips=children but I don't really think that the reason we now like the "12 years old boy body " type is because we want less children.
and of course Dove is just marketing to sell more product. does that make the point they are trying to make "false"? no.
I have no idea if that makes any sense, but I see this as a problem, and I'm sure it's a symptom rather than the root of the issue.
Did you know that no creature of any species except for some insects is strong enough to kick off the head of another creature in it's same species?
I did not know that.
Also, women who have the hips of a 12 year old are skank bitches. This is the message that we should be sending.
Yeah, that's equally fucking charming.
I have the hips of a 42-year-old mule. You wanna make something of it?
The whole issue is based on genetics and perpetuation of the species, but unfortunately marketing has taken it and enhanced it to ridiculous proportions.
I mean, the ultimate result is a society unhappy with itself because it can never be quite good enough- I think what these people are proffering is that if you are beautiful you will be liked more than others, which is true in a basic "wow she's hot" sense, but leads to the elevation of a 'beauty first' attitude which results in some fucked up people.
I mean, how many awesomely good looking girls that you know are 'normal'? Or even just not fucked up? I don't know any... they have all be messed around by their own looks and been exploited because of it.
The problem is I say all this and yet I only even bother making an effort with 'hot' girls. I bet its similar for most of you people on this board. I have no real answer to this, except to suggest that I am a victim of all this marketing as well- despite being aware of it!
Is it just a problem of the human psyche?
Yeah, I do. It's unspeakably terrible that you killed a record-breakingly old mule just for its hips.
most people don't, and you are kinda a judgemental twat and probably are part of the problem. Hell, by your statment don't love women with physical flaws.
I've always kinda been bothered by the lack of press that eating disorders in males get. Almost never mentioned, with just makes guy with eating disorders feel more wierd. Hell, there is even a tendancy to not let guys go to support groups cause it makes the women folk uncomfortable(or at least in some parts of florida, anyway).
meh, yeah our views of beauty are pretty fucked and it ruines a lot of lives. There has been a little progress, but honestly liposuction has probably killed more people than corsets so it is not that much progress.
I am repulsed by the "12 years old boy body type" and I believe most other males are as well. These are only portrayed on women's magazines and such. There are very few of those in men's magazine, porn sites and so on.
I've read a few pages of a book about this issue (can't remember the title/author). The author cited studies showing that on a continuum from "curvy" to "skinny", you get
[1]----[2]----[3]
1-What the average man prefers
2-What the average woman thinks men prefer
3-What the average woman prefers
According to another study the average Playboy model has gotten (very slightly) curvier, not skinnier, over the years.
edit:
And I've just googled studies stating the exact opposite. Whatever... it's not like I'm going to review the methodology for each study.
What the fuck. Calm down.
I am not a judgemental twat. Hell, the only people I would throw some criticism at are the people who layer their fucking faces up with make-up to think it makes them attractive. Or they just do it because it's seen as the "popular" thing to do. I find it hard to respect people like that.
Also,
*Corny Dublo emerges*
When you're in love with someone, physical flaws should not matter to you, and should not be an issue. Hell sometimes it's those little so called "imperfections" that make that person stand out for you, and make you love them even more. It's happened to me countless times in the past.
But then again, something has been wrong in one culture or another since the begining of recorded history. Foot binding, corsets, those neck ring thingies. Skinny seems to be one of those things.
I have to ask, are men perpetuating this skinny stereotype? I have to ask because all of the guys I know gag when they see the anorexic runway model type. So I know they have to be out there somewhere but I'll be damned if I've ever met one of them.
I don't like topics like this because the invariably tend to feel like people telling me what I am and aren't allowed to be attracted you - get the fuck out of my head and all.
I absolutely agree with you. I live in Brazil and girls over here just put so much make up that to me at least it makes them unattractive. You can go out at night and meet and talk to a girl for hours, but if you pass by her the other day on the street you won´t recognize her.
I spent one year studying in Spain and can say that european women are great at knowing to look their best with little to no make up. You actually wake up with the same person you went to sleep the night before. To make a comparison most girls at my college wear more make up to go to class than europeans to go out at night.
On the subject of curvy and skinny I have to go with a quote from Pulp Fiction...
"It's unfortunate what we find pleasing to the touch and pleasing to the eye is seldom the same. "
Women (and some men) get their self-esteem from looks because they got attention as a child. When they were teenagers most people reacted favorably to them because of their looks, thus they based their self-worth on said looks.
Those who grew past or never based self-worth on looks will overall have a better life, when they grow older. It is simply easier for the hot ones to go through life on looks because no one cares about who you are if you stimulate them with your bod. Dove has realized that older women have experienced the loss of attention, and created this campaign to exploit it.
Now concerning the basis for attraction, I agree with you. Cuteness goes a hell of a lot farther for me then model looks. I believe that who find attractive is based on who you were attracted to when you were young, but that is slightly off-topic.
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There's a lot of focus on how girls look from the time they are very young even from peers. This is probably a symptom in that this is a beauty obsessed, sexuality obsessed culture in a way, and people are learning things younger and things like this are happening while girls are still coming to terms with themselves and that's when these things stick with them into womanhood, where it manifests into insecurity.
I could be totally wrong though.
like, you are just saying a bullshit line which is socially acceptable even though you don't really belive it. Kinda like the whole sienfield "he's gay, not that there is anything wrong with that."
Saying things like what you said are kinda of the issue, and now you are basicly saying something diffrent. You didn't say "I think women look best without make-up", you said you like women who look good without. meh... Don't know how a statement like that could be particularly relavent in a thread about the inacuracy of (percived) standards of beauty.
honeslty, most guys have been trained to say that they don't like make up. They don't like obvious make up, sure, but there is a reason your pretty unlikely to find a girl at a bar/club/restraunt/damn near anywhere in public without say... a bit of foundation and powder(probably mascara too). It is not entierly revlon and red book's fault.
probably not. Kids are fucking horible to each other.
you ever see one of them there nature shows what with the antalopes and the lions? Anything that makes you stand out make you a target no mater which end of the spectrum you're on. or whatever.
Oh, jesus christ. I don't have to prove anything to you. Although, I do entirely believe in what I said in my previous post. And that's all I'm saying to you on that issue.
no you don't.
Yes, you probably belive what you are saying accurately reflects your views and could not be misconstued in such a way that it would cause emotional harm.
It's not that men are trained to say they don't like make-up. It's that a lot of women are completely obsessed, as a result of this whole phenomenon, with looking like goddesses or whatever. So I see someone at a club who looks like she applied her make-up with a shotgun, yeah, that is unattractive.
On the other hand, I don't think there isn't anything wrong with a little bit of make-up. On the contrary, at least making an effort to look better than average when you go out at night or something gives the impression that you care, not necessarily about what other people think of your looks, but about the kind of looks you as a person are projecting. It's like trying to look your best when you go to an important business dinner. You're not really trying to charm the other guys as much as give them the impression that you care, that you respect them and the event itself. I don't know if that makes sense.
Personally, I like make-up that accentuates the already attractive features of the face, rather than make-up that tries to create an attractive feature out of an unattractive one. Like, if she has pretty eyes, and she's wearing a little eye-liner or something to make her eyes stand out more, that's attractive to me. If she looks like Paris Hilton, that's not attractive.
And redx, I don't see how saying "I like women who are naturally beautiful" makes me a judgmental twat. It's not fair to hold someone accountable for their tastes and preferences.
I agree with all the points in this post. I'm not completely adverse to make-up, but like you implied, it's awful when it's excessive.
This is true, but it's worth asking from whence our tastes and preferences came? I tend to like thin girls with dark hair and strong features - it's just my preference, though I've dated many different varieties of girls. While we really can't help what we find attractive or unattractive, there's probably a reason that the girls I find attractive are fairly generally considered attractive - most likely, in part, that these were always presented as "attractive women" in the media while I was growing up.
I don't think there's much more to it than that. It's probably ridiculous to posit that there's some evolutionary reason that society's view of beauty has changed in the past 200 years - we just haven't evolved since then.
Calm the fuck down. He was saying that women who don't slather makeup on > women who slather makeup on. There are so many women I know who, if they would just put down the god damned makeup case, would look so much better. As it is, they look like clowns.