We are all fighting for women's rights, women's equal pay, and ultimately women's happiness. We band together, make protests, form communities. It seems that it is our common goal for all women to feel loved, beautiful, and happy.
Women are supposed to be a sex based on community, togetherness. Weddings, slumber parties, even group trips to the bathroom are all something girls do together, and there seems to be this sense of sisterhood, but 'sadly, these delightful bonds too often dissolve when the women reenter public space and resume their isolated, unequal, mutually threatening, jealously guarded "beauty" status' (Wolf 76).
Why are we all against each other?
What I am talking about is how it seems to me that sometimes our biggest bullies are other women themselves. We care about which girls we hang out with. We dress a certain way to impress our friends. We feel the need to one up each other with boyfriends and relationships. Women judge each other because we feel threatened. If that one women is pretty, that must mean that I am not, right?
Wrong.
Somehow, over the years we have developed this very black-and-white point of view that acts as a wooden shudder through which we look at people, and ourselves. If one girl is good at something, we are not. If I am the only single one out of my friends, it must mean that there is something wrong with me. And for some reason, we always lose in the comparison. Further and further we batter ourselves until our self-esteem is left to nothingness. Even those who seem confident, even the ones who put others down, have deep insecurities. They simply learned to take their anger out on other people. 'Women can tend to resent each other if they look too "good" and dismiss one another if they look too "bad"' (Wolf 75). We can't win with one another. So why do we assume that the media is the only issue that we battle?
While we always want to look good for men, in reality most of the time we feel more self-concious around other woman. 'What are other women really thinking, feeling, experiencing when they slip away from the gaze and culture of men?' (Wolf 76). It seems to me that first we need to fix the way we perceive and treat each other before we can expect any kind of reform in the media and society. The public, the viewers, the masses, we control what the media decides to focus on. They give us what we want to see. So if they see a mass beauty revolution promoting self-value and worth and wholesome self-adoration, isn't that eventually what they will have to sell us? It's all up to us, ladies.
Monday, 23 April 2012
Hunger For Thinness 2: The Disease
Eating disorders are the number one most deadly psychiatric illness in the world. Anorexia nervosa, just one of the many different types of eating disorders, has a mortality rate of 20% (NEDA).
I have had many close friends go through eating disorders and so I have had some very up close and personal accounts with the horrors of the disease. And that's just it, most people don't even recognize it as a disease. Most people think the solution for the nearly 70 million people across the world with eating disorders is to just eat (NEDA).
If it were that easy, trust me, people would do it.
The problem is not that women measure their weight in pounds, it's that they measure their worth in pounds. Eating disorders are not about the food, or even really about being thin. They are about a need for control. If everything is spinning out beyond a woman's grasp and she has no control over it, at least she can control what she eats. She can punish those she loves by not eating, she can reward herself with losing weight, she can punish herself by not eating. It gives her a sense of empowerment and control. The irony is that in the end, the disease controls the woman. Not the other way around. That is often why the projected recovery time is five-ten years for an eating disorder victim. It's about giving up that control.
At first it may just start out as the desire to drop a couple pounds, and before she knows it, that original goal was twenty-five pounds ago. 'At a certain point inside the cult of "beauty," dieting becomes anorexia or compulsive eating or bulimia' (Kilbourne 127). The hard part is that most people associate eating disorders with emaciated models who weigh under 100lbs. The truth is, only 30% of all eating disordered people are underweight. It is completely false for someone to think that a person "looks like they have an eating disorder." Therein lies the problem. Most women think that they are "too fat" to have an eating disorder, so they do not see a need to get help, or are embarrassed to do so. Thinness is just a symptom of the eating disorder, not the problem itself. The core issue is a sense that one is not "good enough" or "worth it." Worth love, care, affection, etc.
People often think it's for attention. That the woman just wants to be told she's thin or that she's beautiful. Nothing could be farther from the truth. 'What has not been recognized is how it actually makes a woman feel slightly mad' (Kilbourne 123). It is an illness. Would you tell someone with diabetes that they are just doing it for attention? What about clinical depression? Eating disorders are the same. The person often wants to get out of the trap, but finds that the current of society's expectations for thinness are too strong to breakaway from.
Hunger for Thinness 1: Media
The media has completely warped and skewed women's body image into a filter that only allows negativity, and it penetrates every last bit of self-worth that we have. 'The current emphasis on excessive thinness for women is one of the clearest examples of advertising's power to influence us' (Kilbourne, Slim Hopes). It's true. From the shapes of shampoo and perfume bottles, to the LOW CALORIE-NON-FAT-NO-PRESERVATIVES foods (they might as well say NO FLAVOR) that women see all the time, the ideal of this thinness permeates their everyday lives.
I read a statistic once that girls see 400 ads a day telling them how they should look. Telling them that they are not beautiful enough, thin enough, delicate enough, feminine enough...That's 400 reminders a day tearing down at their self-image, telling them that by themselves they are not worth anything. The only time that most women feel truly comfortable in their own skin is as young children, as 'those who have not been told yet that they are not beautiful' (Kilbourne 104). But as soon as adolescence creeps up, when makeup and boys and clothes finally become of major importance, that confidence begins to shatter.
"Girls reach adolescence and they hit a wall. And at least part of that wall seems to be this incessant obsession with physical perfection" (Kilbourne, Slim Hopes). I remember when I began to feel the pressure to look a certain way. As a young child I was a complete tomboy. I refused to wear pink or dresses or skirts, but would run around in boys cargo shorts and t-shirts while barefoot. I remember seeing my older girl cousins getting ready for church in the morning. They were curling their hair, swiping their eyes with colorful shadows, dabbing on lip gloss. My cousin turned to me and held up her tube of Bonnie Bell Lip Smackers (watermelon flavor to be exact), and said, 'Want some?' I contorted my face into an expression of disgust and scoffed. 'Ew, no.' She rolled her eyes. Secretly, I really wanted to put it on. I wanted to slather the pink glossy stuff all over my lips and taste the watermelon goodness. I wanted to look pretty like them. I felt embarrassed about my want for girly things, it was a new feeling. But later in church, I felt more embarrassed about my boyish appearance.
That's just the thing, we buy into the beauty myth. We willingly spend our money, time, and effort on this thing that degrades us. At first we feel embarrassed about our obsession and want to be beautiful, but then we feel feel even more embarrassed for not being so in the first place. And that's exactly what the beauty myth intends to do, guilt-trip us into thinking we need it, until we are convinced that we really do.
I read a statistic once that girls see 400 ads a day telling them how they should look. Telling them that they are not beautiful enough, thin enough, delicate enough, feminine enough...That's 400 reminders a day tearing down at their self-image, telling them that by themselves they are not worth anything. The only time that most women feel truly comfortable in their own skin is as young children, as 'those who have not been told yet that they are not beautiful' (Kilbourne 104). But as soon as adolescence creeps up, when makeup and boys and clothes finally become of major importance, that confidence begins to shatter.
"Girls reach adolescence and they hit a wall. And at least part of that wall seems to be this incessant obsession with physical perfection" (Kilbourne, Slim Hopes). I remember when I began to feel the pressure to look a certain way. As a young child I was a complete tomboy. I refused to wear pink or dresses or skirts, but would run around in boys cargo shorts and t-shirts while barefoot. I remember seeing my older girl cousins getting ready for church in the morning. They were curling their hair, swiping their eyes with colorful shadows, dabbing on lip gloss. My cousin turned to me and held up her tube of Bonnie Bell Lip Smackers (watermelon flavor to be exact), and said, 'Want some?' I contorted my face into an expression of disgust and scoffed. 'Ew, no.' She rolled her eyes. Secretly, I really wanted to put it on. I wanted to slather the pink glossy stuff all over my lips and taste the watermelon goodness. I wanted to look pretty like them. I felt embarrassed about my want for girly things, it was a new feeling. But later in church, I felt more embarrassed about my boyish appearance.
That's just the thing, we buy into the beauty myth. We willingly spend our money, time, and effort on this thing that degrades us. At first we feel embarrassed about our obsession and want to be beautiful, but then we feel feel even more embarrassed for not being so in the first place. And that's exactly what the beauty myth intends to do, guilt-trip us into thinking we need it, until we are convinced that we really do.
Thursday, 19 April 2012
Prom Drama II
I thought I should continue on from my previous piece, and what I would like to focus on is the mindset of a girl attending the event.
Let's be honest. It is a competition as well as a production. Everyone is looking to see who will be the Best Dressed, Most Expensively Dressed, Best Hair, Most Attractive Couple...and also Worst Dressed, Worst Hair, Most Embarrassing Prom Moment...It's sad and quite frankly awful, but it's part of the whole production.
Let's be honest. It is a competition as well as a production. Everyone is looking to see who will be the Best Dressed, Most Expensively Dressed, Best Hair, Most Attractive Couple...and also Worst Dressed, Worst Hair, Most Embarrassing Prom Moment...It's sad and quite frankly awful, but it's part of the whole production.
The Prom is the time when girls can impress, shock, and startle their classmates with how beautiful they are. The amount of planning that goes into their unveiling is mind-boggling. I read another article about Prom from the New York Times, and one girl stated that she had begun planning her dress in September. "To avoid the horror of walking into the prom and seeing someone else in the same dress, Shantelle is having her dress made, something a number of her classmates are doing. Even so, she was reluctant to say too much about what the dress would look like before she appeared at the actual event" (Lombardi 1). "'You have to make a grandoise entrance'" she said (Lombardi 1).
I have to admit I am quite torn about this subject. On the one hand I think it is so fun to be able to get dolled-up and do something special with my peers in celebration, yet at the same time I think that the stress that the event puts on us to "look beautiful" is so sad and unnecessary. One lady in the article said "'''These young women wear blue jeans all the time, and it's kind of a fantasy to get in a glamorous dress,'' Ms. Iverson said. ''They watch MTV all the time and they see award shows with girls in amazing gowns. On prom night they can be like the stars they idolize. This is the age of celebrity, and they get turned on by all that. For one night they can dress the part and act the part''' (Lombardi 2). While this is true, it is also sad because it is the essence of the beauty myth. Girls are following the example of what they are told is beautiful, and they are acting.
I have to admit I am quite torn about this subject. On the one hand I think it is so fun to be able to get dolled-up and do something special with my peers in celebration, yet at the same time I think that the stress that the event puts on us to "look beautiful" is so sad and unnecessary. One lady in the article said "'''These young women wear blue jeans all the time, and it's kind of a fantasy to get in a glamorous dress,'' Ms. Iverson said. ''They watch MTV all the time and they see award shows with girls in amazing gowns. On prom night they can be like the stars they idolize. This is the age of celebrity, and they get turned on by all that. For one night they can dress the part and act the part''' (Lombardi 2). While this is true, it is also sad because it is the essence of the beauty myth. Girls are following the example of what they are told is beautiful, and they are acting.
Girls relish the compliments that they get on Prom night. 'Oh! You look stunning' 'You look so in shape, I'm jealous!' They take them to heart and try to use them to glue back together whatever self-esteem the high school experience has shattered. Why can't girls be told these things all the time? Why does it just have to be one night a year? Why is it that this is the only time that many of them will feel beautiful? It just goes to show how entrenched our culture is in the beauty myth, and how often we are unaware of it.
Sunday, 15 April 2012
The Beauty Myth - Work
It was the Friday afternoon that break got out, and I had to wait for my little brother to get out of his after-school activity. I had time to kill, so I decided to start reading our new book The Beauty Myth. Right as I brought it out of my bag and set it on the table, I heard a voice behind me say, "The beauty myth? What? There isn't a beauty myth." I turned around to meet a boy who is in one of my classes. "Actually, yeah there is. They're referring to society's constraints and expectations that are put on women about their appearance. How it makes women insecure, this myth that they need to look a certain way for acceptance and success."
He laughed. "There is no such thing as a beauty myth."
"Uh, yes there is," I frowned, not sure if he was serious or not.
"No, there's not. It's stupid, it's made up." He was serious. I found myself getting angry, trying to find words that wouldn't sound too harsh but would convey what I wanted to say.
"Well, yes there is. And the fact is that when people deny that there is a beauty myth, it only reinforces the fact that there is one. If it never gets talked about or recognized, then it just goes on keeping women contained within its lies."
"Bull****." He rolled his eyes.
"Well, I am sorry you feel that way. But it is people like you who are the reason the beauty myth exists. I'm going to get back to reading now."
Okay, so I was a bit harsh, but I couldn't explain why his comment made me so angry. When I started reading the book and thinking about it, I realized that it is because whether we choose to recognize it or not, all women are somehow constrained by the Beauty Myth, that "there is a dispiriting climate of confusion, division, cynicism, and above all, exhaustion" (Wolf 10). Myself included.
Being held under the beauty myth is exhausting.
Society has so many standards. And for woman, the first and foremost of those is beauty. The beauty industry is a multi-billion dollar industry. Makeup, hair products, clothing, cosmetic surgery, the diet industry, all of these are intricate strings of the web that the beauty myth weaves, ready to catch women as they go through life. The further and further they go, the more and more they become entangled in the sticky web. Think about it. As children, young girls have a freedom and security that can be directly connected to childhood innocence/ignorance. As they are exposed to more and more of society's expectations, that security is eroded away, until "there is a secret "underlife" poisoning our freedom;infused with notions of beauty, it is a dark vein of self-hatred, physical obsessions, terror of aging, and dread of lost control" (Wolf 10).
We all want to be the most beautiful. We alter and change our bodies in order to fit this "culturally imposed physical standard" (Wolf 12). We painstakingly spend hours slathering our faces with creams and powder and goop to look NOT like ourselves. We undergo dangerous surgeries to defy our genetic makeup.
What's the worst part about it? No one even recognizes it's happening.
Thursday, 12 April 2012
Prom Drama
It's Prom Season, ladies and gentlemen. Time for glittering gowns, overpriced tickets, and exciting predictions of possible Prom couples. Prom is a right of passage. It is the most exciting marker of becoming an upperclassmen. Freshmen talk about Prom, and they're two years away. As a junior this year, I will be attending the dance for the first time.
Prom is a big deal. Personally, I am not a big fan of school dances or functions. I am not on Prom committee, I have not spent months searching for a dress, I haven't been planning for this since Freshmen year, but I know that this is a big deal. People make it that way. Now, I'm not going to lie, of course I am excited to get all dolled-up and go out with my friends. But nevertheless, doesn't this all seem a bit...excessive? That's because it is. A couple of years ago, a girl at school brought up the inequality between guys and girls in terms of the "Prom process." And she's right. As a girl going to Prom, I am supposed to consider: a Prom dress, makeup, hair, shoes, nails, a clutch, jewelry, tickets, a corsage, and a date. Oh, and I forgot transportation, photos, pre-Prom groups, an after-Prom dress, after-Prom arrangements, and other "necessary" duties like facials and spray-tanning (what?). All guys have to do is throw on a tux, and "badabing-badaboom" they're ready. Granted, they do have to ask a girl out, which carries its own heavy load of stress. Nowadays it's become a competition of who can come up with the most creative and exciting ways to ask a girl out.
I read an article in the New York Times from the '90s by Betsy Israel called Prom: The Production. Granted, it's been nearly 20 years since the article was written, but I still think that the title is spot on. It is a big production. Everyone gets so caught up in the dresses and the dates and the parties and the planning that it becomes this exhausting (and apparently exciting?) ritual that often ends in the disappointment of the students. We all know that the excitement isn't for the grand ballroom that hosts the event, nor the awkward meals of some generic type of chicken, but it's for the After-Prom. Elegant, floor-length dresses are traded for slightly tighter (and much shorter) get-ups, billowing hair is unleashed from the bobby-pin clutches, and tuxedo jackets are quickly shed. That's what everyone is really waiting for. 'It's "the after" that the girls themselves have to describe -- "the after" that most parents don't want to hear about' (Israel 2).
So isn't it a bit strange that we should spend all this money and time and effort (ladies in particular) to prepare for something that isn't even the main event?
One thing I find particularly mind-boggling is the length to which girls will go to transform themselves for the night. I mean, don't they want to be able to at least recognize themselves when they look at the pictures 30 years down the road? The article mentions "the makeovers that change pale, freckle faced girls into bronzed prom women" and it's true (Israel 1)! Hired makeup professionals will douse the upperclassmen girls population with powder and mascara and glitter until we no longer look like the 16-18 year olds that many of us are. One girl in the article, Liz York, refers to Prom as the ' last great moment...this is the best night of your life, like, before your life' (Israel 1). Now as ridiculous and superficial as that may seem (and it is) , honestly that is how it is viewed. We've worked our butts off as juniors and seniors to prepare for college, so shouldn't we have some big event to just let loose before the colossal stresses of university crush us in the Fall?
Prom is a big deal. Personally, I am not a big fan of school dances or functions. I am not on Prom committee, I have not spent months searching for a dress, I haven't been planning for this since Freshmen year, but I know that this is a big deal. People make it that way. Now, I'm not going to lie, of course I am excited to get all dolled-up and go out with my friends. But nevertheless, doesn't this all seem a bit...excessive? That's because it is. A couple of years ago, a girl at school brought up the inequality between guys and girls in terms of the "Prom process." And she's right. As a girl going to Prom, I am supposed to consider: a Prom dress, makeup, hair, shoes, nails, a clutch, jewelry, tickets, a corsage, and a date. Oh, and I forgot transportation, photos, pre-Prom groups, an after-Prom dress, after-Prom arrangements, and other "necessary" duties like facials and spray-tanning (what?). All guys have to do is throw on a tux, and "badabing-badaboom" they're ready. Granted, they do have to ask a girl out, which carries its own heavy load of stress. Nowadays it's become a competition of who can come up with the most creative and exciting ways to ask a girl out.
I read an article in the New York Times from the '90s by Betsy Israel called Prom: The Production. Granted, it's been nearly 20 years since the article was written, but I still think that the title is spot on. It is a big production. Everyone gets so caught up in the dresses and the dates and the parties and the planning that it becomes this exhausting (and apparently exciting?) ritual that often ends in the disappointment of the students. We all know that the excitement isn't for the grand ballroom that hosts the event, nor the awkward meals of some generic type of chicken, but it's for the After-Prom. Elegant, floor-length dresses are traded for slightly tighter (and much shorter) get-ups, billowing hair is unleashed from the bobby-pin clutches, and tuxedo jackets are quickly shed. That's what everyone is really waiting for. 'It's "the after" that the girls themselves have to describe -- "the after" that most parents don't want to hear about' (Israel 2).
So isn't it a bit strange that we should spend all this money and time and effort (ladies in particular) to prepare for something that isn't even the main event?
One thing I find particularly mind-boggling is the length to which girls will go to transform themselves for the night. I mean, don't they want to be able to at least recognize themselves when they look at the pictures 30 years down the road? The article mentions "the makeovers that change pale, freckle faced girls into bronzed prom women" and it's true (Israel 1)! Hired makeup professionals will douse the upperclassmen girls population with powder and mascara and glitter until we no longer look like the 16-18 year olds that many of us are. One girl in the article, Liz York, refers to Prom as the ' last great moment...this is the best night of your life, like, before your life' (Israel 1). Now as ridiculous and superficial as that may seem (and it is) , honestly that is how it is viewed. We've worked our butts off as juniors and seniors to prepare for college, so shouldn't we have some big event to just let loose before the colossal stresses of university crush us in the Fall?
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