When people talk about beauty, they usually refer to a person’s physical appearance, such as their facial characteristics, weight, and body form. According to a famous saying, “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder,” implying that people’s perceptions of beauty vary among people based on personal preference, life experience, or cultural background. However, beauty ideals have shifted throughout time, and the concept of beauty has become commercialized in recent years. Popular culture, advertising, and social media all portray different beauty ideals, yet these norms do establish unrealistic expectations of how women should look in society. In Beauty by Jane Martin, the author tells the story of two girls fighting over a magical wish to receive a feature that each other has. Although the fact that each of these girls is pleading to modify their physical appearance is heartbreaking, it properly illustrates the value society places on a woman’s physical attributes and the belief of what makes a woman appealing, pretty, flawless, and altogether beautiful.
Beauty by Jane Martins follows the lives of two young women, Carl and Bethany. The author uses dialogue to shape their lives and personas. Carla is beautiful, Bethany is clever, and each has their own problems. Carla is a stunning woman who attracts the attention of the males. She’s always on the go, going on dates and talking on the phone. She is, nonetheless, not very adept at learning, as evidenced by the fact that she cannot recall anything she has studied earlier. Although Carla is stunning, she wishes for men to see beyond her appearance and want to learn more about her. Bethany, on the other hand, is a star student and is smart and clever. Her job pays her $40,000, and she has numerous short tales published (Martin 1272). However, Bethany feels she is not as attractive as Carl, so she desires Carla’s life and wishes she would be looked at by men more.
Like Bethany and Carla from Beauty, women today are blinded by the unrealistic beauty standards set for women by society, and fail to embrace themselves for who they are. Over the years, society has set various beauty ideals causing people to be self-conscious about their looks. The way women feel, think, feel and act about their bodies is currently based on how society feels and thinks. This criterion is just a statement of what society deems “beautiful.” This is a concept that almost everyone is familiar with and can relate to. Although no two persons on the earth are precisely alike, many feel compelled to meet specific beauty standards. Between fashion, accessories, cosmetics, technologies, fitness, nutrition industries, and mainstream media, women are continually fed the notion that they are not good enough. They are continuously told that they are not attractive enough, thin or fit enough, their skin is not smooth enough, or their skin color is not appealing enough.
One of the most powerful and broadly supported beauty standards is the weight standard. Western culture typically places a greater emphasis on an ultra-thin body shape, which is highly echoed in mainstream media (Levi et al. 397). For instance, the bulk of well-known ladies regarded fashion and beauty trendsetters are, in fact, petite. Fashion magazines such as Vogue, Cosmopolitan, and Elle are plastered with “petite models,” When women see these photos, they assume that they need to look like them to be noticed. That’s when they go to extremes to improve their appearance after being affected by the media’s definition of “beautiful.” In Beauty, Bethany says, “But it’s what everyone wants. … millions upon millions of people longing hopelessly and forever to stop being whatever they are and be beautiful…” (Martins). As a result, all women in Western society are pressured to be slender and have a specific physical form so they can be deemed beautiful. Sadly, heavier or thicker women endure prejudice and pressures from society and their friends to reduce weight because their body shapes are viewed unfit (Calogero et al. 14). It makes little difference that not all women meet these criteria, yet society does not frequently understand that every other body stature is okay and can be attractive.
Another robust beauty standard echoed by society is the skin complexion standard. For many years, the ideal beauty has long been thought to be someone with lighter features. Stepping back in time, Marilyn Monroe was ‘thought’ ideal in her day, with her all-American characteristics of blonde hair, fair skin, and blue eyes. Eurocentric beauty ruled the world, followed by Brigette Bardot, another blonde bombshell. Till today, black women with deeper skin tones have long been ostracized as not embodying or expressing the ‘ideal beauty.’ (Canvas). With all of this in mind, it’s no wonder that the cosmetics sector has grown rapidly in recent years. Today, every cosmetic store is stocked with skin-lightening lotions that people use to bleach their skin and make it appear lighter. Such ladies are pressured to look lighter mainly because having fair or light skin has been considered a compliment, an accomplishment, and a stand-alone quality for most of this world’s history. Ultimately, At the end of the day, the goal is for everybody to feel comfortable in their skin and for no one to envy another for the skin they wish they had. Society has allowed the fallacy of attaching self-worth to the hue in one’s skin for far too long because this matter is literally “skin deep.”
Indeed, social media has also played a major part in creating unrealistic beauty standards. The problem is exacerbated by the various sorts of applications that help for filters, manipulation, and editing. People can never upload an un-edited photo because they want to look “better”, and this lowers one’s self-esteem. These techniques of photoshopping and manipulating photographs of genuinely attractive women to make them look unrealistically attractive puts enormous pressure on women all around the world, and makes them anxious about their own bodies. They are oblivious to the fact that there is no such thing as a flawless body, and that the notion of perfection is in itself faulty. The fake depiction of a flawless existence combined with the tendency of comparing oneself to others is itself blueprint for catastrophe.
In conclusion, women are raised to live up to unrealistic beauty standards put upon them by society from a young age. They are expected to look a certain way, be petite with a big butt, have flawless hair and fair skin, and be an all-around perfect Barbie. Ultimately, it is well recognized that these unrealistic images and body standards of a beautiful woman influence the behavior of young women. When women want to slim down their figures, the most common method is to diet. Dieting may be harmful if they do not receive adequate nutrients from their meal. Furthermore, this condition may result in even more severe effects, such as eating disorders such as anorexia and bulimia in women. Other women resort to aesthetic surgeries, liposuction, and facial surgeries to improve their appearances. Such invasive surgical operations could be hazardous to women’s health. Moreover, such procedures are not cheap, and women end up spending significant sums of money on cosmetics and skincare products, all in the name of looking a certain way. Nonetheless, living up to something so unattainable is extremely difficult, especially when you’re very young. Such societal expectations of women are excessively high, and they must no longer be imposed on them as they foster confidence issues and self-esteem issues. It becomes very exhausting because women and ladies keep trying so hard to find the status quo, yet the standard quo should be tailored to fit everyone realistically.
Works Cited
- Blac Canvas, “Unfair and Unlovely; A COMMENTARY ON THE LIGHTSKIN IDEAL,” (2020) Available at: https://medium.com/@umairagal/unfair-and-unlovely-a-commentary-on-the-lightskin-ideal-8e84e2d217c7.
- Calogero, Rachel M., Michael Boroughs, and J. Kevin Thompson. “The impact of Western beauty ideals on the lives of women: A sociocultural perspective.” The body beautiful. Palgrave Macmillan, London, 2007. 259-298.
- Lev-Ari, Lilac, Inbar Baumgarten-Katz, and Ada H. Zohar. “Mirror, mirror on the wall: How women learn body dissatisfaction.” Eating behaviors3 (2014): 397-402.
- Jane Martin
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