Posted by Godelieve
'She never looked nice. She looked like art, and art wasn’t supposed to look nice; it was supposed to make you feel something.”
- Rainbow Rowell
The Idea of beauty is something that is often brought up in society and media and there are so many articles and pieces that I could make reference to but I find myself having to give reference to three pieces in particular. Caitlyn Siehl beautifully describes how it isn't our jobs or societies' job to judge whether we are pretty or not, we don't have to be anything that we don't wish to be, the word itself unworthy. Katie Makkai then proceeds to complete this point in a piece of spoken word poetry, when she phrases that ' The word pretty is unworthy of everything you will be, and no child of mine will be contained in five letters. You will be pretty intelligent, pretty creative , pretty amazing but you will never be merely pretty'
I feel as if modern culture is too dependant on how people look, if they fit into certain sizes or if they are 'pretty', as if this isn't bad enough we are then measured and definite by numbers, which mean next to nothing, and are given the unrealistic and unhealthy image of what we should strive towards being, instead of being told that we are beautiful the way we are.. The way that people look externally is placed to high on the list of character traits that people can have and because of this there is an immense pressure on people to look a certain way and do certain things so that they can be considered beautiful, and this is affecting the general happiness of society itself.
What media shows us, is less than 1% of the world are the people that are the exception. Its our decision to choose how we want to look, what we want to wear and how we display ourselves, we as women are often told that we are not graceful and beautiful if we don't shave our legs or if we are not slim .However, once people do wear exactly what they wish to then people proceed to be judged too - the only solution to this must be that we should not let the way that other people look affect anything to do with us, we should not judge or compare our selves to them, and look past the mere exterior.
What people have and the way people look is no reason that people should be more successful than the next person, It's a sad society where the first decision you make about someone is about how they look. We should not have to apologise for things that they cannot change: tiny flaws, scars on knees and knobbly knees. It's all of the tiny imperfections that lace people's skin are what make them unique.
People are worth more than a handful of adjectives and numbers, so we as a society need to stop defining them to be that way.
"when your little girl
asks you if she’s pretty
your heart will drop like a wineglass
on the hardwood floor
part of you will want to say
of course you are, don’t ever question it
and the other part
the part that is clawing at
you
will want to grab her by her shoulders
look straight into the wells of
her eyes until they echo back to you
and say
you do not have to be if you don’t want to
it is not your job
both will feel right
one will feel better
she will only understand the first
when she wants to cut her hair off
or wear her brother’s clothes
you will feel the words in your
mouth like marbles
you do not have to be pretty if you don’t want to
it is not your job”
It is not your Job | Caitlyn Siehl