So I thought that the for a first topic we could talk about body image. I came across this idea while hiking during the weekend. The sun was blazing and so I got a tan. I wondered how going dark(er) would make me feel. or in other words how I would feel about becoming a shade dark(er). I have not resolved that one, but I sort of got an uncomfortable feeling about the prospect. Oh poor me! It seems as if I might have bought into the line of light(er) is better.
The idea was just fascinating. I mean I knew all the correct answers...that is p.c and christian answers but I still felt uncomfortable at the idea. I wondered if people would look at me differently-no more beautiful- and how I would project myself differently and interact with people differently.
Ja good one. Funny, the other day I was talking to a black male friend of mine. he was actually commenting on how looks were not everything. But these were his words: " A woman may have everything, she is beautiful with the perfect curves, long legs, light in complexion with smooth skin, but that is not everything". Funny, but my mind immediately stuck on his description of what a beautiful woman is. Then i thought, wow, beauty is "light in complexion". Really? Now most of us laugh at that and say of course not. But really, when you look, you realise that somewhere along the line, we have been socialised, or at least in this part of the world, that the more fair a woman is, the more beautiful she is. What disturbs me about this, apart from the fact that I am not fair , is that it is comes from that whole the closest to white you are, the better. Now this is not a statement about being white, coz that is of course not a bad thing, it is more a statement about pegging beauty based on any standard at all.
ReplyDeleteAnyway for me, that whole stay out the sun thing was drummed into me from the time I was young. Don’t get dark, coz dark is not beautiful! And I am ever at war with that thought. The other side of course, is that some people feel that they are too pale to be pretty! That’s crazy to me coz I look at pale redheads and I am like, you are gorgeous!!
Ah boo I wrote a whole comment and for some reason it didn't accept it when I posted it :(
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