Beauty
and the Psyche: How the Quest for “Beauty” Can Potentially Damage Our
Collective Psyche
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| "I just feel so insecure! My life would be so much easier if I had a different nose!" "Not to worry Psyche! I'll take you to your make over, for I am the European Power that implies your ethnic characteristics are wrong and demonic! Come Psyche!" |
Are You Ready for this ISH?
Recently, I have been involved in
a variety of conversations that deal with internalized ideals of normative
beauty. That somehow, what we look like on the outside, controls our destiny. To a degree, whether or not you
support this, or whether you believe it to be moral or correct, we could all
agree this can be true. However, what I
am questioning, or critiquing rather, is internalized hate. I’m talking about
the history of the world, Imperialism, and Colonization and the seeping affects
it continues to have on the psyche of cultures affected by it. I am talking
about some sort of accepted hate and disgust that becomes a communal norm. I am
no expert, and in my short time on this planet I have tried hard, to be
accepting and open. But that is always easier said than done, because really,
all of us are fighting something larger than ourselves.
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| Ha Sang Beg and Vice Journalist Charlet Duboc |
Ok, so what brings this on? For
starters, it’s like I said, these conversations I have been having with people
in my environment that I care for. But, as I was searching for my next topic to
discuss on this blog, I came across the presented documentary, which discusses
eyelid surgery in Korea. I found the documentary posted on Jezebel’s website. It
is produced by Vice and is part of an
online series of films about various international fashion weeks. This
particular one focused on Seoul (in South Korea) and the influence of K-Pop, and traditional, conservative Korean
society on a marginal high fashion industry. The host, Charlet Duboc, is a
former model-turned-journalist, who takes us around Seoul Fashion Week and on a
series of interviews.
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| Charlet Duboc |
Ok so lets bring this baby full circle.
Why did I open this post the way I did, with a relatively heavy discussion
about Imperialism and power imbalance and how I believe these powers that were, enabled powers that be to convince many of us, (well really
all of us) that who we are, the way god, or the goddess made us is flawed and
we need to evaluate that? Because Jezebel’s comments hosted a very interesting
conversations about whether this surgery was really to look more Western. Did any of these people watch the damn
documentary? Freaking, Charlet Duboc left a girl in the middle of an
existential crisis because she told her she thought her unique Asian appearance
was beautiful. “Why did that throw this girl into a fit?” you ask. Because the
misguided girl wants to look like Duboc, i.e. “Western”! There is a whole
freaking series of surgeries called “Westernization” and that is not because “actually people just want to look like
other Asians with big eyes!” Ok…
Whatever, you may disagree, but South
Korea isn’t the only place where this painful confusion lies, I mean really
just take a look at all these women with the frizzy blond hair, and orange
skin, or weave caps, or skin lighteners, or ass implants (or boob implants) and let's not get started on the wigs. Ok, what about just blond wigs? And here we are
again with the blond bullshit! Not that
there is anything wrong with blonds, but don’t you think it’s weird to sit
around with bleach on you head just so you hair looks frizzy and dried out? (uhum...sounds like something else too) I’m
not talking about people who want to play around and switch up their look, but
I know a girl that got green contacts in high school that still wears those bad boys like that green stuff actually helps her
see. I mean really? How are these unhealthy, false, procedures really making us
more beautiful? Aside from the fact that frequently, they actually make us look ridiculous, and well, confused.Wouldn’t it just be easier, and healthier if we worked harder to understand the impulses of some of those choices? Why have some black celebrities worn blond weave for years now? It's, in my opinion, not really so much about loving each other, but loving ourselves, working with what we got and, I don't know, looking like who we were before and after our makeovers.
Watch the documentary it’s about 35
minutes and really interesting. And feel free to comment…
Links!
Vice
Jezebel
Ha Sang Beg's Facebook page (I don't know what's going on with his website, I'll post it but i couldn't get on it today)
www.hasangbeg.com/
Follow my blog on Google or Bloglovin.com!
Type Goldsequins-blackleather into the search to follow me!
or twitter @jaime_glam
Follow my blog on Google or Bloglovin.com!
Type Goldsequins-blackleather into the search to follow me!
or twitter @jaime_glam
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