Opinion

Beauty Standards

The internet is like your “best friend” from 7th grade that became too cool for you in 8th grade: two-faced. For goodness sake people, it is 2017 why do articles such as “35 Unattractive Things Girls Do That They Think Is Attractive (According To 35 Guys)” still exist? More importantly, who are the people behind these pieces of “literary” trash and what do I have to do to knock some sense into them?

Articles like the one mentioned above are ones that pop up on your Facebook feed as you aimlessly scroll through an endless amount of memes, Tasty videos, and status updates from your Facebook-loving grandmother in Florida. Under normal circumstances, I would usually scroll right past such an article and probably scowl for a second, roll my eyes, and move on by watching some silly video about a baby panda. But, for the sake of my journalistic duties, I had to muster up my strength and see what this ridiculous article was all about. “Perhaps it’s a parody article?” I thought to myself, but alas I was wrong.

So, ladies, listen up: if you want to be attractive to men and continue to serve the patriarchy, here are some absolute don’ts, as told by the experts themselves:

Don’t get tattoos

Don’t have short hair or bangs

Don’t wear lip-gloss

Don’t wear “high-top” jeans

And the list goes on…

Why should someone feel compelled to tell another person not only how to live their life but also in a way so that they appear attractive to men? Nowadays there is so much pressure placed upon women to fit certain standards. In a society where it was once cool to be slim, then cool to be thick and now be both slim and thick it is no wonder young girls are growing up with unrealistic beauty standards.

Listen, if you want to have short hair with bangs, wear lip-gloss and have tattoos on your body all while wearing “high-top” jeans then go for it. In fact, more power to you for being your own person and carrying yourself how you please, rather than how the men who partook in this article wish you to.

The millennial generation is one deemed as progressive and forward thinking. We are also the pioneers of the social world and should strive to use our online presences to spread the importance of self-love and owning the person you choose to be. Rather than to sit back and let this self-shaming culture persist, we must rise up and take a stance. There is no time like the present to do so.

While this article is filled with nothing but negativity and narrow-minded opinions, it does spark the idea that people, women in particular, need to come together and support each other for being comfortable with who they are and loving the skin they are in.

I am so thankful to go to a school like Monmouth where people rock multi-colored hair, tattoos and express themselves however they wish. While each student is unique in their own way, it is always comforting to remember that “all hawks fly together,” regardless of social standards.

Our generation needs pioneer a movement that inspires everyone to love themselves and be accepting of others, regardless of what we deem attractive or not.