Do You See What I See?

She could be the next Einstein, a world class athlete, or your friendly neighbour but if she’s what North American society deems to be ‘attractive’, the only thing the media cares about is how X product makes her eyelashes ten times fuller, Y shampoo makes her hair voluptuous and sexy, and that her tennis uniform is flattering. The message is that we should envy her because she has something we should all desire: the face, features, and body society defines as ideal.

Every media message we see takes up a little spot in the back of our memory, and sticks there like a stubborn piece of gum on the bottom of your shoe: in spite of the education and awareness we have to fight against it, it means that all too often people are judged right off the bat on appearance.

Maybe it’s just me, but I keep noticing this ludicrous assumption that’s there is in fact an inverse relationship between brain and ‘beauty’. If you say or do something that’s going to change the world, you should be looked at in awe for what you’ve said and done; it’s irrelevant how fantastic your legs do or do not look in that miniskirt (sorry to rain on your parade, Cosmo). And, bartenders and servers please listen loud and clear:  I don’t want to be served first just because I’m “cute”- I have enough dignity – and manners– to wait my turn. And please, don’t serve me last if the soccer team walks in behind me and you think they’re all peachy keen. They can wait their turn, too.

Maintaining motivation to embrace oneself for internal characteristics and qualities knowing just how often they’re initially overlooked because of appearance can be really challenging. It can be even more difficult to stop oneself from falling into the trap of assessing someone based on appearance. I’m the first to admit that I often have to consciously remind myself that appearances are not a reliable way to estimate character.   

It’s both the difficulty I have in avoiding this trap of judging-by-appearance as well as the outrage and pain I have when it happens to me that gives me such passion to fight this battle.

As a sort of concluding note, I would like to share some personal resolutions I’ve made, that I’m anticipating will help me be less appearance-focused in my everyday life. 

First off I am going to speak up when I experience appearance bias. If someone makes a judgment (good or bad) that is based on my appearance as an unreliable source of information about my character, I will say something. I think another important strategy for me personally, is to quite literally, not buy into the stereotypes of the media. I can be conscious about the choices I make it terms of literature, entertainment, and clothing items. Further to that I will do my best to stay informed, so that I am a consumer of companies, products, and policies that coincide with my own viewpoints. In regards to my mention of a tendency to fall into the trap of judging someone on appearance, I can actively hold myself accountable for this and cognitively change these thought patterns. I can start to recognize the instances in which this happens, and change my initial perspective to one that is not falsely based on appearance.

And last but certainly not least I’m going to make time on a more regular basis to really think about what qualities I truly value and admire in a person or what qualities I like about myself – so that words such as smart, compassionate, and humorous remain at the forefront of my descriptive vocabulary.