The Female Body In Context Of A Sanitized Perfection And The Oppressive Standards Of Beauty Article Review Examples

The representations of women in art and popular culture are a study in contradictions. Western society demands that women conform in their appearance to competing and contradictory requirements, imposing a standard of beauty that is impossible for all women to live up to. Women are supposed to be at once sensuous and erotic, but also demure and sexually reserved. They are supposed to be flawless and attractive, but also completely authentic and au-naturel. Women are also not supposed to age, but they should not attempt to hide their wrinkles and sagging skin, because it is a sign of insecurity.
The impossible standard of beauty would not be such a problem if it were not for the fact that in western society, a woman’s appearance is the primary measure of her value. A woman’s body belongs not to herself, but to the whole world. Everyone in the world is entitled to comment on her body and judge her for it. If she is too fat, it is because she is lazy and, therefore, worthless; if she is too thin, it is because she is obsessed with her appearance, and therefore she is prissy and conceited. If she does not wear makeup or expensive clothes, it is because she doesn’t care about her appearance; if she wears a lot of makeup and owns fancy clothes, she is trying too hard to be attractive. Women who are not beautiful are invisible. Women who haven’t aged well are irrelevant. As a society, we have decided that the best and most important thing a woman can contribute to the world is to be pleasurable to look at, and we have defined our criteria for this goal in such a way that no woman could ever hope to achieve it.