[Author’s note: This is the next in a series of writing challenges first proposed to me by Leslie Farnsworth. Leslie has organized and expanded the challenge to include a larger group of excellent blog writers. Once per month, one member of the group will propose a topic and we will all give our own unique take on the subject. This latest installment was proposed by Rebecca Harvey. You may want to look at the other bloggers listed below to see what they came up with:]
- Leslie Farnsworth: http://www.lesliefarnsworth.com/
- Joan Johnson: http://onefishtaco.blogspot.com/
- Rebecca Harvey: http://bayoucitypostcards.blogspot.com/
- James McPherson: http://jalmcpherson.com/
- Jenna Sauber: http://jennasauber.com/
- Jon Lundell: http://therealmil.blogspot.com/
My thinking on this topic began with meditating on the topic of beauty itself. Why does it exist in the first place? Why are some things beautiful and some things ugly and how do we make the distinction?
We all have our preferences in life. No matter what the subject is, no matter how public or personal, we know what we like and what we don’t like. Generally these things have to do with the more basic and primal aspects of our being. Those aspects that determine our survival.
Throughout evolution the beauty aspect has helped the individual find that member of the opposite gender that presented the best possible chance that one’s offspring would not only survive but prosper. As environmental conditions change or a species moves into a new territory sometimes the requirements for surviving changes and beauty standards may change as well. As a tangent line of thought, this may also be where fashion originates, but that’s something to think about another day.
For humans and our immediate predecessors, beauty standards dictated that our potential mates be in generally good physical condition, be larger than other potential mates, and have some advantageous adaptation to the local environment.
Of course this standard varied from situation to situation and from time to time. Cultural norms have come to play a huge role in what we consider to be beautiful. Some cultures will accentuate or even exaggerate some body part that is considered desirable. Those cultures would use clothing, make up, or body modification to achieve the desired look. These practices can of course be carried to extremes. In certain cultures around the world being fat and having poor or no teeth was considered beautiful as it meant that the particular individual had access to excess food supplies and in particular access to sugar which for a very long time was a luxury food item. Even though having poor dental hygiene is in fact a sign of bad health the practice continued on until the improvement of economic situations in these cultures made this a less desirable beauty trait.
As I said previously culture plays a big role in what we consider to be beautiful. Wealth is an aspect of culture that can dictate how we or other people live their lives. Whether we measure wealth by number of farm animals we own, or land we control, or pieces of paper we have in a bank. Money represents power and power has always been beautiful whether we like it or not.
But do we still need the old beauty standards of good health and attractive features? In the urban situation where most humans live, where we no longer have to hunt for food or run away from predators or scavenge and go hungry for weeks or months at a time and where physique is no longer as important, is it still valid to judge others with those old beauty standards? Surely if you are searching for a potential mate and you take into consideration their ability to earn wealth then a potential mate is to be judged by their ability to think, plan, and create content and thus participate in the idea economy rather than by their physical development and their ability to chop wood, or plow a field, or hunt.
That would be true in an ideal world but one thing we have begun to discover is that this human built environment has its own challenges. Sedentary lifestyles now represent the largest danger to those living in cities. We have access to too much food and little need to exert ourselves as vigorously as we once did. Heart disease, diabetes, and cancers are the biggest killers of all these days. Diseases that were previously kept in check by harder and more physical lifestyles. Those individuals that work out and keep fit are still considered beautiful as they seem to reject the sedentary lifestyles that lead to these diseases.
A secondary consideration relating to our new economy is that you may have the best ideas in the world but if you can’t convey those ideas to large groups of other people then your idea won’t be successful. As our means of communications are becoming more and more visual and as our minds respond better to beautiful things, even if just sub-consciously, then we turn again to the old beauty standards. We trust the beautiful, we listen to the beautiful, we envy the beautiful. The ugly, not so much. One famous example was the Kennedy-Nixon debate. Those that listened to the event on radio gave the debate to Nixon as the more persuasive speaker but the vast majority of the population that saw the event on TV gave the debate to the younger and more attractive Kennedy.
So is beauty necessary? I wouldn’t call it necessary as I would call it a factor to be aware of and something to take into consideration. I think we have to be aware that beauty does play a factor in our lives however much we may eschew this and even think this a banal consideration it does exist and does have the power to alter our decision-making process.
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