Why do girls hate each other?

I have a confession. I have a little bit of a guilty pleasure: JennaMarbles on YouTube. And recently, she posted a video entitled "Why Girls Hate Each Other." Warning: her videos feature excessive profanity, but if you don't mind that, she has some really interesting things to say.

Jenna explains a phenomenon that many girls experience, but don't understand why. Girls are raised to be competitive with one another. If you're a girl, I'm sure you've experienced a time when you didn't feel as pretty as someone or thought that they dressed better than you, and hated or judged them for it. Women are constantly qualified and compared: you are nothing if you are not better than those around you.

And I'm not kidding, every girl has felt this way at one time in her life. Sociological Images posted another interesting blog about a meme of Marilyn Monroe, saying that the "new beautiful" (aka skinny) has replaced Marilyn's style of beauty (aka curvy).

But what purpose does this meme serve? Telling anyone who's not shaped like Marilyn that they're not beautiful. There are girls who are naturally skinny, like the photo on the right. And growing up, I could count myself into that category. I used to be made fun of for being "too skinny."And why? Probably because the girls who were saying that felt inferior (even though I in turn felt inferior to them).

Why is this exclusive to girls? Why do girls feel this need to be perfect all of the time? ItsKingsleyB***h on YouTube explains this phenomenon manifested in the females in his life:

One thing I find incredibly interesting about what he has to say is that he does not face these same pressures because he is a man. And this is true: men do not face the same pressures women do to be flawless at every hour of the day. The reason his female friends are putting on makeup to go out to the store? Because they feel like they have to. Because they can't be seen at less than their "best."

How do we stop this? I don't know the answer to that, but I can tell you how I personally combat these types of feelings. You have to love yourself more than you care about what others think about you. I know that's way easier said than done...I get it. But it's a process, and all it takes are baby steps to begin. Start reprimanding yourself for negative thoughts about your body or appearance. Don't let yourself think that you're not good enough. Be positive. If you train yourself to think that way, eventually it will start becoming true, even if it's not now.

Because every person is perfect exactly the way they are, and they should be able to do whatever they want. If you want to wear a full face of makeup for fun? Go ahead. But you also shouldn't be afraid to be seen without it. Crazy clothes? YEAH!

If you're interested in this type of mindset, I'd like to direct you to one of my favorite blogs, The Man Repeller. Part fashion, part feminism; Leandra focuses on wearing whatever she wants, bonus points if it makes men run screaming.

And I'm interested to hear what you think about this subject? Is there a way to combat this mindset on a macro level? What about in your daily lives? What do you think?

Quick Quote

"I don’t wax my eyebrows to appease people making snap judgements about me, I do it because I choose porn-compliant eyebrows. Choosing makes me a feminist. If porn-compliance happens appease to people making snap judgements, well, that’s entirely accidental."

This quote is from a blog post on I Blame the Patriarchy, which I think sums up my feelings about feminism and my feelings about aesthetics. Choosing to wear makeup and care about fashion does not make me an antifeminist (although I may joke that it does). I wear what I wear and apply the makeup that I do because I enjoy it...not to appease someone else.

Along the same lines, I recently found out that my high school is considering abolishing the "Best Dressed" senior superlative. As a senior who very much cares about fashion, I am upset. They claim that this is an unfair superlative, because having a superior fashion sense means you spend more money on your clothes. I completely disagree, you could have an amazing fashion sense and spend very little on your clothes (I buy many of my clothes at Goodwill, Salvation Army, Plato's Closet, and assorted thrift shops). It's a little insulting to someone who cares about fashion and who dresses well because I enjoy it to hear it belittled to nothing more than a petty narcissistic industry and hobby.

That's just what's on my mind today, but I'd love to hear what anyone else thinks about the quote I found from the blog post or my thoughts on the "Best Dressed" superlative.

Until next time,
Meghana

Transforming Yourself: Stage Makeup for Romeo and Juliet

This week I'd like to focus a little less on the academic side of this blog and a little more on the pure aesthetic side of the blog. This last week I had the amazing experience of doing the makeup for my school's production of Romeo and Juliet. For anyone reading this blog that does not go to my school, let me just add that our school affords us a lot of amazing experiences, and our theatre program is both well funded and very high quality.

For the next three weeks, I'd like to focus on the transformative aspect of aesthetics: how easy it is to transform your appearance and how that affects you. That is one of the things that I can take away from my experience with Romeo and Juliet: many of the cast members expressed how theatre can be an escape for them, that they become a complete other person and don't have to focus on themselves for a while. And my job is to make sure that they complete that transformation not only on the inside but on the outside so that the audience believes it.

Working behind the scenes on a play is amazingly enjoyable for me. It's hard to explain to the actors, whose greatest ambition is to be on the stage under a spotlight, but it is much more fulfilling to me to be the one waiting offstage with powder for when they sweat (ew, I know) or blush for when they get a little too washed out. In fact, as I found out last year, I really hate being on stage.

Being able to contribute to the success of a play like Romeo and Juliet, and to watch my friends and peers become fantastic actors was an absolutely rewarding and wonderful experience for me. And helping a 17 year old look like he's 50, well, that's both awesome and hilarious.

It's interesting to me how looking like another person can so wholly transform you. You can't completely become that other person until you walk in their shoes. One perfect example is my friend Megan, who played Lady Capulet. We gave her really sharp lines on her face and dark makeup, which only intensified her sternness as a character. She looked absolutely awesome and you could often catch her staring at herself in the mirror and scowling, because looking like Lady Capulet helped her become Lady Capulet.

In the next two posts, I want to explore other ways that people transform their outer shells to transform themselves on the inside, if only for one night.

Until next time,
Meghana