The Role Of Beauty In American Culture

When Plato once wrote, “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder”, he inquired that the perception of beauty is subjective. According to Merriam-Webster, beauty is defined as the quality or aggregate of qualities in a person or thing that gives pleasure to the senses or pleasurably exalts the mind or spirit. In modern times, beauty is simply perceived as having an appealing face and stick-thin figure. In different cultures, beauty can be defined in many forms. Through fairy-tale stories and movies from Hollywood, most people, especially women, have learned the stereotype that beautiful people like the protagonists are good, and ugly people like the antagonists are bad. These scripts show the beautiful people defeating the horrible, ugly villains.

In the early to late 1900’s, women who were more curvy and robusque were seen as being “beautiful”. In the early 1900’s, women began to bind their breasts to obtain a “washboard” figure. Over time, “slender and long-legged” became the new definition of beauty. It began to take a turn for the better in the 1970’s when stars like Farrah Fawcett began to flaunt her toned, muscular body and minimal makeup. This trend continued up until the 1990’s when models like Kate Moss appeared with her “pale skin, angular bone structure and extremely thin limbs” (Geography of Beauty."). In America, beauty is determined in a few ways. Social media has influenced the way beauty is perceived by having women with small waists, large breasts, and large bottocks be the model of idealized beauty on television shows and movies. One major influence on the way beauty has been perceived is the Victoria’s Secret Angels. With their slim, toned figures and large breasts, Victoria’s Secret models have impacted the way young women want to look. When women see these models, self-esteem plummets because they think, “why can’t I look like this?”. The problem is, their version isn’t realistic. These images are air-brushed versions of models who weigh twenty-three percent less than the average woman. Even though there are many opinions on the matter, there are proven studies that show beauty is a daily

Out of all the women in the world, only four percent of women consider themselves beautiful and only eleven percent of girls globally are comfortable using the word beautiful to describe themselves. Seventy-two percent of women feel pressure to look beautiful and more than half of women are their own worst critic on their appearance.( "Surprising Self Esteem Statistics on Dove®.") One study even found that ninety-seven percent of women have negative thoughts about themselves every fifteen minutes ("Body Image: How Women See Themselves."). According to the Confidence Coalition, “90% of all women want to change at least one aspect of their physical appearance”("Facts."). With these statistics, women across the world should be more inclined to not put so much focus on their outer beauty, but on their inner