My fellow ladies, women, gals, females, etc., I have one question to ask; at what point in life do we lose who we are? As children we laugh, play, and share our dreams with other children, but somewhere between laughing, playing, and dreaming we lose ourselves. I have found the saying “boys will be boys” to be all too true. They play, laugh, and get dirty as children and I don’t know if I’m the only woman who has noticed this, but this pattern continues until they just can’t do it anymore. Oh wouldn’t it be lovely. For women, it’s not that easy. It’s almost like we owe it to the world to begin a growing process to become this ridiculous image of what a “woman” is. Too often girls are growing up with Barbie’s and Brats as role models so don’t blame it on the rain when your daughter tells you she wants to be a Brat when she grows up.
Society has twisted beauty in such a way that women will go from brunette to blond, a size 8 to a size 0, 5’4” to 5’10”, light to dark, dark to light, brown eyes to green eyes, short hair to long hair, (you get my point!), all in one day! In Webster’s New World Dictionary Third college edition, beauty is defined as the quality attributed to whatever pleases or satisfies, the sense or mind, as by line, color, form, texture, proportion, rhythmic motion, tone etc. or by behavior or attitude etc. It looks to me as though some people have left out the part about beauty being a behavior or an attitude.” Let’s indulge ourselves in a few episodes of: A Society Plagued by False Perceptions of Beauty.
Example one: The terror of the tan
Have you ever been in a store enjoying your shopping, looking at all the marvelous clothing, shoes, and accessories, then out of the corner of your eye you spot something horrific moving closer and closer to you. You compare the suspense to a little person being approached by Shaq and as the thing gets within recognition you come to find out that someone let their 70 year old grandmother into the tanning booth only to exceed to recommended amount of time for a color supposedly mocking a beautiful bronze sistah? (Raising my hand) I can say that i’ve definitely been there. Not only does this woman look like a silly representation of what’s on a magazine cover, but it also looks as though she bought her clothes at forever 21, allowing her wrinkles to take precedent over the young stylish apparel. Maybe they should have a sign at the door, WARNING: TAKING THE NAME OF THIS STORE LITERALLY WILL RESULT IN AN OUTBURST OF LAUGHTER, POINTING OF FINGERS, AND POSSIBLE EMBARRASSMENT. PLEASE TAKE THE PUBLIC AND THOSE HAVING TO LOOK AT YOU INTO CONSIDERATION BEFORE PURCHASING CLOTHING.
Example two: the size 12 over the size 16, what to choose?
As a woman of substance, big girl, Fat girl, what have you, i’ve learned to respect my body and only put on it what is a direct reflection of me, and me is beautiful, classy, stylish, must I go on? Well not every woman can or will take certain things into consideration when shopping. We have all seen this before and it applies to women of all colors. It’s, excuse my expression hotter than hell outside and all the “skinny” or “in shape” women are flaunting around in mini’s, tube tops, daisy dukes and the like. You’re out with your man and around the corner comes this woman with everything but what the good lord gave her hanging out. I mean rolls goin’ every which way back and front (I know about these things ladies), thighs singing you an out of tune love song and arms directing the choir and everything 2 sizes too small. I don’t know about you, but what I want to do is almost cuss this woman out. Here I am trying to make a good name for us “fat chicks” and be an example of how too, we can be beautiful, sexy, and tasteful with all of our clothes on in the summer time (without burning up!), and she ruins it for the lot of us! My advice, choose the 16 over the 12.
Example three: They say black is beautiful, but can’t I be white?
Let’s face it. Black women have never been portrayed as the most beautiful women in the world. Society always finds a way to make sure we have to struggle to be beautiful. As a result we turn to long weaves, wigs of all colors and lengths; trust me I know all about them, straightening devices, contact lenses of all different colors, and much, much more. You’re having lunch with your friends and passing the window is a fairly dark woman with blond hair to her behind, green eyes, pink lipstick, blood red blush, proudly wearing a shirt that displays the logo Abercrombie and Fitch. My initial thought would be what circus did she just escape from, then I’d dig deep, deep, deep, waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay down and find the heart to be sad for her because nobody taught her that black is beautiful no matter what shade.
It’s never fun not knowing who you are and grasping for the wind at something you were never meant to be. The examples above and the purpose of this, is to expose the comedic side of finding one’s self. Although it’s not always a funny subject we have to laugh at ourselves then turn around, correct it, and with our attitudes and outward appearances, demand that others admire us for the women we are. It’s important that those of us who know who we are, or are getting close to finding self, pull each other together and get there. Let’s not continue to let society decide who we are, what we should wear, or how we should live our lives as women. Next time you check the mirror before you leave the house make sure you see a woman and not the perception of one.
Tuesday, April 8, 2008
Self Esteem: A Closer Look
“You got a smile so bright, you know you coulda been a candle……Well you coulda been anything that you wanted to and I can tell, the way you do the things you do.” Those lyrics could never be directed towards women of today because obviously we simply don’t deserve it and because we are so undeserving these days, we’re more likely to be “superman’d,” “super soaked,” Or even spiderman’d but never praised. I ask myself often where we went wrong, what exactly is it that we’ve done to deserve the names that are sparingly and so graciously bestowed upon the women of today.
For decades black women have struggled with self esteem, self worth, and the like, although some researchers think differently. Numerous studies have been done which claim that because African American females rarely see runway models of color, and since thin Caucasian women are society’s spokeswomen of beauty, we tend not to be affected by it; therefore a lack of self esteem does not take root as easily as it does for white females. However this proved not to be the case in a more recent study which concluded that we have the same feelings of insecurity, and low self esteem when we see African American women in videos, models, actresses, singers, athletes, etc.
I find it hard to believe a study like that could be anywhere close to accurate when we constantly are talked down to, disrespected in song, rap, or whatever means necessary to degrade us. This is a problem for me because as a race one would think we would do more to encourage and uplift each other because society already sees us as the bottom feeders. As an African American woman my heart goes out to our younger generation. I’m at an age where I’m not affected as much as a 13 year old would be by the media. At 23 I can’t be shaped, molded, or influenced by the images on BET as easily as a young girl can.
In a study done by dove 75% of teenage girls had feelings of depression and low self esteem after three minutes of flipping through a fashion magazine. In today’s society our youth are being taught that beauty is everything and that it will get you everywhere. Proverbs 31:30 says “Charm is deceitful and beauty is passing, but a woman who fears the Lord shall be praised.” Our younger generation needs a new vision of beauty one that is within because as it says in the scripture, outward appearance passes.
The more these girls and young women listen to the lyrics of these songs, and watch these so called “beautiful” women in these videos the more it will begin to take root. If you water a plant everyday and give it plenty of sunlight that plant will begin to grow, but once you stop watering that plan and it sits in the sun it will begin to wither and become dried up and it will eventually die. It’s the same thing with our young girls. They’re being fed day in and day out this degrading music where women are referred to as hoes, bitches, and tricks and they’ve accepted that as being who they are. We need to start cutting off their water and sunlight. That root needs to dry up and die. Instead they should be subjected to positive female role models and songs that encourage women to respect their selves.
For decades black women have struggled with self esteem, self worth, and the like, although some researchers think differently. Numerous studies have been done which claim that because African American females rarely see runway models of color, and since thin Caucasian women are society’s spokeswomen of beauty, we tend not to be affected by it; therefore a lack of self esteem does not take root as easily as it does for white females. However this proved not to be the case in a more recent study which concluded that we have the same feelings of insecurity, and low self esteem when we see African American women in videos, models, actresses, singers, athletes, etc.
I find it hard to believe a study like that could be anywhere close to accurate when we constantly are talked down to, disrespected in song, rap, or whatever means necessary to degrade us. This is a problem for me because as a race one would think we would do more to encourage and uplift each other because society already sees us as the bottom feeders. As an African American woman my heart goes out to our younger generation. I’m at an age where I’m not affected as much as a 13 year old would be by the media. At 23 I can’t be shaped, molded, or influenced by the images on BET as easily as a young girl can.
In a study done by dove 75% of teenage girls had feelings of depression and low self esteem after three minutes of flipping through a fashion magazine. In today’s society our youth are being taught that beauty is everything and that it will get you everywhere. Proverbs 31:30 says “Charm is deceitful and beauty is passing, but a woman who fears the Lord shall be praised.” Our younger generation needs a new vision of beauty one that is within because as it says in the scripture, outward appearance passes.
The more these girls and young women listen to the lyrics of these songs, and watch these so called “beautiful” women in these videos the more it will begin to take root. If you water a plant everyday and give it plenty of sunlight that plant will begin to grow, but once you stop watering that plan and it sits in the sun it will begin to wither and become dried up and it will eventually die. It’s the same thing with our young girls. They’re being fed day in and day out this degrading music where women are referred to as hoes, bitches, and tricks and they’ve accepted that as being who they are. We need to start cutting off their water and sunlight. That root needs to dry up and die. Instead they should be subjected to positive female role models and songs that encourage women to respect their selves.
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