It's very interesting how important ones' image has become in the society that we live today. It seems as though physical perfection has become the ultimate goal of our modern day culture. Plastic Surgery is raging more than ever, anorexia and bulimia are at their highest, and parents are even trying to create the physically perfect baby. It's seems as though one's image is directly correlated with their identity. But how could it not? Well with all the marketing and consumerism, it should be a given. What perplexes me is the fact that people take it so far as to put themselves in physical danger to alter a part of their body that's perfectly healthy. It might not be a "normal" nose within the realm of culture specifications, but it does everything a nose should. This longing for perfection has had both a negative and positive effect on culture. People have decided to get in shape, if it wasn't for all the obesity and fast food today, would the dieting producers even have a spot to advertise? It all seems like an elaborate plan to me.
It seems like we are wasting all this time and energy and stressing ourselves out in order to attain this cultural specific defintion of "perfect." The task just becomes an obstacle in the routine of our lives. If we could see through the muniplulation and redirect that extra energy into productive life improvements as oppose to image, just imagine the capabilites. You only live once, why beat yourself up trying to attain the impossible?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
I agree with you why are wasting time and energy into making something perfect, that could be considered perfection itself. with the ever changing perception of what is "perfect" why cant we accept our own identity as we were born as just right, and use the energy put into self vanity towards something much more rewarding.
ReplyDeleteI agree with both of you =) "Beauty must be defined as what we are, or else the concept itself is our enemy. To see beauty is simply to learn the private language of meaning which is another's life -- to recognize and relish what *is*. Why languish in the shadow of a standard we cannot personify, an ideal we cannot live?" http://www.crimethinc.com/tools/posters/beauty_subversion_front.pdf
ReplyDeleteI agree we have a culture bias toward perceived perfection, But i also think that the flip side is we turn our imperfections into identity just as much as the perfection. Look at disease; cancer patients, hiv positive people, IBS, Chron's, etc.. all create an identity that the person will inhabit sometimes during the pursuit for perfection or as a integral part of the individual. Is perfection the goal? or just a symptom of something else?
ReplyDeleteVery good point Charles. Maybe it's reducible to our drive to feel special? Since our culture is very competitive an easy way to distinguish yourself from the herd is to make others envy you. Whether it's by being smarter or prettier or healthier, or braver or more stoic, we showcase physical or mental characteristics that others wish they had.
ReplyDelete