When I was a young girl I looked in the mirror and saw a big brown freckle on the right side of my face. Always wondering what that was, I was told it was a beauty mark and was there to show that I’m different in a beautiful way. This concept of how a birthmark could signify beauty is seen in celebrities such as Marilyn Monroe, Cindy Crawford, Blake Lively, and Natalie Portman, whose beauty marks are emphasized as a trademark of their unique good looks. While this process of mutated skin cells forming a birthmark is considered a form of beauty, why doesn’t the same go for our individual biological differences that are, for some reason, not considered beautiful?
Take, for example, stretch marks. The scarring of the middle layer of the skin is considered “disgusting” and unflattering. It is a natural process that happens to the body’s skin layer. But why is this condition any different than mutation of skin cells making a beauty mark?
Height. This genetic factor causes so much trouble than what is really set out to be. Most models are recognized for their astonishing height which stirs shorter people into admiring to be taller. Shorter women wear heels to make them seem taller, but as we all have heard, there are severe alignment consequences to our body when wearing our favorite heels. Yet we still do it even if we are on the naturally taller side. Shorter guys feel at a disadvantage too because it is regulated by societal standards that men should be the taller one in the couple.
But look at Keith Urban and Nicole Kidman...they rock the dynamic duo, as Nicole is taller than Keith. Shorter people have struggles, but so do taller people. There are numerous articles about the struggles of being tall; take, for example, being cut out of pictures or practically squatting to try to be some sort of the same height as the people you are taking pictures with. Whether you are tall, short, or right in the middle, height is something that is simply genetic yet controls so much of our thinking.
Another example is the color of skin. The ideal skin color in today’s society is a dark tan color. To achieve this hue, fair people artificially tan (which has known to cause life-threatening cancer) and darker-skinned people try to lighten their skin.
The next big biological beauty difference is eye color, caused by the levels of melanin floating around in our body. I still find it crazy how there are such things as colored contacts. I am at a total disadvantage for understanding why this is, though, as I have blue eyes, which most people remark as “simply stunning.” But the fact is, whether you have caramel browns, ocean blues, grass greens, tree browns, or any other color, it is your own different color and a genetic reminder of who you came from.
The extra cartilage on the nasal bone creates a different shaped nose. But in today’s society, a button nose is considered ideal. If there is too much cartilage that somehow disfigures a nose, it is considered ugly.
We all have looked at examples of different body shapes and tried figuring out which one is considered to be our own body shape. You can be an hourglass, pear, apple, column, or even a strawberry. With all these shapes, it is confusing which one is considered the most “beautiful." But the reality is that we all have different body shapes based on where we store our adipocytes (fat cells.) So extenuate and rock your curves because they are what make you beautiful and fierce.
Every body is biologically different, meaning there are many unique things happening in our body that are our own processes. Yet the attributions to fit societal definitions of “beautiful” say that our own biological methods need to be fixed in order to be physically attractive. Girls and guys spend so much time invested in fixing their appearance just to adhere to what people think is attractive.
More people have become extremely self-conscious, especially since attracting a partner is based on more appearance than ever before. Tinder is a strong example of this phenomenon. We determine if we want to talk to a person based on if we find him or her to be eye candy. With an ever-growing society based on physical appearance, it is important to step back and think that the way we look is what our body determines. Individuality should be more appreciated as what defines beauty.
So rock your love handles, your extremely tall body, your luscious green eyes, your ghostly pale appearance, your stretch marks, or your beauty mark because you have only one specific body to show off and it is what makes you beautiful.
