In society there are always stereotypes and unwritten rules that are followed. During the era of Norman England, gender roles were a prominent facet of life; men and women adhered to strict codes of conduct. Men are idealized as strong, dominant, and respectful, whereas women are elegant and courtly. If an individual does not meet the standards of society, they are shunned. However, not everyone agrees with the heavy stereotypes laid down by the social order such as male dominance and proper courting.
The ideal of beauty has become a form of oppression by men and also self-oppression. This makes women feel inferior because they can never achieve the perfect image. Women are always disapproving every part of their bodies, scrutinizing every imperfection. Women are looked at by the different parts of their bodies while men are looked at as a whole. For example, the word “butterface”, which means overall the woman is attractive “but her face”.
They could not wear anything too revealing like nothing above ankle length or anything that showed off their skin. But by wearing make up women would be a little freer to show how sexual they could or would be. This did not mean to wear globs of make up but just enough to get a potential mate’s attraction. The idea of make up has changed over time and it seems that the more a woman puts on the less attractive she is but if the women wears none she is seen to not care much about her appearance. There is a thin line women have to tread but we seem to be during it
As stated in the article by Robin Henig, “Over the centuries, women have mauled and manipulated just about every body part – lips, eyes, ears, waists, skulls, foreheads, feet… (55). With certain ways women try to build their confidence level for their visual appearance, they go through a great deal of risks; consequently, severe dangers are more likely to occur, also expressed in the article. In this article, Robin Marantz Henig explains and exposes many different forms and ways woman have deliberately made changes to their bodily figures to fit in the standards of perfection in beauty. She clearly isn’t in favor of these practices from her statement in the article, “The crazed quest for beauty at any cost had led to some bizarre practices along the way” (56). Exactly, very bizarre practices that woman go by to feel better about there appearance rather then their health.
The first such way is to ignore any legitimate concerns women have; the second way is to classify any emotion as unnecessary and “irrational.” Women get taken advantage of solely because society has considered them emotional, which in today’s modern society is often mistaken for being unstable. This in turn affects a women’s status in life. With this in mind, it is the status that will ultimately define their social mobility, “the lower the status, the more manner of seeing and feeling is subjected to being discredited, and the less believable it becomes” (Hochschile 173). Society has usually seen the lower class as unintelligent and therefore have their opinions denigrated. Even if she has a legitimate case to voice an opinion, “a person of lower status has a weaker claim to the right to define what is going on; less
Today’s society is overly concerned with the way men and women look. There is a near impossible standard set for the way both genders are meant to look, and there are a lot of problems caused over them. Men are “supposed to” have defined abdominal muscles, bulging biceps, a rugged and strong looking jaw line, and always be taller than their female counterparts. In the same way, women are expected to have long, soft, flowy hair, a perfect hourglass figure, long and lean legs, flawless skin and exquisite make-up. Not only are these standards physically impossible for some men and women to achieve, they are completely unfair.
Not only do women undermine their image by using this - women’s language- but, a woman’s image can be altered by the words that are used to describe her. By
Compare and Contrast: Natural Beauty vs. Cosmetic Beauty Beauty is an object which is respected and admired by tons of women in the United States. People’s perception of beauty and their fondness between natural or cosmetic beauty has been the subject of numerous debates. While there's no agreement as to which kind of beauty is more attractive, both sides of this dispute has its own supporters. Many would say “if something isn't broken there is no need to fix it,” while on the other hand in today’s society countless models and celebrities in the public eye are displaying more cosmetic beauty than natural beauty.
However, women aren’t innocent in this controversy either. They have some control over the attention they receive based on how they dress and present themselves socially. I know for a fact the reason my friend dresses up and stands out it for the attention. In conclusion I agree with Sheets-Johnstone’s thoughts about women only being seen as body parts and objects. Although some perspectives on the subject claim women live in bad faith and put themselves in situations to be defined as a body part, if there was no routine of male’s looking or the notion to dominate and females attention starvation or feelings to please, there would be no need for a dominant and submissive relationship.
No matter where women are in the world their image and appearance is, and will forever be, a daily topic among those around them. The way that women are viewed in society is haunting and causes a lot of women to go to great extremes to try and perfect their culture’s views on what they believe the perfect woman should look like, act like and what her day-to-day activities are. In certain cultures, females will and are demanded to look a specific way. In countries like Iran the women are required to wear full coverage of their body without showing any parts of their body aside for a small window for their eyes partly covered for visual purposes. In some parts of China the males demanded woman with small petite feet and pale white skin.