CREATING SELF WORTH IN A WORLD WHICH DEVALUES WOMEN

I was recently invited to give a presentation to the young Interactors of a Ladies College in Colombo, online via Zoom. The topic centred on how society trivialises and dismisses women, and how we can recognise and navigate this challenge successfully. I started by thanking the young ladies for the honour extended to me, to address them. And I said that, when the President of the Interactors Club was introducing me, she had focused on my achievements and career accolades. But that this is not what society does. I would be asked how old I was, how much I weighed, and my size and shape and skin colour, tone and the condition of my hair would be scrutinized. This is the frustrating reality that women experience.

We are judged on how we look. And measured by beauty standards we had no part in creating. However, there is a remedy for this. It is not in adjusting to society’s standards. But in developing our own moral compass.  And then persistently requiring society to adjust to us. Over the next hour and a half, we poured scorn on society’s superficial standards of judgment. And critiqued Imposter Syndrome and the Golden Ratio of Facial Beauty. We also called out ageism in its relation to beauty standards. I will elaborate on the points that were made in this discussion, here.

1)

The truisms we are told about ourselves as girls and young women are very often not true. We are told these things to mobilize us to behave in ways which disempower us. I urged self-reflection, self-awareness and scepticism towards the advertising and marketing industry around us. They profit from telling us there is something wrong with us, so they can sell us products and services that we really do not need.

2)

I urged the girls to develop a long-term view of the development of their character. Not to believe what society tells us, that we peak at 23. It helps if we understand that we unfold over time, like everything in nature. Maturity as a person often comes in our 40s. Choices made without insight and self-awareness early on in our life can lead to a distortion of our life path. The twenties and thirties are the time we invest in our education and our self-development, intellectually and professionally. It is the foundation of our lives. We need to be aware, not distracted, and misdirected. 

3)

We noted the recent rise in racist ideology and white supremacist jargon, associated with the international politics of the last decade in particular. And how this aversion to melanin affected how South Asian girls see themselves. Colour shaming can be both subtle and brazen. Eurocentric beauty standards fail to encompass the diversity of our skin tones and textures, often curvier body shapes and distinctive facial features. The range of golds, ochres, browns and dark tones in South Asian skin is absolutely mesmerizing. We need to value this.

4)

The pornographic material accessible today online by young men and boys raises the issue of the sharp rise in pornographic and sexualised content to which our male peers are exposed, on the era of the internet. Be aware that when girls and women interact with boys and men whose minds are saturated with these images, the way we dress and behave often seem to them to play into and reinforce these stereotypes. We need to be aware of this, because it affects the way we are perceived. And this perception results in the objectifying and insulting behaviour to which we can sometimes be subjected.

5)

Young girls in mainstream society are being told that provocative self-exposure, and in particular presenting their bodies as sexualised objects on public platforms, will bring them positive attention. Influencers with augmented facial and body features and Only Fans ‘content creators’ and sex workers performing desirability and playing into people’s fetishes or preferences often present highly filtered and manipulated images of themselves. Lips are filled, breasts and butts are lifted, skin is stretched. Age defying means artificially creating a facsimile of youth and mirroring an image of desirability. These models are not positive or empowering ones for us to follow. The attention gained by this kind of self-presentation is short term, and reductive of us in the long run, and diminishes our credibility.

6)

Young women’s appearance is ultra emphasized in mainstream culture; and whole industries are built on selling products and procedures to women to influence them to alter and manipulate their appearance to fit a norm. This norm is easily recognisable because it correlates with the period of biological desirability which we experience in our late teens and early twenties. At this time, due to our hormonal levels, we have glossy, lustrous hair, bright eyes, a clear, glowing complexion, and shiny nails white, pink nail beds and white nail tips. We are told that we should try to look like this via every chemical means available to us, for the rest of our lives. Because, apparently, this is the ‘best time of our life.’ When young, we want to be admired and appreciated and loved, we love the attention we get, and the feeling of being observed with admiration by others.

We are willing to invest a lot of time and money to feel the pleasure of those feelings. We believe that this is the pinnacle of our experience, the time when we are most ‘powerful’ because we are most desired. This makes us vulnerable to manipulation. This message is so often repeated through advertising and the behaviour of others that we come to believe that the age of 23 is the best age to be.

7)

But is it? A life fully lived encompasses several eras. Physical beauty is only one aspect of our existence. If we locate all our happiness in that short period of time, we are bound to lose our joy as we mature. Ageing is a natural process, and it is also humbling. We are more subject to illness and stress as we get older. It is foolish and arrogant to try to defy it or disguise it. Mental, intellectual, psychological, emotional and spiritual development result in a deepening evolution of our character and personality that is not available to us in our early years, and that only emerges from life experience. The thirties and forties and fifties and sixties and seventies and eighties each yield their treasures, and have their high points, and bring lasting happiness in a way that being complimented for our looks for a short time cannot really match.

8)

Short cuts and quick fixes for our complexions and experimentations with our hair colour can cause lasting damage to us. The chemicals we apply onto our skin and our hair add up over time and have toxic effects. The skin lightening products are dangerous; surgical procedures are expensive and also dangerous and irreversible; Ozempic etc and other rapid weight loss products are not even properly tested, and can cause psychological problems, and the list goes on.

9)

In question time, some of the girls said they felt trivialized and frustrated by the way they are treated in society. How come men get all the attention and respect, and get to decide the path of their lives for themselves, while girls and women have to do as they are told? I said we can recognise the injustice and make sure we see ourselves as the ones who have the choice. We choose how we want to present ourselves authentically in the world. Not to conform and look like everyone else but celebrate our individuality. We decide not to make shallow personal choices. We do not present ourselves as ornaments, toys or playthings. We present ourselves as whole beings, with all our aspects of character fully showcased.  To find soul mates, we need to access and develop our soul, beyond our appearance and external self.

We should, for example, select our friends and partners for non-superficial reasons, not because they are good looking or charming or popular. But because of their ethics and their values, their qualities of character. We are best off being selective and discerning in our choices and in our conduct. Not to impress anyone, but in order to create a fulfilling life.

10)

 Basically, we need to start thinking in the long term, from a young age, and build our future on a commitment not to another person but to developing our own character. God made us each unique, with a unique contribution to make. Let’s recognise our individuality and celebrate that, and expand that, and understand that when other people measure us, they often fail to recognize our full worth. Some who make critical comments to young people are frustrated and jealous, as they lacked the opportunities that young people have today. So, let’s see that for ourselves and experience the excitement of that discovery in all we do. We need to understand that it is we who have the power of choice. Not to scare anyone, but in personal relationships women biologically are uniquely given this choice, to discern and to select. It is our choice of partner that determines the quality of future generations and the whole human race. Red Pill incels are activated by rage about this, because they understand what even apparently casual rejection by a woman means for them and their sense of value. It is not women who are seen as unmarriageable, it is men who are actually afraid of being unchosen.

‘High value’ does not mean how much money we earn or inherit. In terms of self-worth, high value means self-respect and personal coherence and integrity. Therefore, in our lives, wherever we have choice, we should appreciate each opportunity and use it well. The choices we make determine the quality of our life. It is worth taking that choice in our own hands and taking our time to make each choice a good one, a better one, the best.