In chapter two of The World of the Image by Trudy Smoke and Alan Robbins titled Mirroring Ourselves discusses how an attractive physical appearance will lead to people going further in their life. As tragic as that statement is I would have to agree with it because people that tend to be beautiful or handsome are usually favored more in life.
The first section, Equation for Beauty Emerges in Studies by Daniel Goleman first talked about the structure of humans faces and what is considered beauty. As I was reading this I immediately thought of The Ventruvian Man created by Leonardo Da Vinci because he created it to show how the perfect human should be structured and how the perfect symmetry of a person creates beauty. Much of the section talked about just this. “In the last two decades, psychologists have come to realize that physical attractiveness, in males as well as females, carries with it an impressive array of social and psychological benefits – from getting more attention from teachers in childhood, to earning more money in adulthood.”, as stated by Daniel Goleman (pg. 42). Even though things such as education shouldn’t be affected by our physical appearance it is sad to say that it is. I definitely saw this while I was growing up and now that I reflect on it, it disgusts me that people that are more attractive do get more attention in school.
In the second section of our reading Never Just Pictures by Susan Bordo discussed the harsh reality of how our society is completely involved in self image. It was depressing to read about people who believe they have to be anorexic to be pretty and how our society has accepted this as beauty. I would have to say one of the most disturbing quotes I read was, “If I had to say my anorexia was about any single thing, I would have said it was about living without desire. Without longing of any kind.”, which was quoted from Stephanie Grant’s, The Passion of Alice (pg. 51). I believe that our personal desires each make us who we are and if we strip ourselves of that it takes our character away from us.
This chapter was a much more interesting than the first chapter but even though I did enjoy reading it I still found it to be a bit disturbing. I find it sad that people must take drastic measures just to consider themselves beautiful. It would be a much better world if people can conform to focus on inner beauty instead of only looking at the surface.
