You know that there is something wrong with the equation if you praise a woman on her particular physical attributes and then she subsequently considers almost each compliment as a cutting insult. She may sometimes (or even oftentimes) feel indignation over your remarks. Put more simply, she may say “Liar!”, responding with much the same gravity and sincerity as the intentions behind your favourable remarks. It can be genuinely creepy and weird.
We are absolutely not talking about male acts of lechery or perversions most foul. It is of course totally warranted for any level-headed woman to display vehement objection—and even injurious physical retaliation, maybe—toward recklessly snide remarks about her ass, her jugs, her legs, her camel-toe (and at this point yours truly, this writer, would like to beg for a lot of leniency for using such words in the interest of emphatic exposition). Certain men with the impulses of cattle or predatory reptiles can exhibit the most loathsome behaviour, and the wandering hand or the inconsiderate stare would frequently deserve a perfectly delivered axe-kick capable of launching two organic spheres heretofore attached to the groin-area.
No—we are here referring to manners of grace and polish which manifest themselves through well-meant words, delivered merely to convey an honest appreciation of certain visually-perceptible characteristics.
“You’re hair looks nice on you the way it is. You don’t have to have it dyed.”
“Don’t worry about the size of your hips. You have a fine figure.”
“Why use whitening cream when your own tan color makes you sexier?”
“You’d look better without that much make-up, honey.”
Statements very much similar to those above and many more, however thoughtfully expressed in multitudes of variants, are not relayed only during rare and isolated instances. On the contrary. An infinitely vast number of them are transmitted from men to women every day, in most areas of the world. If it was possible to count this number, it would in all probability exceed the total population of all human beings alive. Sadly, the number of times that females refute these same compliments would possibly be higher.
It is simply that women ferociously embrace some sort of dogma of infallible principles, perhaps inscribed in stone, which purportedly defines with precision the elements of a beautiful woman, very much impregnable to any contravening ideas. The Ten Commandments in Moses’s hands won’t hold a candle to this. Many people don’t even follow the Commandments. But women seem to know their dogma even before they were born.
What does this dogma proclaim? Strangely enough, nobody seems to be clear about it—even women themselves. There exists, supposedly, empirical formulae which make persons fully knowledgeable about them living authorities on the subject of beautiful women. Then again, the rules seem to remain perpetually mired in ambiguity. In short, the dogma is there, but no one is ever really sure what it truly prescribes.
However, there is a certain type of celebratory event that apparently codifies this dogma: the beauty contest, where the participants are actually rated through a numerical point-system. This must certainly mean that differences in bodily dimensions and proportions, sheen and lustre of skin, tinges and colours of hair, mystique and playfulness of smiles, the corners and curvatures of facial features, can all be ranked according to a scale of reliable measure. Much in the same way that hot and cold temperatures, the intensity of earthquakes, or the depths of the ocean can be accurately appraised in terms of strength or weakness or declivity with numbers and instruments.
Or perhaps not. Unfortunately, the point systems used in beauty contests, although always expressed in numerical values, never at all rely on any set of uniform calibrations. Everybody knows this. Awarding 20 points to a contestant in a beauty pageant in the United States for the category of the swimsuit competition would not give anyone a fair idea of what merits are required to likewise confer 20 points on a beauty contestant in, let’s say, Brazil, for the same category. Even if both beauty contests are happening at the same time. It’s just not the same as saying that, in matters of chronometry for example, a 1 minute-20 second lap scored by a runner in a track and field contest in Mongolia would exactly mean the same score for another runner who achieved the same feat in a similar competition in the Cape of Good Hope. Which is why world records mostly belong to the Olympics, where the uniformity of numerical values define the level of achievement. Nobody has heard of any beauty contestant setting the World Record for Shiniest Smile at any time in the history of beauty contests.
What then, are we to make of the by-laws separating the beautiful woman from those who are not? It may be possible that by turning our backs on beauty competitions—which arguably are contrivances so exclusionary to the most of us they may as well be as distant as foreign solar systems with their own clockwork machinery so alien because of their cosmic remoteness—and concentrating our attentions, rather, on the commonplace, the mundane, the pedestrian encounters between males and females, then perhaps we might yet arrive at a more consequential and meaningful interpretation of what it really takes to be a beautiful female specimen.
Is she too fat? Even if the male doesn’t think she is, what if the female herself feels that way? Do her freckles, her pimples, her wrinkles wreak insufferable mutilation on her otherwise normal face? Do the contours of her bosoms, her upper torso, her lower stomach, her hips, her thighs—does any one of them, or do some of them, or even all of them present proportions so malformed and repulsive that even the dead pray for deliverance from their mere presence? Is it fairly pardonable for some women to wage wars on hair that they prefer not to grow on certain parts of their bodies?
These and many other enigmas are interesting because females and males would not have the same answers for them, even if these inquiries are made every day. Even answers amongst members of the same gender would be different. Interestingly, however, a consensus seems to be reached through hidden pathways, some form of extrasensory telepathic conduit from one person to the next. A secret parliament clothed in absolute subterfuge is convened, where convictions come together, and the collision produces a group of edicts, or a codification of some sort.
There can be little doubt that this engine of unification performs its processes with cunning efficiency because there simply are particular women out there who are extolled by a great many as personifications of beauty. Anyone can easily mention a whole list of names drawn from movie celebrities, television celebrities, career models, songstresses, news reporters, weather reporters, pin-up girls, fashionistas, and yes, of course, beauty contestants—practically the whole lot of females enjoying massive popularity, who have become members of a coven valiantly nurturing and protecting the Code.
And everybody would see these women everywhere. Their ubiquitous faces and figures permeate big cinemas and television screens, computer monitors and the LCD’s of electronic devices, magazine and posters. They’re in billboards. They follow and stare back at people while emblazoned across buses and trains. They are in calendars. They even smile from the notebooks of students.
Hannibal Lecter, that venerable fictional character in the novel and movie “The Silence of The Lambs”, a most intelligent and hideously evil personage, was once asked in all earnestness about what motivated a certain serial killer to commit an assortment of horrendous murders. Dr. Lecter carefully replied, “He covets”. The idea behind his deceptively simple answer was that the serial killer was pretty much like the majority of us non-criminals—“We covet what we see everyday”. We are nothing like serial murderers, but we do tend to favor for ourselves what we see all the time. It seems the same can be said about women and their regard for the Beautiful Women they see everyday.
“Don't you feel eyes moving over your body, Clarice? And don't your eyes seek out the things you want?” Again, Dr. Hannibal Lecter’s words ring with lofty but simple truth.
Problems can easily be encountered, however, when the basis is only what is perceived by the eyes everyday. One big conundrum that floats up quite effortlessly is the fact that the luscious, lugubrious females we see displayed everywhere we turn can look so different from each other. Males can frequently conclude that the differences between celebrities or cover girls or models remain pretty much on the same level of differences between the women they typically apprehend walking down the street. But the female comprehension of these self-same variations reaches a much deeper, much more discernible understanding. MALE: “You absolutely look just as stunning as the actress miss so-and-so.” FEMALE: “Of course not. You’re saying that just to make me feel better.” Hadn’t he caught sight of the slight overhang of flab below her triceps? Didn’t he notice the inadequacy of her snub nose? How the f***ing hell could he have missed the scar on her neck! Men simply don’t know.
Pity the poor women! Having to wake up each morning assailed by images populated with innumerable body shapes, lips of divergent lustres, eyes and eyelashes pointed upwards or sideways, cheekbones and noses of confusing varieties, et cetera et cetera. And all of this overwhelming information requiring distillation towards an Absolute that must guilelessly be funnelled into the waiting vessel of the woman’s mind. It must be like being aware that a vehicular speed limit is being imposed, and yet the authorities themselves aren’t sure what the exact figure may be. What right hath any man to pronounce upon this turbulence! Beings that have no stake on the merciless, omnipotent Code.
Just take, for example, the fertile arena of skin whiteners. Somehow, somewhere, it seems that the Code got around to prescribing melanin-rich skin as a sacrilege, even if one was born into it. A darker skin tone most often is sentenced with a lack of allure. An inexhaustible avalanche of females seemingly believes in this, judging by the number of cosmetic skin whiteners being successfully sold each day. Women just can’t get enough of unguents, potions, concoctions, ointments and cocktails that are supposed to provoke the epidermis into paler, lighter hue. There’s no telling how many brands of whitening soaps there are in the market—it appears as if there’s always this new brand appearing every week. Indeed, the phenomenon of skin whiteners would not be much of a curiosity if an equal number of skin darkeners were available.
And it’s all because of the Code. There is a validation on having whiter skin. Still, if one were to patiently inquire where this philosophy of white was set in stone, nobody would be able to tell. This absence would otherwise make it easy for males to graciously admire women who are naturally adorned with ebony sheen. Unfortunately, the rule is in force through some intractable existence.
The discussion can move well beyond white skin and onto the matter of facelifts with Botox, breast augmentations, the battle against freckles and zits, the worship of the sharp nose and hollow cheeks—these things can go on and on. There are, after all, just too many ways to skin a cat.
There can be no escape from it. Men will continue to see things in a different way, and women will persist in observing the Code. The situation can see no end to itself.
Perhaps, then, some accommodations in the Code are in order, just to make things less tempestuous and convoluted. The physique can be segregated into categories just as scientific nomenclature can always conjure up sub-sub-species within species, or sub-epochs and sub-eras within pre-historic eras. Maybe it’s about time to expand and enlarge on the tenets of the rules.
Why not introduce weight divisions in beauty contests? The sport of boxing has long enjoyed the convenience of packaging fighters into even matches based on poundage. There may be great potential in segmenting beauty contestants into straw weight, mosquito weight, light featherweight, featherweight, middleweight, bantamweight, and so on until heavyweight. Age brackets in some beauty pageants are already finding acceptance, anyway. And since we’re already into making creative reforms to make beauty more inclusive rather than exclusive, let’s throw in competitions for excellence in implants and other forms of modifications as well. Who says that shouldn’t there be radical breakaways from the rigidity of the rules?
Maybe these reforms can herald a time when men can confidently march up to women and say, “You are simply the most awesome light heavyweight and funkily lip-waxed, naturally ash-blonde woman I have ever laid my eyes on”—and be totally understood. Well…maybe except for the part where he said “naturally ash-blonde”.
Still, wouldn’t something along that scenario be…beautiful?
