Beauty Standards

Beauty standards are the guidelines for men and women in order to be deemed beautiful by society. Beauty standards are rather complex, they're different based on time period, gender, geographic region, race and many other factors. 

Currently, women are expected to look like Barbie. We're supposed to be tall, thin, and white, but not pale. We're supposed to have flawless skin without make up. We're supposed to have gorgeous hair without styling it. And if we are caught using make up or styling our hair, we're told we're vain. Bur if we don't we are told we don't care enough about ourselves.

Men also have it bad. They are expected to be taller than 6 feet, super buff, perfect hair, perfect complexion, and tan. And it's even worse if men are caught using make up or hair styling products, they are made fun of for being 'girly.' (More on why this is stupid later.)

The feminist movement has brought to light the consequences of telling men, women, boys, and girls that they are ugly if they don't fit within a very small constraints of socially accepted beauty.

 Most girls develop negative body image before they graduate high school. 

But boys are affected too. In high school a lot of boys are bullied and teased for being too small or not muscular enough. 

To promote positive body images, they had their employees model their new line of swimsuits.

There have been many different campaigns helping girls prove that their beauty isn't defined by society. It helps girls realize that they are beautiful no matter what society tells them about their body. There has been a more recent movement for girls to love their natural hair. There's also another movement that has been going on concurrently with both of these, a movement that tells women of color that they are beautiful too. It tells them that even with the majority of media being whitewashed, they are beautiful.

Sadly there isn't a huge movement that promotes positive body image for men and boys. There is a movement online for boys and men, but it mostly stays online and hasn't really gained much attention by many large social media outlets. But it is getting out there and becoming more popular. 

All of these movements are important. It is very important to tell people, especially young people, that they're beautiful and can be confident even if they don't fit into the socially accepted ideal of beauty. These movements tell people that they can define what beauty is and they can be happy and confident with the way they look no matter what other people think. Because above all else its about what makes you and what makes you feel beautiful in your skin. 

Tl;dr You are beautiful, no matter what. Let me know what you think in the comments.