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Why "Beauty?" Why Girly Girls Over Tomboys and Boys?

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seldrane
Captain

PostPosted: Tue May 27, 2008 4:10 am


Some of you have attacked the notion of beauty as being too shallow and too feminine in a stupid way. It doesn't allow for girls to be who they truly are; it pushes them to look like every other "plastic" celebrity. - Given that "Mean Girls" is one of my favorite movies (yes, I like Lindsay Lohan. Shut up), this argument has some pretty strong weight. -

Furthermore, we don't want guys to be turned off by the concept of "beauty," do we? I mean, our advertisement for officers seems really girly in a bad way: what guy wants to learn about how to dress and makeup tips? Even a guy into that sort of thing figures out how to do those things on his own. If we're going to help make boys gentlemen, men who can stand strong for themselves and others, a "beauty" guild is a bit of a problem.

So many of you have suggested we focus on "wellness" and drop the beauty thing. I was going to leave this debate open, but a few things I've seen recently have made me more partial to bringing back beauty as a concept while encouraging everyone to be independent and strong in their own way.

1. This section is complicated. If you don't follow it entirely, skip to 2, and ask me about it later.

The first thing you'll note is that if we surrender the concept of beauty to the plastics, throwing it aside as inherently corrupt, then how do we explain any tastes we have?

We can say we're free, we make our own choices, but you know how this line of argumentation works: the best arguments for free will (cf. Kant, "Critique of Practical Reason") depend on skepticism. To not fly over your heads: arguments for free will start with something that can't be explained, and then say "because we don't understand something, there's freedom/choice here."

In other words - the inability to say anything is going on, that anything actually exists in a situation, is what grounds freedom. If an object actually existed that was of import, it would necessitate certain actions and remove us from calling ourselves free.

Matters of taste are matters of beauty. We approach the truth because we hope it is beautiful; we hope what is beautiful is true. That truth is ugly at times is a very dark irony and not one we willingly accept. If we have the luxury of saying "truth is ugly," we're probably not hurting badly enough.

2. OK, looking that over, I realize I've probably lost some of you. No matter, here's a simpler argument.

What used to make men gentlemen was a concept of the "noble." The noble was taken so seriously we had aristocrats - you know, knights in shining armor, chivalry, a whole code of conduct different for a different class of people.

In Ancient Greek - Greece being where philosophic and political thought developed so well that we're still working from their ideas - the word for "noble" is the same as the word for "beautiful" (to kalos). The ability to switch between the terms is key for understanding Aristotle, whose "Ethics" argues that there are intellectual and moral virtues that can be had in this life just by being human. In other words: just as an acorn strives to become an oak tree, man (in Aristotle: the "rational animal") strives to become more rational than animal. He strives to become virtuous, to live an excellent, happy life.

Part of that confidence is being able to stand up for oneself independent of physical competition and fighting. I don't think anyone is going to say Shakespeare is less of a man because he wrote poetry. He's an example of self-confidence directed towards a noble/beauty conflation: in creating beauty, he demonstrated nobility.

Feel free to argue about this below, I'll make this a sticky in due time.
PostPosted: Thu May 29, 2008 3:38 pm


Why would anyone consider the concept of beauty as "too feminine"? I had always thought that beauty was associated with aesthetic pleasantry, not just females. And isn't the topic of beauty subjective? If that depends on human tastes, how could it be shallow? (not sure if this is what you were talking about in your first point...I kind of got lost sweatdrop )

I honestly don't see anything wrong with including the concept of beauty, but that's just me.

Therin55
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ElenorTheDark

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PostPosted: Sat May 31, 2008 9:55 am


I concure that nobility in itself is a type of beauty. If you look at it critically, for a long time now there have been fantasies of men in shining armour coming to sweep people away. This is thought of as a romantic notion...mostly I believe because of the fact of what they represent more than the men themselves. It is never just any man...it's always a knight or noble spirit of sorts. Beyond the looks of the man, the people are looking for the proper attitude, the noble spirit that they desire to couple themselves with. I have never heard of a woman looking for a rude, violent, horribly abrasive man in her fantasies...though I could be wrong. This is only my opinion.

Basically, what I'm trying to say here is that I believe inner beauty is more important, followed by the outer beauty and that the second notion is far to constrained by todays influence of media. Anyone can be beautiful, if they take the time. Being beautiful, even if it's only in the eyes of the one that you love is very important to a person, at least I think it would be...there's a measure of wellness in being called beautiful. It's good for the mind and spirit to know that someone feels that way about you. Personally, I know this to be true.

And furthermore, when did the concept of beauty narrow so much? Many things are beautiful, the sun falling below the mountains, the cool shade of a large tree in a meadow, and even a single petal floating in the water. I don't mean to sound overly romantic and poetic here, but with so many things in nature being beautiful, and so many things that we make considered works of art...why is is that we ourselves have been limited to one flat concept of beauty?

If anyone followed that rant, I would be more than happy to talk about it further.
PostPosted: Sun Jun 01, 2008 9:12 pm


Shattered_Life
Why would anyone consider the concept of beauty as "too feminine"? I had always thought that beauty was associated with aesthetic pleasantry, not just females. And isn't the topic of beauty subjective? If that depends on human tastes, how could it be shallow? (not sure if this is what you were talking about in your first point...I kind of got lost sweatdrop )

I honestly don't see anything wrong with including the concept of beauty, but that's just me.


You caught onto what I was talking about quite well. I gotta sweat a bit because the rhetoric I'm using has a few holes in it.

sweatdrop

seldrane
Captain


seldrane
Captain

PostPosted: Mon Jun 02, 2008 12:24 pm


Sekkole
I concure that nobility in itself is a type of beauty. If you look at it critically, for a long time now there have been fantasies of men in shining armour coming to sweep people away. This is thought of as a romantic notion...mostly I believe because of the fact of what they represent more than the men themselves. It is never just any man...it's always a knight or noble spirit of sorts. Beyond the looks of the man, the people are looking for the proper attitude, the noble spirit that they desire to couple themselves with. I have never heard of a woman looking for a rude, violent, horribly abrasive man in her fantasies...though I could be wrong. This is only my opinion.

Basically, what I'm trying to say here is that I believe inner beauty is more important, followed by the outer beauty and that the second notion is far to constrained by todays influence of media. Anyone can be beautiful, if they take the time. Being beautiful, even if it's only in the eyes of the one that you love is very important to a person, at least I think it would be...there's a measure of wellness in being called beautiful. It's good for the mind and spirit to know that someone feels that way about you. Personally, I know this to be true.

And furthermore, when did the concept of beauty narrow so much? Many things are beautiful, the sun falling below the mountains, the cool shade of a large tree in a meadow, and even a single petal floating in the water. I don't mean to sound overly romantic and poetic here, but with so many things in nature being beautiful, and so many things that we make considered works of art...why is is that we ourselves have been limited to one flat concept of beauty?

If anyone followed that rant, I would be more than happy to talk about it further.


I like your musings. Thank you so much for sharing them!
PostPosted: Mon Jun 02, 2008 2:50 pm


Sekkole

And furthermore, when did the concept of beauty narrow so much? Many things are beautiful, the sun falling below the mountains, the cool shade of a large tree in a meadow, and even a single petal floating in the water. I don't mean to sound overly romantic and poetic here, but with so many things in nature being beautiful, and so many things that we make considered works of art...why is is that we ourselves have been limited to one flat concept of beauty?

If anyone followed that rant, I would be more than happy to talk about it further.


I was going to say the same thing! The definition of beauty is definitely not limited to feminity, or to human beings in general for that matter.

Therin55
Crew


pens_hockey_lover
Crew

PostPosted: Fri Jun 06, 2008 11:35 am


There is really no true set beauty. Beauty is whatever you think it is "in the eyes of the beholder." Trends change the concept of beauty once or twice every season. One day blonde hilights will be the fad, and the next day everyone will have brown hair, as has recently happened. Sweatpants have gone in and out twice a week around here. There is no set beauty and so any argument over beauty is indeed corrupt, and immediently biased.
I have to completly agree with you about nobility. Most of the guys on Gaia really need to take some classes or something. I think if we stressed this more, Hopeland would have more members. But I'm new here, and son't know much about it. From what I've observed the guild is compiled primarily of females.
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Hopeland: For Beauty and Wellness

 
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