Taipei Times Editorial: The ugly face of beauty
The relationship between bodily appearance and self-esteem is universal and permanent. In recent decades, however, this relationship has had an accelerating impact on young women, pubescent girls and children even younger.
1. How would you rate your sense of self-esteem? If a person has low self-esteem, does that mean she thinks highly of herself? Have you ever met a person with low self-esteem? if so, what evidence did you see?
2. If something is universal, what does that mean? Do you think appreciation of music (for example, the blues, or jazz) is universal? Explain.
3. Divide into pairs (prepare out of class), one side arguing that music is universal and the other side arguing the opposite (try to argue what you believe and find a partner accordingly; otherwise, pretend your point-of-view).
4. If you were bumper-to-bumper with another car, would it be wise to step on the accelerator or the decelerator?
5. What are some signs of pubescence in males or females. (Do not get into sexual matters; that's for another type of class. Rather discuss tastes, clothing, music, habits, interests, hobbies, etc.)
Anorexia and bulimia are two extreme products of cultures that marry unbalanced consumption and celebrity idolization. Some girls and young women who see nothing but ugliness in themselves and captivating beauty all around have the potential to commit long-term violence against their bodies. Starving oneself in order to obtain a personal ideal of thinness and regularly inducing vomiting to prevent weight gain are sadly logical acts if one's self-esteem is too closely attached to one's appearance.
6. Name and discuss a famous star (singer or actress) who suffered from bulimia or anorexia. Download information on this person and present it to the class in conversational style.
7. In what area do you think you have the most potential to succeed?
8. Do you have personal experience of a person with an eating disorder? Explain.
The appeal of breast enlargement is another example of expensive (and sometimes dangerous) surgical procedures feeding off unreasonable feelings of inadequacy. And Taiwan shares a regional variation of such bodily discomfort: the feeling among some women that eyes without double-fold eyelids should be surgically "corrected" to make them beautiful.
9. What is your ideal of beauty? Would you consider surgical means of improving your physical appearance. For males or females, is physical appearance very important in choosing a romantic companion? Explain.
But damage from low self-esteem is not limited to these extreme cases. Research around the world -- including a survey released in Taiwan yesterday -- points to large numbers of girls everywhere and of all backgrounds suffering self-esteem problems to the extent that their education may suffer.
One of the most worrying findings in the international survey conducted by the Dove Self Esteem Fund was the large number of girls who thought their appearance influenced their grades and the way that teachers related to them.
10. Do you believe that this last statement is true or not? Explain.
There are some childish cruelties that the most interventionist state cannot eradicate -- bullying and other mistreatment in the playground on the basis of appearance are among them. But on the basis of these results, the Ministry of Education would do well to consider ramping up personal development curriculums and teacher training to help those who are "too fat," "too skinny," "too short" or "too tall" from suffering unnecessarily at the hands of their peers and tactless staff.
11. Did you ever witness a classmate in grade school being bullied due to his or her physical appearance. Explain.
12. What do you think an interventionist state is? What does it mean to intervene in someone else's affairs?
13. What's a curriculum?
14. What do you think is the meaning of "ramping up"? By the way, this is an example of a phrasal verb; that is, a verb that is always attached to a smaller word called a particle, such as "turn off" the radio, "shut down" the computer, etc. These phrasals can be separated, as in the sentence, "Turn the radio off" or "Turn off the radio." Notice in the first example the particle ("off") was separated from the main verb, "turn," but still had to be in the same sentence.
How radical should such ramping up be? Given that Taiwanese teachers are in the main more conservative than their counterparts in the West, it is difficult to see them openly criticizing parental standards of beauty that hurt children, or launching attacks on the more obvious corporate exploitation of prejudice against unusual body shapes.
15. What standards of beauty did your parents have? Or did they pressure you to lose or gain weight or achieve other physical goals, such as excelling in football or tennis? How was this pressure shown?
16. "Take" is a multi-function word. "Take" a photograph; "take" water along for the hike; and the joke, "Take my wife, please." Explain the meaning of that joke. Explain the way that "take" is used in the paragraph below (underlined).
Yet it is disappointing that no one at the press conference announcing yesterday's survey results asked the organizers for their take on the connection between improving self-esteem and purchasing cosmetics. The Dove Self Esteem Fund -- part of the Unilever corporation -- seems designed to further the interests of a firm that potentially benefits from women feeling poorly about their appearance. It does this by delinking the desirability of its products from myths about beauty, which is quite reasonable.
But at least one reporter might have asked why girls should not be encouraged to actively detach their self-worth from commercial products of any nature. If the Dove Self Esteem Fund has good intentions -- and there is nothing to suggest that it does not -- it would encourage girls to do just that.
One key question remains. This society demands that women spend significant amounts of money on cosmetics and beautifying products. Why then does it take so little responsibility for those who, through sheer misfortune and youthful vulnerability, suffer for not living up to its "standards" of beauty?
17. When have you felt vulnerable? For example, a husband might feel vulnerable when his wife is in the hospital.
18. Do a Web search on a cosmetic product and "sell" it in class: explain what it's supposed to do, describe the promised results for users of the products, etc.
19. Discuss a physically "imperfect" person (must be famous) that you personally find attractive, and explain why. For example, some bald-headed movie stars have sex appeal, as do short actors or comics. Some overweight women might appeal to some men, etc.
20. Do you think physically attractive people have better opportunities in life? Explain.
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