Ugly: Giving us back our beauty standards

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Why? Because I don’t feel old and I hate being categorised, but society treats women over 35 as if they don’t exist.

As 33yo woman who noticed significant changes in my body I started being way meaner and cruel to myself than ever before. I hated what I saw in the mirror everyday. I was horrified I didn't fit in my clothes anymore and blamed myself for not looking like I am 25 anymore. The ramifications are troubling. Why should we exert all our energy and resources into the appearance of effortless youth? DeFino explains that this “speaks to the making of modern femininity,” which, as Susie Orbach writes in Aesthetic Labour: Rethinking Beauty Politics in Neoliberalism, is “marked by a concealment of the work of body making,”

Working on the inside of the beauty industry, I started to notice some changes. Around 2010, social media gave people a voice and more control over what magazines and brands were creating for them, eroding the carefully crafted elitism and exclusion that I’d been chipping away at from the inside. Campaigns started to become more inclusive on a surface level (though they still rarely featured anyone genuinely plus size, with disabilities or dark skin) and the beauty product launches I attended finally offered shades of foundation in my skin tone and informed me that instead of trying to fit in, I should feel “empowered”. I didn’t. Anita Bhagwandas: ‘When I started to read about beauty standards, who created them and held the strings, things started to shift.’ Photograph: Kellie French/The Guardian I am so glad I found this book. It spoke to me on so many levels. It named things I already knew but also brought new perspectives to concepts I thought I have worked through. I wish everybody would read this book because it would give them a huge relief, offer understanding and compassion towards self and others. We need knowledge like this as a society, community, a group of people just so we can start unlearning all the toxicity and beauty anxiety. This discomfort followed me from my teens to university and into adult life – a constant imaginary friend always there to remind you of your lowly place in the world. It gradually evolved into a toxic obsession with thinness – and all that it promised: success, acceptance and prettiness. We're all told that this is just part of growing up, but it stays with us, evolving as we age. The internet tells us we should love ourselves, whilst bombarding us with images of airbrushed perfection, upholding centuries-old beauty standards which we can't always see. Our beauty rituals are so often based around things we think we need to fix, grow and develop - sometimes tipping into dangerous obsession.

Orbach continues, “We can see this same concept more clearly in trends like no-makeup makeup and the clean-girl look. In both instances, women are expected to perform the labor of applying cosmetics and then the labor of making those cosmetics seem nonexistent. ‘Aging gracefully’ is much the same! We’re encouraged to participate in the system but also, to make it appear as if we aren’t participating in the system at all.” I’ll make a moodboard of beauty and fashion looks I want to try just because I love them and they represent me. And I’ll try one new thing every week. Essentially, it’s about funneling a lot of time and resources into antiaging efforts while maintaining a facade of effortlessness. As DeFino explains, “What makes aging gracefully a particularly nefarious euphemism for antiaging is that it implies antiaging should appear to be effortless. Of course aging gracefully is not effortless—it demands a lot of effort, and then demands even more effort to disappear the evidence of said effort.” “Women are expected to perform the labor of applying cosmetics and then the labor of making those cosmetics seem nonexistent.”She continued, "With her obvious aesthetic interventions, Madonna’s effort and her desperation for youth are on full display. That not only violates the rules of ‘aging gracefully’; it violates the (false) code of ethics embedded in beauty culture. For example: When plastic surgery is subtle, we call it good work. When plastic surgery is obvious, we call it bad work. The message is, a good woman with good work conceals the labor they perform to make the construct of womanhood seem natural. Madonna is being judged as a bad woman with bad work for exposing the construct of womanhood as unnatural.”

Who isn’t feeling like this? Men – largely speaking. They don’t have the pressure to look under 30 all their lives. Often they’re told they look better with age. The author’s pre-set experience has added value to the writing process: ‘I’ve worked on the inside of the industry, I’ve got a very unique insight into how so many parts of it work. The personal experiences I explore in the book bring together the elements of politics, history, science and psychology of beauty standards,’ she explains. We're still told that it's good to be thin rather than bigger... even though we have body positivity," Bhagwandas shares. Take one of the biggest make-up trends in the past 10 years: contouring. When Kim Kardashian went viral after posting her contouring selfie in 2012, it showed how our faces could be manipulated into looking entirely different with elaborate make-up techniques. Contouring wasn’t new – Max Factor popularised it in the 20s at his Hollywood salon, and movie actors like Vivien Leigh used it in the 30s. Kim Kardashian, centre, was one of the first to make modern contouring techniques popular (Photo: Todd Williamson/E! Entertainment/NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal/Getty) OK, but you know why that’s the case though, right? Yes (sigh). Archaic data on fertility, patriarchal views of women’s appearance and the multiple industries that sell youth to women as the sole beauty ideal.I then made a pivotal life choice. Where is the worst place you can imagine a broken human obsessed with being thin and beautiful and never quite measuring up might find themselves? You guessed it: women’s fashion magazines. Anita felt the world was telling her to ‘correct’ the colour of her skin as she got older (Photo: Supplied) We aren’t responsible for everything that’s come before us – but we are responsible for what we do now, and the changes we can all make to shift archaic narratives. Considering where whiteness might be ruling your beauty standards and routines – no matter what your heritage – is a great starting point. A good book makes you think and reflect. This book did that for me. I started with skepticism and a touch of boredom. A bit of dismissal and denial followed. But as I kept reading I found my thoughts and attitudes shift. And yes, I even learnt a thing or two. Now that’s a good book!