Petrarchive – Ugliness

I wish I wasn't a fuggo

>>6407
Me too, but I honestly think that (barring cases of disfigurement or extremity) being ugly mattered significantly less before now. Or maybe we believe it to be worse now, so it is.

Social-shaming is the answer. Call it snobbishness if you want.
The preoccupation of ugliness and beauty is still vain and somewhat shameful. While advertisement is shameless and public; the quest for beauty is private and hidden. The only barrier to a total flood of these preoccupations is social shaming, which signals that, no, this is a childish topic of interest, and the one who devotes too much time to it is not to be taken seriously. In that regard, we do have a role to play by enforcing these values. But most people regard judging as bad nowadays, so they tolerate vanity and expose themselves to it, more and more until it becomes normal.
Add to that: among teenagers, beauty-ugliness is a shameless quest, and most adults might want to retvrn to teenageland these days.

>>6408
I think that this overused phrase "barring cases of disfigurement or extremity" is itself obscuring the history of ugliness.

In the past, there were simply more sources of disease, more birth complications, incest, and so on, and therefore people who suffered these were "ugly". It was an unfortunate but understandable and logical thing to exclude someone with leprosy out of the walls of your city.

Today, we have largely eliminated these physical sources of ugliness, only using it as a hypothetical marker on the grid (the thousand or so extreme burn victims out there have to shoulder this stereotype alone). What remains is a finer-tuned calibration of ethnic and other heritable features; as well as a tendency to ascribe every formation of the human body to them - ignoring environment and upbringing.

Making any sort of definite statement about The Now and How It Was In The Past seems futile to me. For example, I once read someone lament that at least ugly people (as we would understand this "group" in our own discourse) can get faceless anonymous jobs, in the past they would have been shunned out of social life. But a cursory look at history provides us with hypotheticals such as this ugly person being able to make a living being a farmer in a rural area much more accessibly. In our day we are constantly paraded with photography and scrutinization of our faces and bodies from birth and getting a job, even a work from home programming job, requires showing your face to thousands of people. Simply interfacing with the system demands this.

Did the cows on my ancestor's farm care if he had a big nose? No, but my classmates at school sure did. When I look in the mirror I don't really see myself as ugly. I think I am an average looking person in decent health with little extremity in one direction or another and that reflects in how I look. It's only when I interact with other people in person or online that I'm reminded of it, unwillingly.

>What is to be done regarding the state of beauty and ugliness?
While undesirable for various reasons, there is no doubt that polygenic scores and embryo selection will be used to create a more beautiful race of humans, particularly when social scientists come to terms with the effect of 'lookism' on human success compared to their current bugbears of class, race, and so on. Few would not choose to make their son a few inches taller, or to give their daughter a face more harmonious than Nature would have supplied.

I leave you with this quote of James Watson.
>People say it would be terrible if we made all girls pretty. I think it would be great.

Also I've been reading about the history of Byzantine political mutilation--very interesting stuff.

>>6410
Reasonable from a moral standpoint but given the deep roots of the beauty-preference in our evolution, it is certainly unavoidable that people will wish to beautify themselves in order to have a much better life (this goes for both men and women).

>>6414
>the history of Byzantine political mutilation
What have you been reading about that in?

where *

>>6410
Shame as a deterrent and/or punishment seems to only work when the majority is agrees that such behavior is shameful. If you try to shame someone for something normal, you may as well be laughed at or looked at with confusion. And I think the vain masses will not surrender their desire.

>>6414
I agree with the view that such technologies and efforts will inevitably be made in the future (or at least sought after), but I do find it a bit sad that we would rather change nature than human behavior.

Here is the actual answer: the gods have abandoned us

>>6240
Warren Treadgold Byzantine Revival

>>6436
But the preference for beauty is not just behavior, it is deeply rooted in humans' own nature. Hence children naturally recoil at the sight of the disabled, not having been acculturated.
While it is sad, I see it as unavoidable given the massive improvements possible. Who wouldn't want his kid to be handsome/beautiful?

>>6453
After I posted my reply, I did think about how that human behavior is natural to human beings, and ergo is within the domain of "nature".

I don't know if I agree that disgust/fear at the sight of disfigurement is the same as a preference for beauty.

>>6414
>given the deep roots of the beauty-preference in our evolution, it is certainly unavoidable that people will wish to beautify themselves in order to have a much better life (this goes for both men and women).
This is true of any basic need in time of abundance (sex, food). We do not regulate anymore (no more laws or close to none), so social-shaming is the last social regulation tool.

>>6463
And how has that worked out with both food and sex? We live in the most obese and most debauched societies imaginable. Failure of social shaming on both counts--it doesn't override nature, nature finds a way through.

>>6469
Japan is a good example about food, but a bad one regarding sex.
Italy, France are also not that bad either regarding food (no eating outside certain hours, obesity is looked down etc.)

>>6463
>We do not regulate anymore (no more laws or close to none), so social-shaming is the last social regulation tool.

It's the opposite. Laws come after social shaming fails to work sufficiently. In a society with no cohesive social structure, laws are the only way to get anyone to behave (see responses like "I wish we could make so-and-so annoying behavior illegal").

>>6494
We'd need facts to know what is true.
Sex regulation: apparently there's been less of one type of regulation, and more of another type of regulation.
https://academic.oup.com/edited-volume/28210/chapter-abstract/213215419
I suspect it is the same for food (less folk rules (fish on friday, Lent etc.) and traditions), more state regulations (hygiene regulation etc.)).

Beauty is the least regulated of the three I'd think; many of its constraints rely on traditions (rigid clothing styles for instance), and are an puny obstacle to a profitable market.

>>6443
What makes you say so?

>>6412
I too have a big nose. It seems like there is little established discourse around this. You see a lot about being bald, or short, or fat, or just being ugly in a general way. But there is little about having a big nose. It comes with its own phenomenology. It's very localized, a specific part in the center of your face. This can happen to otherwise handsome people. That already creates a very different set of experiences compared to a more uniform feature like being short of fat. The effect on people is more subtle and ambigious, which makes it psychologically more difficult to comprehend. Some people will be oblivious, others will innocently notice something "off", maybe without being fully aware of what exactly at first, a swift sub-conscious evaluation has detected something not quite right, a deviation from the mean. Others give you positive signals, then suddenly retract or invert those signals once a different angle creates a new confusing or unexpected impression. At least in my experience it kind of throws you into an epistemic twilight zone that low-key fucks with your mind due to receiving a myriad little signals that are often contradictory and shroud one's self-image in ambiguity. That's just one aspect of it. There is actually way more to it, I could probably write an essay about this lol.

>>6516
This is a really neurotic interpretation of simply having a large nose, but I find it interesting, though perhaps not accurate. Do you really think something as average as having a larger nose makes this big of a divergence in the way you're treated? Unless you're talking ungodly big, like cauliflower ear except in the middle of your face, then maybe I could understand. But your analysis strikes me as the type of an overthinker.

Saw someone at the grocery store yesterday with a very severely disfigured face, probably a burn victim. I have to imagine it's borderline impossible not to let something like that dominate your psychology. There's an experience I often have in social situations of my anxious thoughts and self perceptions fading away, and just feeling free to focus on the conversation and enjoy the presence of others. I wonder if it's still possible to do that when you always know on some level that people are paying a lot of attention to your disfigurement.

>>6551
Probably. I sometimes think about that US soldier who got blown up in the Middle East, survived, and looked fucked up after, was pretty notable and was awarded a high level decoration. He came home, wife divorced him, and eventually killed himself. Obviously many factors at play, but being totally disfigured cannot be disregarded as the pivotal aspect.

>>6588
What a wench.

>>6594
I have sympathy for her, assuming she was not a total sociopath and had conflicting emotions. I don't think one could resume the same relationship with someone totally changed by trauma, be it physical or psychical. And to expect someone to be a saint is foolish.

But yeah, that made that guy's life go from bad to worse, to say the least.

>>6551
> I wonder if it's still possible to do that when you always know on some level that people are paying a lot of attention to your disfigurement.
Isn't this the only moment when you are absolutely free to focus on the conversation and others?
When there is an overload of self-conscious thoughts (I must smell horrible, I have something on my face, this scar is too noticeable etc., any variety of "something is wrong with my appearance and they are experiencing it right now because I'm putting it in their face"), the solution is to give up: the only thing you have power over is the conversation and your interaction. You won't fix your face now, so let it go, and if there is an actual issue with your face, accept that you'll deal with the consequences (which are... ?). This is instant relief.
This is the serenity prayer applied: have "serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference"

>>6622
I kind of agree with the Stoics, and this frame of mind, that you have a certain control over your perspective on emotions, if not the emotion itself. But the curious aspect of modern ugliness is that it pervades everything and every interaction. Your own perspective is not safe. You find it a necessary belief in order to interact with society, that ugliness is evil and beauty is good.

>But the curious aspect of modern ugliness is that it pervades everything and every interaction.
I disagree, this is a monster that is only as strong as you believe it to be. Else, you're around people who make it their idol, and since this is all you know, you think everyone worships the same values (?).

>>7154
>this is a monster that is only as strong as you believe it to be
I agree with you insofar as the "monsters" we believe in, i.e. vices, are as powerful as the belief put into them, reciprocally. I disagree that it is "only as strong" as "I" or "you" or anyone else individually believes in it. The beliefs of our village have an impact on us, whether we like it or not. Here's a dramatic example: I do not believe in witchcraft, but if my fellows accuse me of such a thing and burn me at the stake, my belief (or disbelief, as it may be) has no effect. Similarly, everyone believes me to be ugly, but I say I don't care for vanity... My cares hold no water. It may be true that "birds of a feather flock together" and that I am around vain people. But I think that it is rarer to find people who do not believe in vanity than those who do.

>>7239
>Similarly, everyone believes me to be ugly, but I say I don't care for vanity... My cares hold no water.
Yeah, but what is your loss then?
My sibling is (much ?) more beautiful than I, and I am reminded of it sometimes when we hang out and I see people we meet behaving very differently. So... what ? What have I lost, what has my sibling gained? What have I gained, what has my sibling lost?
I feel my loss now (in some circonstances, people are a bit less nice to me). A very beautiful friend of mine is oblivious to her gain, and I suspect old age will be difficult for her, she will then feel her loss.
But in any case, this is just chump change in the economy of relationships.