WHEN THE BEAUTY BECOME THE BEAST

Beauty! This simple word is the meaning of the most desirable possession that someone could have in our days, this word evoke glamour, money and power. Is not a secret that doesn’t matter how rich or intelligent someone is, beauty definitely can smooth your way to your personal ambitions, from the renascence painter to the fashion photographers the message is only one : Beauty sells ideas ,sells art ,sells products and change the way people understand the world around them and the way they see themselves.

Do you know that even much longer before the Photoshop the pictures of the glamorous Hollywood actresses were manually retouched with a sharp razor under the delicate negative to make their skins lucid and flawless, their youth were kept pulling their natural hair as far up they could and then a wig placed so they could sell the elusion of eternal beauty as long as possible.

Madonna change the musical world and the way we appreciate female singers, today is not enough you be a good singer, you need to be gorgeous (or at least sell that idea) you need to be sexy and you need to have different looks. In the 90´s the super models took over the world selling the idea of the perfect woman is rare but exist.

Today the Photoshop made any famous actress play the role of flawless supermodel creating a wrong idea of perfection and making the world population think that Hollywood is this magic place where everybody is gorgeous ageless creating a generation of starving teenagers, eating disorders and deformed middle age women with faces that look like wax work and pulled skins that instead of taking back the years just make you like a cartoon version of yourself.

My country pay a high price in this kind of mentality, different than here in UK, Brazil kind of spread this ideal of the perfect human being even before the Americans, I grew up surround by women in their 40´s looking like they are in their 30´s, where the middle class has access to plastic surgery and there is no natural boobs in between women over 30!

Through the gay community the situation is bigger and global, I was never a super model, but I grew up taking the compliments about how cute I was but always subconscious about my looks, because we are educated to keep the eye in the competition, so be pretty is a social obligation, a wrinkle is a sin and put weight on is social death and doesn’t matter how pretty you are you always gonna think that something is wrong.

That got me thinking, WTF I really thought that when you born at least a bit attractive you don’t need to worry about your appearance, but it seams that more attractive you are the more concern you become about your own beauty, not only about ways to enhance it but in ways to keep as you grow older!

Last July 30 of 2010 I had a accident , I fell from a quite high stair case straight with my face on the concrete, the scene was ugly as I never saw so much of my own blood, they thought I broke my jaw but in the end is everything ok ,I just end up with some stitches inside and outside my mouth and of course swelled and bruised and besides a scar under my lips I will back to my every day face again soon.

The reason I wrote this entry was especially motivated from the people reaction on my face on the streets in the day after my accident when even with the pain I wanted to walk around and do some shopping to make me feel better. What for my surprise that even with the evident signs on my face that I was in a accident some people just reacted to me like I had some contagious disease or born deformity. ( even if was the case it just don’t justify )

Is funny (not really) like the treatment I got change so much accordance to my looks, even when I ask information for one guy in the train station (the same guy I usually ask information ever time I come to London) change completely and was barely rude ( note : even the not gay guys react different from a cute and not cute guy )

As I walk on the street the looks were divide in 3 categories: The people staring at me without blink (pretty uncomfortable) the people that saw me but had the kindness to try not look distress on my presence and the people who first look at me in disgust and then turn their head and change direction to not get close to me, that type I just wanted to beat and give them more bruises than my own.

So, if I was depress with my accident, that was the moment that I felt happy and lucky and in the same moment extremely in chock with our modern society, I had I quickly preview that what would be my life if my face was permanently affected and how sorry I am about those people that need to deal with that in the daily basis.

That made me think how luck I am not only because im normal but I not even needed to deal with problems that some normal people deal like obesity or prejudice because they not have the attractive face or body that our society accept like pretty.

I was never Brad Pitt but being cute was a part of my journey and yes made easier all aspects of my life and now being 34 represents the time when all that starting fading away, and im really glad that even I received the involuntary benefits of my looks I never really rely on it and after this situation I definitely fell comfortable on my own skin doesn’t matter how damage, wrinkle or out of fashion I may end up, I never lived my life under other people expectations and I don’t see a reason my face should to !

Steve Cavalcanti