Ever since we’re young, we’re told to be a certain way, dress a certain way, talk in a certain way. And if not, we aren’t deemed beautiful, or up to the so called “standard”. We all spend hours scrolling through social media and become more conscious of our body image seeing all the perfect and more so perfectly-edited women. We begin to think less of ourselves.
We think as If we have to be like this or we aren’t going to be praised in the society. This desire of being like a certain “standard” is present in every corner of the world though standards in various countries do differ. This being up to the “standard” feeling isn’t our own. Had we not been told to be a certain way since our childhood we would’ve been our own selves, we would’ve been unique, we would’ve have own special image in the world. But that surely doesn’t happen at most of the places. Surely not here in Pakistan.
If you’re from Pakistan you would’ve surely heard it more than once or twice in your life that a girl needs to be fair. She should have a white flawless skin. And if someone isn’t, the pressure of not being up to the standard would surely make her go for skin lightening creams, bleaches and injections. All costing her money, her precious time, and it’s all a byproduct of anxiety. A girl in Pakistan is made to believe that she isn’t beautiful if she isn’t fair and light toned. The women selected to appear on television or cast in serials are always fair toned. Every other TV advertisement is a remedy to lighten your skin tone. Not just this, being fair is what is a standard propagated by the elders and the wiser of the community as well.
When a girl is presented to a possible match for marriage, the guy, her mother and all the family examine the girl and tell the girl’s parents how she is flawed and how she is not suitable for the boy. The top flaw they’d most likely mention is whether she is fair enough or not.
Most of the anxiety the guy’s mother growing up would also be that she isn’t fair but she still expects her daughter in law to be fair as can be although her family isn’t? The obsession with white sin tone has been messing up the minds of girls in the country from a very young age. God made us all alike, no one superior on the basis of their tone but the foolish human thinks they have a right to judge another human on that front.
I mean living in a country recognized by the word “brown” everywhere why do people feel the need to judge every girl on her skin tone. We are called brown for a reason. Keeping in view the geographical location of the country, we’re supposed to have a brown dark toned skin. We’re supposed to be the way we are for a reason. The amount of sunlight our skin is exposed to in the day requires the melanin in our skin to be a certain amount. Its basically science. Why lighten your skin artificially just to make yourself more vulnerable to skin cancer??
A woman’s worth is not to be dictated by some foolish beauty standards. A woman’s worth is measured by her accomplishments just like any other man, her dreams her thinking, all her hard work is the way you can if you may to judge her. But judging her on the basis of her appearance what she has no control of and is merely the work of God, I ask those people: Are you calling someone flawed or are you calling the Divine’s creation flawed?
Next comes the beauty standard that’s affected everyone equally in every part of the world and that is a person should be petite and slim. The toxic beauty standard of being paper thin and having all the curves in the right places propagated by beauty magazines all around the world has led to girls literally starving themselves and not taking the proper diet needed to have a healthy body. Like everywhere, girls in Pakistan also starve themselves to the point that they develop anorexia nervosa, refrain from eating even the bare essentials needed to sustain a healthy life and as a result develop a number of body deficits like iron deficiency, anemia, hair loss and a number of another disorders that are certainly may make them slim and petite but are destroying them from the inside. Me calling it a toxic beauty standard certainly does not mean I support being overly obese and unhealthy but being healthy certainly does not mean depriving yourself of food in order to get a slim malnourished body.
Obesity is a disease and should be treated with adopting a healthy life. So is undernourishment. But fat shaming and slim shaming girls is in no way a right thing. A person, girl or boy should be persuaded to live healthy, not have a certain body shape. Everyone is beautiful in their own unique way and should be comfortable in their own skin if its not causing them any health issue.
A beauty standard that always prevails is the need to be of good height. Everyone has a different body, own level of hormones, own level of activity of their glandular systems, own genes and own family backgrounds, so some people would have a certain height and would not be under their will or control. Girls having a short height and by short for Pakistani girls is under 5’2’’ should be acceptable. People come in various shapes and sizes and considering we’re all human we should consider every height acceptable, every person beautiful, and every person’s characteristics the best that can be for them.
A certain beauty standard also seen to be common among Pakistani women is that they should have long straight shiny hair. A girl is not considered pretty if she doesn’t have long and nice hair although the quality of one’s hair is also genetic and environmental. A person can try to take care of their hair and try to make them remain healthy but going over board with extensive treatments, extensive hair re-bonding and trying to make yourself look a certain way that isn’t natural should not be encouraged unless you’re doing it out of your own free will and not because of the societies pressure and to be up the so called “standards”.
In order to change the standards in Pakistan, everyone should be accepting of the way they are created and the way others are created by the Divine. Only then can we curb the pressure of the society, as we ourselves are the society, and we can create a pleasant environment for our future generations to come. Also, less time on social media and more time on personality and character building should be helpful in the process.
In short, every girl and every person in general is beautiful just the way the God created them and one should never feel the need to change themselves to look a certain way and meet a certain level.
