As we were on this subject, I started thinking… Just about everyone I have ever known that was planning for a baby, pregnant or had a dream of a family all made the same request we were: They all wanted pretty babies.
I said to this person, “What if the babies aren’t cute?”
She wisely responded, “I don’t believe parents notice.”
Wow. She is smart.
But really, when I think about it, pretty people sure get more of the attention. Let me rephrase that: Pretty people are more humanized than those who aren’t considered attractive.
For example, when a blonde haired, blue eyed, white little suburban girl goes missing or is murdered; she gets a lot more press and sympathy then say, a black child or a less than attractive girl from the trailer park.
Most people recognize these kids:
Most don’t recognize
these:
All children who met a similar fate. But only the first two, Caylee Anthony and Kelsey Briggs, were given the national spotlight.
Some may say it is simply a race issue but I will take it one step further and say it is a Cute Issue.
Remember Jon Benet Ramsey, the “pretty” little beauty pageant child? She has been in the newspapers for almost a decade. Draw your own conclusions on why. And before anyone blames the press or the newspapers for giving more attention to the pretty kids, you have to remember that the press only gives us the news, we the consumer, want to read about. It’s about supply and demand. We are to blame; not the newspapers.
Now, If I extrapolate my cute theory into other avenues of society, I could lay claim that the reason Haiti and their catastrophe is met with a certain level of indifference is because it’s a poor country with a less than attractive citizenship. If the same tragedy hit Paris or Melbourne, would telethons be needed to get us to donate or even care?
Once again, I don’t necessarily believe it is just a race issue. I think it is a cute issue.
Americans are the most charitable and compassionate people on earth. I believe that. However, I also think we are the most arrogant.
Back to my cute theory…
Take PETA, for example. They want you eating this:
Dolphin Safe Tuna.
Tuna that was fished without using nets that sometimes kill dolphins.
Why do they want to save the dolphin but not the tuna?
Dolphins are “cute”.
Tuna, on the other hand, are “just” fish.
Ordinary, plain looking fish. Granted, dolphins are mammals and tuna are not.
However, PETA is supposedly against ALL “murder” of animals or living breathing species (that aren’t human). It seems to me they are really more specific in which animals are more worthy of being spared… the cute ones.
Anyway, it’s just a theory.
I do notice here online that when adults start fighting with other adults; that personal attacks always center around the other person’s appearance. I’ve heard terms like “white trash” thrown around. I’ve seen people refer to each other as “fat” or “ugly”. I have witnessed people treat another person as if they are less than human because physically they don’t meet that person’s standards of attractive.
Kids do it in elementary school. Adults do it online. Less than “cute” people are often ostracized or bullied.
Back during the Salem witch trials, the so-called “witches” were most often women and a few men that had an unseemly appearance.
And we wonder why eating disorders run rampant in schools across the country; why celebrities have become the gods to many; why “attractive” people get more press than the rest of us… Like I said, it’s a theory.
*wrote this in 2010*
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