Some feminists have been claiming that beauty standards for women promote weakness.
That may be the case with some places; but that is not the case with where I come from.
Where I come from, beauty standards for women promote elegance. Elegance is strength done in a beautiful way. We see this with ballet. We see this with figure skating. Both of these take as much strength as playing football or ice hockey, and people who see such things as weakness are fools.
The first girl I loved was a champion figure skater. She most definitely was not weak, either physically or personally. She was beautiful; she also had strength both of body and of mind.
Elegance, once again, is strength done in a beautiful way. This is something that is much more natural to women than to men. Southern belles – as presented in film “Steel Magnolias” – are an obvious example of that. These women are tough as nails; they are also beautiful and feminine.
In ignoring elegance as an ideal, feminists fail to see a strength that women have that men have to a much lesser extent. They buy into the male ideal of what is strength while completely ignoring an area of strength that women have that men don’t. There is nothing weak about ballerinas or figure skaters. They don’t have huge muscles; but that does not keep them from being both physically and mentally strong.
A woman who truly seeks to benefit women will promote the ideal of elegance. This is an area of women’s clear superiority to men, and a movement that claims to celebrate women will affirm it. It works in favor of women and celebrates a strength that women have that men do not. And that benefits women far more than buying into a concept of strength that favors men.