On Beauty

Anne Hathaway is a guilty pleasure of mine.

To clarify, I do not feel any particular sort of guilt for liking Anne Hathaway, but due to various reports about her attitude as well as some unfavorable performances scattered throughout her earlier history, a large majority of the general populace find her distasteful, so for them, I have added the descriptor. When I was younger, I thoroughly enjoyed her rambunctious performance in The Princess Diaries – yes, even the second one, because Julie Andrews mattress surfed like a champion, and if you don’t think that’s amazing, then I am severely concerned about the state of your consciousness. As I got older, I continued to appreciate her in The Devil Wears Prada, Les Mis, and The Dark Knight Rises, although honestly, Anne Hathaway’s career hasn’t really been a prevalent topic of conversation in my everyday life.

Until I saw a tumblr post the other day.

For those of you that don’t know what tumblr is, that is perfectly fine, and I actually do not wholeheartedly recommend perusing the dark depths of its domain. Tumblr collects a massive series of blogs dedicated to everything from socioeconomic policy to pictures of cats who look like they have mustaches, and the community is prized for being particularly forward thinking when it comes to issues like marriage equality, women’s rights, and so forth. That is the light side of tumblr.

But there is darkness, my friends. There is darkness. Rabid fan communities fester within the site to the point of legitimate concern, and hours of potential productivity are often lost within the endless gifs of tv shows you had long forgotten about, but I believe that the biggest offense perpetrated by the site is this:

In an effort to promote the rights and welfare of those traditionally underprivileged and undervalued, the tumblr community often alienates and even attacks all other groups. This involves attacking the legitimacy of heterosexuality because of the lack of homosexual rights, the degradation of white people in response to the atrocities committed against the African-American community, and despising “traditional beauty practices” because of the disgustingly unrealistic standards forced onto adolescents by the global media. While I truly believe that the intentions of these bloggers’ originate from a noble purpose, their methods are occasionally just as harmful as the movements they are attempting to vanquish.

And here’s where we come back to Anne Hathaway.

The gifset I discovered on tumblr recreated a scene from the first Princess Diaries movie where Anne Hathaway’s character is ridiculed by her best friend after receiving a makeover. Hathaway’s character greets her friend with an eager smile that is clearly seeking approval for the new look, and her friend callously dismisses the change by calling it “weird” and offering a look of absolute disgust. When I was a kid, I giggled at this scene, and I’m sure that was the director’s intent, but now…I interpret this very differently. Undoubtedly, this scene was meant to appeal to the “quirky” crowd by making fun of traditional beauty, but as an adult, I can now see the rich irony and hypocrisy of raising the confidence of the downtrodden by diminishing the value of others. Hathaway’s character was proud of her transformation, and instead of supporting her, her best friend immediately ridiculed her. Would this have been allowed if the transformation had been reversed? If Hathaway had transitioned from popularity to obscurity only to face the same kind of dejection from her best friend, audiences would have been livid at her treatment…but because she’s beautiful, apparently she’s just expected to take it?

Hathaway receives a similar treatment in The Devil Wears Prada. Her boyfriend in the film constantly derides her for wearing nice clothes and makeup, and the way that the movie is framed, he is supposed to be at least somewhat likeable. As an audience, we are meant to side with him despite the fact that he is consistently mocking his girlfriend for dressing in a way that makes her feel beautiful and empowered, but if he was making the exact same comments because of her decision to lounge around in sweatpants, he would be painted as an asshole – rightfully so, I might add. Both of Hathaway’s characters are subject to this derision after altering their appearance, and in a world where we are attempting to bolster the self-confidence of every boy and girl on a daily basis, there is no room for this type of disdain.

If a woman feels beautiful in a three hundred dollar coat, she should receive the same respect as a woman who feels beautiful in sweatpants. If a homosexual couple proclaims their love to the world, it should be met with the same joy and celebration as that of a heterosexual announcement. There is a terrifying trend seeping through the upcoming generations that equates the advancement of equality with the scornful hatred of the majority, and that does nothing but increase the disdainful polarity of both sides. True equality comes from loving every single person in exactly the way that they are, and that is the only hope that we have of erasing this new double standard that is rapidly spreading within today’s youth.

Whoever is reading this, you have the right to feel beautiful, and don’t let anybody’s definition of what that should mean affect your ability to stand tall.