Our Obsession With Beauty is Dystopian

Our obsession with beauty and aesthetics on social media platforms like TikTok perhaps point to a larger problem in our culture. How does beauty surveillance and performance harm us? And how does it turn us into ornamental products to be consumed?

second channel: @shansorbet

Hi! I'm Shaniya but I use the moniker Shanspeare on Youtube. I'm 23, use they/them pronouns, and love all things pop culture! My channel has a lot going on: think Shakespeare meets Baz Luhrmann meets insufferable jester in a relevant but silly costume. I have a bachelor's in English Professional Writing (and basically Literary Analysis--long story) which aids me in the creation of my content. Above all, I wish to emphasize teachability and critical engagement through a fun lens.

Sources:
-Engeln, Renee. “Beauty Sick: How the Cultural Obsession with Appearance Hurts Girls and Women.”

Videos Mentioned:

timestamps:
0:00 beauty routine skit
5:47 contextualizing beauty horror | pt.1
16:07 defending beauty | pt.2
22:26 pillars of beauty sickness | pt.3
47:35 conclusion + solution (?)
50:45 bloops

Tags:
aesthetic, beauty, beauty tips, beauty subliminal, aesthetic warning, aesthetic songs, aesthetic tiktok, tiktok compilations, beauty tiktok hacks, pretty privilege, subliminal pretty privilege, buccal fat removal, plastic surgery, beauty trends, anti-aging, botox, jennifer check, jennifer check subliminal, aesthetic morning routines, siren, tiktok

[anthrohuman]

“Performing even when no one else is there” is SUCH a big thing for me. Sometimes when I’m alone in public, I find myself acting in a certain way and I really don’t like it and have been trying to overcome it, but it’s basically unconscious. It’s exhausting

[hannahyamauchi]

If you ever feel self-conscious of your wrinkles, remember that the alternative to aging is being dead

[grandsome]

No matter what we look like, we all poop, and that's beautiful.

[mlgnfsh-art]

The latest wave of beauty sickness is those fresh out of highschool girls being obsessed with anti aging.

[bangtanluver]

tiktok has definitely amplified beauty sickness in my oppinion

[PlSSVORTEX]

honestly the best part about growing up “ugly” is that i do not care about aging at all. my self worth was never tied to my looks and the older i get the less people care that i’m not conventionally attractive

[ponetium]

Also, teens bully other teens for not using makeup, removing hair, wearing the "right" clothes. And when you grow up, those scars stay.

[MothsAreTheBest]

Shanspeare: "I can't sit down"
My brain, autofilling "Cause I've got ✨hemorrhoids✨"

[ChrisBrooks]

When watching some of these anti-aging videos on from TikTok that I think maybe it's not worth it to be beautiful. Maybe I should be glad that I'm just average looking because the girls do not look happy at all. In fact they seem to be suffering.

[hehe]

I'm east Asian so maybe I'm extra critical towards my people but....Asian girls take the beauty obsession to NEW HEIGHTS. Like...i cannot even begin. Asian women generally age gracefully, yet in my community women will self-bash and talk about how 'saggy' they look when they 30 and look 20...do things like avoiding facial expressions like laughing, avoiding outdoors coz the sun, it's MADNESS.

[hymio]

"You're not a currated pintrest board of static images: you're a person"
Speak for yourself Shan, Ive escaped the flesh prison and ascended to pintrest board nirvana lmao

[hot.bowl.of.stew]

One of the biggest things that helped with my self-love journey isn’t telling myself “I’m always pretty” but that I’m ALLOWED to be ugly.

[screaminosdooleross]

Beauty is becoming a privilege that's behind an ever growing pay wall that the average person can't hope to achieve without ruining their own life, and I feel it's only going to get worse and worse...

[lindsayryan]

I never wanted to look like anyone… I just didn’t wanna be ugly.

[LifeisaBeautifulting]

I realized I'm beauty sick. I'm a black girl with medium-length thin hair who has acne. I expressed to my mother how I felt about my appearance, and she didn't understand why I'd focus so much on my appearance when I'm about to be a doctor. Despite my other good qualities, it's very hard for me to feel fully confident if I don't feel beautiful. People don't look at me and see that I'm smart, empathetic, deep, etc. They can't see how beautiful I truly am within without thinking I look good on the outside. It's sad but it's the truth

[noplace]

Every time I see an influencer putting drops in their eyes to make them whiter and their pupils larger, I think about the women who blinded themselves with belladonna drops. Truly we’ve learned so little

[nicolasgalviza]

I talked about a tiktok of a very little girl doing her skincare routine (must've been under 11) and a mother doing her baby's skincare routine to my coworkers during break cuz we were talking about random shit... and they were like omg thats normal. thats peachy keeny. I, like, still dont know how people cant see the fact capitalistic society's selling us an idea of aging equated with ugliness which, in the end, brings us all down. why are little kids doing their skincare routine? why are we normalizing this?

[Arcadian-Nova]

i was.... socialized as white, but around every day my white mother would critize an aspect of me that i got from my south east asian ancestors. (like honey if you didnt want a hairy daughter, you shouldnt have gotten a hairy man) i was critized for the binge eating disorder she gave me and the weight that came with it by my (white again) half-brother, and than critized by both for thinking im ugly.... make it make sense.

[fiction-]

I'm 41, a widowed mom of three, and a feminist. I consider myself marginally intelligent, a nerd, and I hardly ever wear make up. I'm a tomboy, play video games, etc.
I'm STILL infected by beauty sickness. I recently thought about giving streaming a serious go and dismissed because I'm not pretty enough and the thought of putting on makeup and trying to MAKE myself pretty enough was exhausting. I'm too old and ugly to share my love of video games with the world. WTF right?

[lore]

y'know, I wondered why I was so excited when the soap brow came on the scene YEARS ago, & it was because it was the only beauty trend in recent history I can think of that didn't require you to buy something (most likely). all of these other trends are literally just consumerism masquerading as self care and I am TIRED