Today’s society and culture have made it important for a person to be beautiful.  A person who wants to be successful in their career, marriage, and life must have a sense of uniqueness or beauty. For some people, they are born with natural beauty, but for others, they think they have to work at their beauty to be accepted into society.  Beauty is a rewarding trait to have, especially in todays society, but it should not get to the point where a person is physically or mentally hurting them self in order to achieve it.

People do get treated better if they have certain good looks, I have personally seen this in my life. Back in 8th grade, when I was in Algebra I, I had a cruel teacher that would never help anyone during a test, except that one girl.  She was a good looking girl who was also a cheerleader, and whenever she didn’t understand anything she would walk up to the teacher’s desk, and the teacher would practically tell her the answer. Other students tried but failed to get the teacher to do the same for them, but it was just that one girl who was able to get that advantage. It made all of us mad, but there was nothing we could do about it. We just ended up getting the bad grade while the cheerleader made all A’s.  That was the first time that I noticed that beauty could give a person advantages over another. I agree that people who have good looks do get treated better in our society. (Ackerman) People who do not have this image sometimes put themselves through a lot to achieve it.

Hurting oneself in order to achieve beauty is very dangerous and can cause many health problems. Whether they are anorexic or bulimic or take hormonal steroids, they expose themselves to have their harmful side effects. Dickinson states that from 1990 to 2000 that over a million teenage boys were found to have harmful eating disorders. (Dickinson) That is serious. Girls too have problems with eating disorders and keeping their desired body image, due to the pressure of society.  It’s not only teen agers who feel as though their image in society is key.  Adults are often found with not only eating disorders, but plastic surgery as well.  Going under the knife, as it is often expressed, can cause many problems as the patient gets older. 

Today’s media is what has set the standards for beauty.  People see how society says they should look through television, magazines, and the internet.  These factors add intense pressure to a person, which could make them go through drastic measures, such as not eating or taking steroids, to accomplish beauty for themselves.  Hall tells a story of a boy who was pressured to look not thin, but “strong and virile”. (Hall)  He was pressured through his peers at school, whom all had the right “body image”. (Hall) He ultimately accomplished his goal because of other people’s opinions, and not for himself. (Hall) Sometimes it might not be through the media, but from pressure of friends or family.  It is important that a person is content with their image, because being content could raise their self confidence and allow them to achieve great things.

People sometimes go through a lot to achieve their self image. Society has put pressure on individuals, saying that in order to succeed in life, you must have beauty. It’s a fact people take drastic measures to look good, but I ask myself, is it all that important?  Beauty is a rewarding trait to have, especially in today’s society, but it should not get to the point to where one is physically or mentally putting themselves in harms way in order to achieve credibility in society.

Works Cited

Ackerman, Diane. Subjects/Strategies: A Writer’s Reader. Ed. Paul Eschholz and Alfred Rosa. Boston: Bedford St Martin’s, 2002. 496-500.

Dickinson, Amy. “Measuring Up.” Breaking News, Analysis, Politics, Blogs, News Photos, Video, Tech Reviews – TIME.com. 20 Nov. 2000. 11 Jan. 2009 .

Hall, Stephen S. “THE TROUBLED LIFE OF BOYS; The Bully in the Mirror – New York Times.” The New York Times – Breaking News, World News & Multimedia. 22 Aug. 1999. 14 Jan. 2009 .