Beauty and the beast

Since time immemorial, beauty has been a virtue associated with women. All women are expected to be beautiful. In Indian society the ideal of a woman is “slim”, “fair” and “beautiful”. One look at the matrimonial columns of any newspaper will reiterate the fact that our Indian society is obsessed with beauty. It is this attitude that raises expectations from ordinary women. Any woman who does not fit the ideal i.e “fair”, “slim” and “beautiful” is not considered attractive or beautiful enough.
Like in Greek mythology where Aphrodite or Venus was considered to be the Goddess of Beauty, our Indian mythology too is abundant with Beautiful women like Goddess Parvati, and Maneka who lured the great sage Vishvamitra with her Beauty. One has to understand that each individual is unique and has her/his own charisma. To expect all women to conform to the “ideal” is futile.
Coming to the present context, living in a world of commodities, more often than not, we tend to overlook the historical context, the cultural and social implications of, the impact on mentalities, and the impact on our lives of commercial products and the marketing techniques used to sell these products. One of the best examples is that of Fair and Lovely. One of the market leaders in fairness creams, Fair and Lovely targets young women who aspire to be fair. Here fairness is closely associated with the “ideal” beauty. Thus, fair women are considered to be beautiful. All the women potrayed in the Fair and Lovely ads are either conventionally beautiful or are expected to be so. No one seems to appreciate individuals own beauty.
Beauty in my opinion is not something with which one is born. Beauty is the attitude of a woman. It’s much more than surface beauty. In India, advertisers portray women as exceedingly anxious about their looks and outward beauty. This is not fair as women have much more to their character than just this.
Over the years many Indians have been programmed to equate fair skin with beauty, success and happiness. This craze for white skin has been aggressively marketed. In advertisements, it is always shown that in order to be successful, liked and approved by others, one needs to have fair skin. However this is not true. In order to succeed in life one needs to have character and depth. That is what makes an individual successful.