Question for Dope ladies (although men are welcome to chime in too): Dove had a survey that claimed that only 4 percent of women worldwide think they are beautiful. Does this sound right to you? I thought the figure would be substantially higher than that.
No I do not believe that a substantial portion of our population of women are vain.
I think the word ‘beautiful’ has a ton of weight on it that most women aren’t comfortable with. I think if they asked how many women consider themselves ‘pretty’ or even ‘good looking’ the number would be much much higher. And then there’s the societal pressure on women to be humble about themselves, be it in appearance or any sort of accomplishment. Given the company behind the study, I think it’s biased and may have worded the question in such a way to get the results they wanted. Or, they didn’t even do a study and pulled that number from their ass lol
Edit: Post above kinda shows what I mean about pressure from society. Apparently a woman considering herself beautiful is being ‘vain’. :rolleyes:
How many women are actually beautiful though? Most women are unattractive, and even of the 30% or so that’s attractive, only a small proportion are what I’d call “beautiful”.
I’d say maybe 5% is about right, so finding out that 20% of beautiful women don’t realize it isn’t unreasonable.
It all goes back to your definitions.
My personal definition: Person is exceedingly attractive to viewer or general population. Very much above average.
Participation trophy or feel-good definition: We are all beautiful. Every last one. To everyone. All the time.
Although the first one is a bit harsh (or shallow, if you define it to mean only physically), I feel it preservers a meaning for the word.
If everyone is “beautiful” then what does beautiful mean? It means nothing.
I’m surprised its only 4% too.
That said, we need to challenge the idea that to have high self-esteem, a woman has to see herself as beautiful. Doesn’t this just reinforce the notion is woman’s worth hinges on her looks? Maybe she takes pride in being quick witted, athletic, or musically talented; whether or not she’s turning heads everywhere is the last thing she’s thinking about.
Hollywood and the fashion industry tells us we are all too fat and too ugly. And probably too poor to buy their product.
Well, as a heterosexual male, I will state unequivocally my opinion that significantly higher than 4% of the female population is beautiful.
I rarely think of people as beautiful. Flowers are beautiful; sunsets are beautiful; a moment is beautiful.
I think I’m good looking, but I would not say I was beautiful.
I am beautiful no matter what you say, words can’t bring me down. So don’t you bring me down today.
I personally think that “beautiful” is a somewhat rarefied state - I’m not sure that anyone is always beautiful. The way I’ve seen the word used it seems to describe the pinnacle state of a person’s appearance - no matter how pretty you are you lose ‘beautiful’ when you put on the stained t-shirt and your hair is messy. About the only exception to this is if the viewer is viewing the person through altered perception - love goggles or beer goggles or somesuch.
Disclaimer: I’m male.
One study I heard about - possibly also by Dove - had women describe themselves to a sketch artist, and then had other people describe that woman. The sketches representing the other peoples’ descriptions were consistently more attractive than the self descriptions. Which suggests something about self image, or focusing on flaws however minute.
IMO, the key word in the OP is “beautiful.” What % of women are we to assume ARE beautiful - the top 10%? 25%? 1%?
It would be interesting to see how well the 4% rated in a general poll. Are we saying that that 4% IS beautiful, and that others are as well? Or are some of that 4% mistaken as to their beauty?
Yeah. I think/hope that I would be fairly generous in ascribing beauty to women.
But if you asked me to “Picture a beautiful woman,” I’m pretty sure the image that would come to mind would be at least in the top 4% of attractiveness. And I wouldn’t be picturing her at her worst (e.g. just woke up, bleary eyes, runny nose, bed hair, etc.).
Right, as is often the case, there seems to be a drastic skew/gap in between how men see women and women see themselves.
Also, don’t know if there have been equivalent surveys, but I’d guess that around 30-40% of men think of themselves as good-looking.
Well I’m sure if the survey in question would have asked women if they thought they were good-looking, we’d see a much higher number. A lot of women think they’re good-looking or cute or pretty.
It just occurred to me that I don’t know of a male-equivalent word for “beautiful”. “Handsome” doesn’t seem to imply quite the same level of intensity; you don’t picture a woman exclaiming “You’re handsome!” the way you picture men exclaiming “You’re beautiful!”.
It’s like women have an extra level of perfection that they’re supposed to try to attain beyond what men are expected to.
Nah, I don’t think it’s an extra level. I think there is a distinction between feminine “beauty” and masculine “beauty”, and the masculine version is not usually referred to as “beautiful”.
Female beauty is equated with flowers, sunsets, spring days, etc. It’s genuinely enjoyable to look at and appreciate, sexuality aside. It’s definitely visual.
I don’t know that male “beauty” is as visually-oriented as female beauty, but I could be wrong. Ladies?
This nonsense will only change when mirrors are equipped with PhotoShop.
No, that sounds about right.
The sad thing about this is how much physical beauty matters to most women. Such a very shallow thing to make a central tenet of one’s life. But society pounds the message into women mercilessly, “You must look good, or else you are worthless.” Over and over again.
Thank god I’m over it. I know I’m not physically beautiful. But I don’t care at all that I’m not.