Americans have no idea what natural beauty is anymore – and neither do I.
I’m not fat. I exercise regularly, limit my calorie intake and choke down every last vitamin my mother orders me to take.
I usually don’t have trouble buttoning my jeans, the inside of my thighs barely touch and I haven’t yet developed saggy arms.
But it’s not good enough for me. I want to be thinner.
Every time I watch supermodel Tyra Banks’ reality show, “America’s Next Top Model,” or thumb through the pages of a fashion magazine, I can’t help but feel overweight.
I admit it, whenever I see a girl on television that is thinner than I am, I consider putting on my worn-out Nike tennis shoes and running a few miles to combat those love handles I haven’t been able to work off.
Hell, the hundred-some diet-pill commercials I see every night on television make losing weight look like a piece of cake. The fat just seems to melt off of those people, so why not me?
I know I’m not the only person who hates her body, not the only person who has considered starving herself in order to lose weight, not the only person who keeps track of every fat gram that she consumes, not the only person who has invested in one of those $15 calorie counters at Wal-Mart and would wear it religiously if she wasn’t embarrassed.
There are 10 million women in the United States who would do almost anything to lose weight – even die.
But what for?
I’m also not pale.
I spend as much time in the sun as I can and use lotion that claims to enhance my skin’s “natural radiance.”
But it’s not good enough for me. I want to be tanner.
Television commercials don’t glorify women with porcelain-colored skin. They frown upon it, suggesting we invest in a liquid tan that comes in a bottle.
I’m aware that 40 percent to 50 percent of Americans will fight malignant melanoma – the most deadly type of skin cancer – in their lifetime, and still I bask in the sweet ambience of a tanning bed at least three times a week without thinking about what I’m doing to myself.
I’m not naturally pale, but I’ve spent more time soaking up the cancer-causing UV rays of a tanning bed than I’ve spent studying, and I have 50 empty bottles of tanning lotion to prove it.
But what for?
Nor do I have yellow teeth.
I brush and floss my pearly whites three to four times a day with the most expensive toothpaste on the market and refuse to drink pop out of fear that it will somehow tarnish my precious teeth.
But it’s not good enough for me. I want to have whiter teeth.
I see flawless white teeth on every page of Vogue magazine and in nearly every movie, television show and commercial shown on cable.
So instead of accepting that my teeth are a natural shade of white, I phone my dentist and set up an appointment to get them professionally bleached – an easy way to shell out a couple hundred dollars.
I’m not the only person who wants whiter teeth. Americans spend more than $1.4 billion dollars a year on over-the-counter teeth whitening products.
My dentist warned me that if I don’t stop bleaching and brushing my teeth so excessively, the enamel on them will wear, and I will experience an increased sensitivity to hot and cold temperatures, but do I listen? No.
As I think about all the different actions I take to improve my appearance, I have to question what I’m gaining out of spending my money, spending my time, spending my energy on changing my looks.
It is true that each of these steps, in some way, makes me feel better about myself, but the strain they each put on my body shouldn’t be worth that. Americans, as a whole, should not be willing to risk their health in order to impress others.
Honestly, most of the women I see cutting calories and counting fat grams are at a healthy weight, and some of them could even afford to gain a few pounds.
The same holds true for girls who tan religiously. After two weeks’ worth of tans, they probably don’t need to schedule another appointment, but the majority of tanners probably do.
And those frequent bleachers could more than likely do without a third or fourth visit to the dentist.
But beauty isn’t an individual problem; it’s a societal catastrophe that we need to address.
What is it about our society that dehumanizes natural beauty and emphasizes product-enhanced glamour?
Once upon a time, women didn’t need to cake on makeup to fit in. Skin was in.
Now, the only time I see what a person really looks like is right after she gets out of the shower and before she has time to apply her face.
I’m not fat, I’m not pale and I’m not cursed with yellow teeth, but our society makes me feel like I have the biggest butt, palest skin and most tarnished teeth in the world.