Of all the places on internet where time is a lost concept I
spend (or waste?) a shamefully considerable amount of time on Pinterest and
Tumblr. My interests vary on a day to day basis and it solely depends on my
state of mind on that day. So it could be anything from fashion week street
style to the latest Game of Thrones memes to articles on Vajrayana to zodiac
signs. I usually steer clear of recipes and DIY projects – not my forte. So the
other day while wasting another precious evening off the book of my life I stumbled
across this discussion on Tumblr. Beauty vs. brain. Or if there is really a vs.
there in between. Of course those nerdy, uber-cool Tumblr girls did not
disappoint me. As always they punched the apparent trade-off between physical
beauty and intellectual quotient into oblivion with their witty, sarcastic
comebacks. It felt good.
During my tenure at a B school of Calcutta I had a colleague
who once shared an illustration (not by her) on facebook. Three rows of
identical looking girls, all heavily made up, reading books and holding them
upside down. Only one girl in the crowd, with no makeup on, was holding the
book in proper fashion. The message was clear. If you wore lipstick and smeared
your eyelids with eyeliner, you were a dumb bitch. I practice reticence as much
as possible in this landmine laden big world. It was not one of those times and
I somehow ended up asking her “I wear lipstick and I also know how to hold a
book and read it. Where would you put me in your clever, feminist picture
there?” Her aggressive reply was incoherent and stinking of personal insecurity. One of
the perks of being an emotionally unstable clever person is that you master how
to smell others’ insecurities with time. My colleague was a short, fat, pimple
faced, thoroughly ungroomed girl who was apparently so proud of her appearance
that she couldn’t stop mentioning it. She was also the same person who happened
to ask me “Who is Agatha Christie?” and “What is a Holy Grail?”. Both the times she had spotted me whiling away our comparatively workless lazy afternoons with books.
I am a keen observer and a ruthless judge of people. Don’t let
my dreamy, happy-go-lucky appearance fool you. I am actually shaping you up and
your every single move behind my exuberant laughter and absent-minded gaze. But
come on, I don’t even spare myself. One fault and I will criticise myself mercilessly.
So don’t expect me to be otherwise when it comes to other people. I follow a
hell lot of fashion and beauty bloggers/vloggers (mostly Indians) on social
media. Not regularly but I keep a track. And needless to say, I judge the
living shit out of most of them. And believe me even though I try to like them
thinking about my very own principle of no conflict between beauty and brain; I
fail miserably. But what can you do really when you observe them and wonder if
their vocabulary stops at ‘really’, ‘super cool’, ‘super super pretty’ and ‘super
cute’ pronounced with accents from God knows what country. Or looking at their
outfits at various fashion week events and wondering if it was actually a
go-as-you-like show for rodeo clowns. Men are no less there. It’s OK to be gay,
but not OK looking like a poster for serial killer movie-cum-carnival. And then there comes the other side of the coin. There is this girl from Canada who travels the
world and dresses up like a doll and talks about her struggle with alcohol addiction and every inch of her blog oozes a heady mix
of wit, intelligence and sex appeal. Or this other girl from Delhi who narrates like a pro
journalist on her shopping vlogs. Articulate, funny and smart. Or this
Indian woman from Washington whose write ups are as good as her outfits.
Those who know me are well aware of my obsession with
clothes and shoes. How conscious I am about my looks. But a bimbo? Not even my
worst enemy would dare call me that. It’s very simple actually. Either be
unabashedly proud and comfortable in your own skin, be it fair or dark, smooth
or pimpled. Or just work towards to make it appear better. Don't try to hide insecurity behind pseudo-feminism. Sadly, men do not have to face this conflict. Why do women always have to choose a side then? Isn't this too a subtle form of misogyny? That no matter what we do we are always under constant scrutiny. Beauty never had any
conflict with being intelligent. Cleopetra would not have existed then. Some people
are just born dumb and they will remain so even if you snatch their Gucci bag away. I am usually an either-black-or-white type person given my condition. But sometimes even with my turbulent mind I feel that maybe the grey intersection segment of the Venn diagram of life is the best place to dwell in. Beauty or brain?
Well, how about both?
Comments
Post a comment