From: balistik@big-brother.nevada.edu (Shawn Hicks)
Subject: Re: Ah, Fashion.
Organization: Not yet, but we're working on it...
Date: Fri, 2 Oct 1992 17:25:26 GMT

In article <1992Oct1.172914.7349@spdcc.com>, rdonahue@spdcc.com (Bob Donahue) writes:

>	Beauty is internal, not external. 

I hear this a lot.  I wish I could agree.  Isn't it just the
perfect attitude?  You can love someone for the person they
are and not the affect they have on your hormones.  Maybe I'm
just a bit lower on the evolutionary ladder, but my hormones
seem to demand satisfaction.  I've met several wonderful people
that did nothing physical for me.  Attempts at creating a physical
response didn't work.  Somewhere there is a balance, but the external
*is*, to some degree, important.  Also, internal beauty will
affect the external appearance. [more on this later]

>	You don't *need* to wax to look good, sexy, interesting, etc.
>You don't *need* to be thin, tan, blond, smooth, muscular, young
>to have self-worth and to be found attractive by other people.
>These things are *traits* not requirements or conditions.

Exactly!  But traits are traits, and parts are parts.  Just because
you don't like the above set, doesn't mean you haven't got another
set in mind.  

>	It's time our community started casting off these things
>in favor of liking each other for who we are, not who we're told to be.
>We dont' like it when the phobes treat us as things, why are we so 
>willing to let GQ/IM/EL/LLBean/etc. to do the same?  

Insecurity.  "What do people think of me?"  At least for me, this is
a major question.  GQIMELLLBeanHead tells us that looking like X will
make people like us more; it implies that if we do Y, we will get 
reaction Z.  Knowing how other people are going to react to us is
comforting.  Of course, its all a sham.  It takes all of three 
seconds to get at the underlying personality, and fashion aint
so good at covering *that* up.  

>	Admittedly, looksism did provide the mechanism for most of
>the bear and G&M community to form out of, mostly for self-preservation,
>but these same elements can and do permeate these sub communities.

In a way, it's like the Hankie code.  We use our cloths to send
a message to potential contacts.  The way Furr dresses and the
way I dress differ as much as our tastes in men, for example.  
Neither is better; we are just different. (Which is a good thing
because I could never compete for men who like hair: I've got
very little.)

>	The next time you find yourself judging someone because
>of how they look/dress/etc... ask yourself: who is telling me
>to come to this conclusion? 

Welllll..... taken in a larger sense, this isn't so awful.  If
you limit it to judging what is beauty based on current pop
fashion, then I agree.  But it goes both ways.  What can you
learn about someone who is always in fashion?  For me, if someone
looks like they take a long time on their hair, and use more than
one chemical to get it "just so," I might be curious about *why*
they need to go through all that work: what motivates them?  Don't
get me wrong, if that's the way they want to look, great.  One of
the things I like about SF most is the diversity.  Yet the way
a person chooses to dress can tell you things about them, or at
least create curiosities.  I don't automatically cut people off
because of their appearance, but they had to make choices about
their appearance, and those choices can tell you things about
them.  Judging someone because of their look isn't bad until
you base your opinion on that information alone.  

> Then next time you see/hear/read
>something telling you "you really want to look like THIS" ask
>yourself is that the *only* possibility there is?  The model may
>be beautiful, sexy, hot, and wonderful, but so are you.

Well said.

>BBC, beautiful, sexy,
>cuddly, unwaxed, not
>blonde, not thin, and
>without designer clothes,
>tanning salons, designer
>hair care products (unless
>Head and Shoulders counts :-),
>Soloflex, etc.

Shawn, plain on the outside, but spicy hot on the inside.