Henrietta Hay's Column

"Beauty is in the eye of the beholder." Or is it? That's what a 19th century author named Hungerford wrote. But he was obviously talking about the natural world, because throughout recorded history standards of human beauty have been set for the many by the few.

Often I catch myself saying, silently, "That woman really shouldn't wear shorts at her age," or, "If he insists on bending over, that guy should wear longer shirts." But what right have I, or anyone else, to set acceptable standards of appearance?

I can't see anything very beautiful about the Klingons on Star Trek, but they obviously like their looks. They don't treat each other very well, but that apparently is not a cosmetic problem. Did you ever see a baby baboon and the utterly adoring look in the eyes of its mother as she gazed at her offspring? The phrase, "a face only a mother could love" was invented for a baboon.

In our modern human world there are billions of people, and no two of us look alike. So who makes the rules that govern physical beauty in people? Who says that Miss America is more beautiful than billions of other women? And in our obsession with the beauty image we don't even stop with planet earth! It boggles the mind to realize that we are perhaps the only galaxy in the universe arrogant and visionary enough to sponsor a Miss Universe pageant and limit the entrants to earthlings.

Each era has its standards of female beauty. In past centuries the great artists created the ideal in painting and sculpture, but their ideal did not conform very closely to the natural female figure. Women have tortured themselves for generations trying to shape up to somebody else's version of what they should look like.

And now we have advertising, television, magazines and toys to tell us what is beautiful. According to these authorities, every American woman is expected to be tall, thin, blond and young. Well now, wait a minute. I don't know how many tall, blonde, young women there are in the world, but there can't be that many. What if she is short and blonde, or tall and brunette, or what if she has gray hair, or black or brown skin, or a ring through her nose?

Or, getting closer to home, what if she is short and has almond eyes, a flat little nose and skin the color of coffee with rich cream? I know one young lady like that and she is one of the most beautiful children I have ever known, beautiful, that is, by my standards. Although she was born in Korea she is purely American. But she says, wistfully, as she combs the long golden hair of her Barbie doll, "I can't ever be beautiful. I'm not American." What can we say to her? The best I have come up with is, "Look at Connie Chung. She's an American."

But how did Barbie get into this discussion? She is an American staple who has influenced thousands of little girls for years. Maybe she's the real villain after all. Lots of kids get their first view of the beauty image from her. Of course, the civil rights movement has forced some changes in Barbie. She now comes in a black format and an Asian format, but the basic image, the greatest profit-maker and certainly my little Korean-born friend's favorite, still has long golden hair.

Barbie reflects the pervasiveness of that image of beauty which modern advertising has given us. She is really only one of many influences setting the standard, but it helps to have something specific to blame. Or we could blame Miss Piggy, who certainly talks a good line of blonde beauty.

I believe that beauty truly is in the eye of the beholder. My idea of beauty and yours are probably not the same. But what do we tell our girl children since we can't isolate them from the power of the modern beauty image? We have to tell them that they are all beautiful and that they are all different and individual, and that's what makes it so wonderful. Unfortunately, however sincerely we mean it, they're not likely to believe it.