Look Deeper: The Impact of Pretty Privilege on Artists.
As a writer/poet I often feel the desire to remove my identity from my work. This desire seemed random and unwarranted to me until I examined the role of women within various industries. I soon realised that the success of many female musicians for example Jorja smith or even TV presenters such as Maya Jama was often paired with their conventional beauty. This is not to say that these women are untalented and cheated their way up; i actually adore Jorja as a musician. What I am saying , though, is that the work of these undoubtedly stunning women became almost erased and their beauty became their main reason for fame. I am by no means as beautiful as these women however the very knowledge that as a woman my physical appearance could influence the reception of my work haunted me for a very long time. But I chalked my fear up to delusion and a bleak perception of the world, that was until I started posting my poetry on Instagram.
I found myself receiving positive and encouraging comments and messages which left me on top of the world. I questioned why I had ever been hesitant or anxious; no one would use my poetry as a way to ask me on a date or make crude remarks. Well actually they would. My DMs were filled with messages about how great my writing was shortly followed by some form of preposition of a date or my number etc. This was of course harmless, I'm not here to complain about Instagram etiquette, but i couldn’t help but feel deflated and each new like or comment that my poetry received left me conflicted. “Do they like my writing or my face?” I often wondered.
Pretty Privilege is defined (by urban dictionary) as “when being pretty/ beautiful gets you better things or opportunities.” In my opinion it is impossible to escape pretty privilege. As humans we are obsessed with aesthetics and we will never stop. We take pictures of sunsets any chance we get. We take pictures of perfectly symmetrical fruit when we can. We like things that please our eyes and rightfully so. But my issue lies not in the actual existence of pretty privilege because on the scale of the world’s issues it doesn’t even make the top 100. Instead, my problem lies in how pretty privilege devalues women’s work. What I mean by this is that women who are conventionally beautiful can often contemplate remaining anonymous because they fear their work will be overlooked. This issue is not historically foreign, in fact we see this in women in literature centuries ago for example choosing to use pseudonyms in order for their work to be taken seriously. Mary Shelley is still discredited for Frankenstein with claims her husband must have helped her write it.
It is valid to argue that this industry operates on male gaze and female gaze; most successful singers/ actors are attractive both male and female. I mean boy bands are constantly objectified and male actors just the same. I agree, however men’s attractiveness doesn’t ever compete with their accolades. Brad Pitt is considered a great actor before he is considered attractive, women are simply placed in the ‘pretty’ box and their whole careers are ignored. The music industry seems especially experienced in this.
Jorja Smith is a case I feel strongly about because I enjoy her artistry and yet a majority of the time she is being discussed on social media platforms her music is rarely mentioned. Jorja has spoken about this in the past stating “some people don’t even know i make music.” It is truly disheartening. Billie Eilish is another artist I wish wasn’t part of this conversation. Eilish has publicly talked about her baggy figure-covering style being a way of preventing being oversexualised and having her music sidetracked. Pretty Privilege suddenly stops being a privilege and just becomes constant fear of objectification. R&B singer H.E.R decided to hide her face in the early days of her career and established her role in the industry before revealing her face fully. This proved successful and she garnered a genuine following based on talent alone.
So that’s the solution right? Women should just hide their faces and bodies and it will all be okay. Not quite. Being any form of a creative is incredibly difficult because whatever niche you target there’s always an abundance of creatives with the same talents or even more than you. I have personally encountered poets, writers and bloggers who I felt were better than me, this feeling is inevitable for anyone. The only thing that makes me feel better is writing something and truly being proud of it. Really truly proud. It is sad to think i would ever have to remove my face from my work. Of course it does not reduce the value of the work but I WANT the ability to claim my work and be known for my work. I imagine this is the same for all of these artists, unfortunately their genetic lottery is viewed as more important. There are of course other fields in which aesthetics are important, modelling being the main one, however, your prettiness should not dictate your success in music and fields based on talent. In rare cases (Beyonce) your beauty and talent can both be acknowledged but this is very rare.
200 years ago women’s work was overlooked because women “did not have the brains to create anything worth considering”. Today women’s work is overlooked because their faces are more interesting. I hope in 200 years the idea of women’s work being sidelined will be considered archaic.
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