Body Insecurity and the Quest for Social Prestigue

I want to argue that body insecurity is related to social inequality, and the things people (men and women) are insecure about are related to their social class, gender, race, and age in ways that are unique to their sets of oppression. In all of these groups, the things they focus on and want to change are related to the privileges they seek to attain based on their current oppression. To make this point I will go through a variety of different races, genders, classes, ages, etc and analyze how their body insecurity is related to their oppression and their seek to change their body is related to trying to gain privilege. 

Black women. Insecurities: Hair texture, too thin, too fat, butt shape and size, skin color, eye color. (I am sure there are more but just to name a few) most of the insecurities of black women are related to their race and gender status. Some are related to being female, and trying to gain social acceptance by gaining acceptance by males. Another facet is trying to gain social acceptance by embracing whiteness, like straightening hair or wearing a wig.

Asian women. Insecurities: low nose bridge, too big of calves, eye lid crease, hair color. Again a lot of these insecurities are because of their oppression associated with being asian, so they might try to change to white ideals of beauty and may go as far as plastic surgery to change the bridge of their nose or get an artificial eye lid crease. 

Poor Women. Insecurities: clothing, weight, missing teeth, hygienic appearance. Many of the insecurities of poor women are related to them being poor. Many are self conscious of their clothing, or that they have missing teeth because they don’t have money for a dentist. As well as hygienic appearance. These are related to their class, and ways to improve it are ways to gain privilege by appearing to be a higher class than they are (i.e. wearing nicer clothing etc) 

Low class to working class men: without a way to gain power by money, or status, there develops an excessive amount of effort and body insecurity regarding physical size as a means to show power. Many body insecurities regard lack of muscle and lack of a tough look. I would argue that this seeking status through bodily power is why MMA fighting like UFC is predominantly men from lower class backgrounds. It is a way to seek status, power and recognition in alternate ways besides money and class. 

Old women: Insecurities: winkles, aging, etc. All of these are related to trying to gain privilege by trying to look physically young. In our culture those who are young are privileged (especially women since their bodies and physical appearance are much more related to status than men) 

Finally. Almost all literature on body insecurity covers one very stereotypical narrow type of person. A white, heterosexual, middle-class, teenage woman. It is harder to see how her insecurities are related to oppression. This women is for the most part the epitome of privilege, with the exception of female gender. There are many theories of thinness as a way to objectify and control women. I won’t go into it but the desire for thinness can be seen as a way to try to gain privilege by being accepted by more privileged males (since they control a majority of expenses, attractiveness and appeal to males to marry you would be a good way to gain capital)

I also want to note that our need for attractiveness is very related to our need to be socially accepted or our need to rise in social class. For instance, the start of adolescence marks a huge rise in body insecurity, and I don’t think this is coincidental. I would argue that in a time of such need for social acceptance, body consciousness goes through the roof. On the contrary, when one feels rather content, socially accepted, and has adequate access to money, their body consciousness seems to fall. (somewhat anecdotal evidence here) I would argue that dress and appearance is also very important when one is seeking a job promotion for the sake of gaining social status. 

So here I present body consciousness as a form of internalized oppression, and moreover the attempts to correct body shape, size and appearance is an active attempt to gain social standing and status in a group. 

While much of this is speculative, and theoretical, I did get my basic ideas from this source: (The Intersectional Approach: Transforming the academy through race, class & gender) (Authors, Michele Tracy Berger & Kathleen Guidroz) (p. 173-189) (terrible and lazy citation I know)