Most women aren't pretty: Julie Burchill

[revolutionscoop]

With apologies in advance for linking to the DailyHeil;
www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2024655/Face-ladies-NEVER-pretty.html
AIBU in thinking Burchill's got a point?

i try not to tell my (beautiful) 2.6y old dd that she is beautiful because i don't want the tyranny of personal appearance to start impacting her any sooner than it has to. i'm hoping that she'll develop a proper sense of her value as a person independent of her appearance before she is engulfed with the message that that's all that matters...

(jb was never a looker imo, but that's not what's offensive about her...)

LineRunner: - JB has been around for years - journalism is a tough industry where only the strong survive, so she must be doing something right.

I've always liked her - she's just a bit different.

Shallow, trivial article. Typical of Burchill, though. She is deluded if she thought she used to be a "looker", for sure!

Depends a lot on your definition of beautiful - she never will be because she has a wizened worm-eaten apple where her heart should be and it "shines" through - ugly inside --> ugly outside. Even the plainest women can look beautiful if they are lovely inside - ugly insides make the most beautiful facades look tarnished.

IMO.

Oh sweet Jesus, did Hazel Blears really just say live on TV - 'we need to be asking why these children are not at schoo' - Lolololololololol

I think she has a point, I am not nor will I ever be pretty or even vaguely attractive. I became much happier when I stopped trying to be something I am not. I was teased by my parents, other kids and later on my husband for being ugly. A huge turning point for me after my divorce was accepting that fact but focusing on what I had going for me. I am clever, warm, kind and funny with a great sense of style.

Interestingly I have a daughter who is pretty and it fascinates me because it is something I never had. I tell her that she looks pretty because she is just as I tell her that she is clever and can be kind. I don't know why people have this fear about using the word pretty or beauty correctly.

When I look at my 3 year old dd I honestly think she is the most beautiful "thing" I have ever seen. Then everyone comments about how alike we are and how she is the image of me. I am not beautiful looking. I do not have beautiful features. My sister is definitely a looker. I am attractive but I think that is more my personality than my features. How can this be?????

It is odd, my dd looks like me and yet I have clearly been repeatedly whacked with the ugly stick and she is very pretty. I went through a phase of thinking that she was doomed to look like me when I was older but having looked back at childhood pictures I can confirm that even as a child I was a minger.

It is funny how some people can make features work

Julie Burchill is a clever controversialist. Does she sunbathe on the beech at Brighton

Shurely shome mishtake?

On the beach.

I think the majority of people in general, are plain tbh. Not ugly, not beautiful, just plain.

Carmina, yes she by her own admission blagged her way into NME with Tony Parsons in the late 1970s, I think. She kind of suggests herself herself that she did it on image and bullshit not talent.

There are lots of shit journalists who have undeserved longevity though, for all sorts of reasons.

What's with Hazel Blears??!!

She is absolutely right; the reason people are deemed to be physically beautiful (and, be honest, the word 'beautiful' is only really properly applied to physical appearance) is because they stand out in some way. If everybody looked like a supermodel, the word 'beautiful' would not even have come into existence.
The Dove adverts are crap as not everybody is beautiful. It is a rare thing. Prettiness is obviously more common, but beauty is rarer.

It is a very positive article- focus on other things than physical appearances because beauty fades.
All she is saying that most women are not beautiful, but, so what, men will love them anyway.
Don't know why she is getting criticised; it's actually a sensible and postive article.

I wonder if how we perceive the majority of others reflects how we see the world in general...

She will get criticised because she has created a persona that invites criticism. It has kept her in work and if she ever does say something sensible then she carries all this baggage round her neck.

Maybe, LineRunner, but I am just taking the article at face value and I don't really know anything about her. At face value, this is a sensible article.

Or should we all go about worrying about how beautiful we are all the time?

thumwitch you are wrong there are people who outwardly look good but inside are ugly and it doesnt show through .

As newspaper sales dwindle they seem to relying more and more on employing those like Burchill*, who will say 'outrageous' things so forums will link to it and they will get loads of hits which pleases the advertisers. It would probably be better if people want to discuss an article to post the whole thing without a link.

*Liz Mad-Dog Jones, and newcomer Tanya Talentless Gold.

Oh I got a text from a teacher friend saying HB had said live on TV 'we need to be asking why these children are not at school' - as it's the 6 weeks holiday it's bleeding obvious... lol

& re; JB - surviving on image and bullshit is a great talent surely?
Perhaps an even bigger talent than genuine intelligence -
But the bottom line is - if people don't want to read what you're writing you'll soon disappear - she is still very much alive & kicking and good for her.

(( although I thought her Sugar Rush books were awful ))

Sorry that's for LineRunner

(( although I thought her Sugar Rush books were awful ))

Oh I forgot she wrote those. They were awful!

Carmina, they're not at school because it's the school holidays AND it's midnight??!! Bless her, little Hazel Blears.

JB is certainly long-lasting.

I find that if a woman (or man) has a bitchy or nasty attitude then they seem ugly however good-looking they are.
Also you can be plain as a child then become a pretty adult - & vice versa.

I am totally stunning of course.
Ok, a bit fat.

Burchill isn't even bright enough to understand what point Audrey Hepburn was actually making when she said that happy girls were the prettiest - it's not that they are happy because they are pretty but pretty because they are happy! Did she really not get that?

And as for her bold claim that she was certainly beautiful when she was 25 - only if they've changed the definition of 'beautiful' since I last looked it up, love!

Kallista, I think you mean curvy...

I think that a beautiful man or woman is beautiful no matter what their personalities are like. An out and out bitch/bastard who has good looks is nevertheless beautiful/handsome.
They may have horrible personalities, that does not negate their beauty, though.
I don't want to confuse beauty with a person's personality; I think the two should be judged separately.