To be beautiful?

[Mindgoneblanko]

Aibu to want to be beautiful and to wonder what it must be like to be beautiful and know you’re beautiful? How does it feel, if you are?
Have you been aware of having more opportunities in life, people being nicer to you etc, based on your looks, or has it been detrimental in any way?
For the record, I’m not hideous, ok I’d say or was when younger, but definitely not highly attractive/very pretty/beautiful

At University, my stunningly beautiful friend (young Brooke Shields king look) took full advantage of the men who would fall over themselves to get her drinks, food and gifts. And being genuinely lovely, I don't think she had that many people who disliked her purely through jealousy, as no one who knew her would hear a bad word said.

If had a few men in my time stop me.If I go out and get made up.I tend to get some attention.I would say like most women do.I do like to make a effort.Iv noticed my friend has made a few bitchy snippet comments about me.She seems to dislike if I get attention.I don’t know why.

If you've ever (a lot of stuff)...

I have experienced similar things, especially horrible male attention. I am not beautiful.

As for being served first, er, everyone gets annoyed when someone else is served ahead of them. It may have had nothing to do with your looks. Or if it did, you're the one who gets to queue jump, but she's the cow for being annoyed about it? Why the determination to look straight to "jealous bitch"?

I'm not accusing anyone of lying about their experiences of beauty. What I'm doubting in some cases is whether the level of apparent bitchiness from other women really is purely down to jealousy and spite and nothing more nuanced. One poster accused another of this standard bitchiness when the comment wasn't bitchy, just offered an alternative possibility for why she had got a certain job. I got accused of psychological manipulation to make someone doubt her sanity because I suggested that if men are enchanted by your beauty, more normal treatment from women who aren't may seem worse in comparison. Is that such an offensive theory? And right here, you got served first and the only reason another woman might be annoyed is because she's a jealous bitch?

There is almost a determination in SOME posters to believe the worst of other women. Is it really surprising if women don't warm to someone who thinks of them like this?

I don't know how much of a chicken and egg situation this is. I'm sure it's a bit complicated and not all down to one simple thing. But based on what people are saying, the surprising amount of overlap with my own experiences as an ordinary looking person and the accusations of bitchiness and gaslighting that I really don't think are grounded....has there really never been any "push and pull", so to speak?

I mean, another thing...this "jealous friend who hates me getting attention" thing. You clearly aren't friends with someone if you don't like nice things happening to them. So how much of this is "jealous bitchy unbeautiful women" and how much of it is "why the fuck do women stay in toxic non-friendships when they clearly don't like each other, because they certainly do, there are threads about it every single day and not just relating to looks"?

Decent ordinary women do not turn into spiteful nasty, jealous ones in the presence of beauty.
If you've been treated badly by a woman its because she's not a nice person, not because you're beautiful.
Equally, decent men do not turn into nuisances, cat callers, harassers and flirts because they are stunned by a woman's beauty.
Nor is beauty the reason a man thinks he is entitled to purchase a woman's attention with gifts, meals or drinks.
If you've recieved unwanted male attention, or unpleasant female behaviour, you've just come across one of the multitude of men or women who behave in these ways.
My point is not that you are not beautiful, you may well be. But your beauty is not the cause of these things. If you are beautiful, enjoy the gift you have been given. Less attractive people experience the same sort of problems as you do, but without the extra advantages.

@5128gap

Decent ordinary women do not turn into spiteful nasty, jealous ones in the presence of beauty. If you've been treated badly by a woman its because she's not a nice person, not because you're beautiful. Equally, decent men do not turn into nuisances, cat callers, harassers and flirts because they are stunned by a woman's beauty. Nor is beauty the reason a man thinks he is entitled to purchase a woman's attention with gifts, meals or drinks. If you've recieved unwanted male attention, or unpleasant female behaviour, you've just come across one of the multitude of men or women who behave in these ways. My point is not that you are not beautiful, you may well be. But your beauty is not the cause of these things. If you are beautiful, enjoy the gift you have been given. Less attractive people experience the same sort of problems as you do, but without the extra advantages.

Hear, hear!

@5128gap you're right that decent people don't turn into spiteful nasty jealous ones in the presence of someone beautiful but the spiteful nasty ones definitely surface!
I was considered very pretty at college and a girl was determined to beat me up and 'stamp on my face' it was horrific. I stopped going out completely. She was a nasty bully and she had beaten people up before, I was terrified. I experienced a similar thing playing a sport where this nasty woman hated me. She had never spoken to me but she made my life hell through jealousy. If you are quiet people think you are aloof, they call you stuck up, up yourself or they slag off your personality 'she might be pretty but she's dull as shit etc'
Anyway I don't get that anymore, I'm quite average looking and older now but those experiences had a real impact on me and made me feel like crap.

I feel like all the average people saying we experience the same are being completely ignored by some pp.
Its like they are stamping their feet and saying 'its because im beautiful I wont hear anything else' so determined that its beauty related and refuse to believe it could be quite normal.
Although I say again I think the truly unusual beauties no doubt do have very different experiences to the rest of us.

@5128gap what's the point in reading personal experiences if you're just going to say no, no, no looks don't come into it 🤷

In my last post I listed examples of being treated badly directly as a result of my looks. This wasn't imagined and no I have never thought all bad experiences are down to my looks! but then again I've never been in a position where I don't like a person because they are good looking I just don't feel threatened but I do believe some women are so they take a dislike.

I think men do treat you differently and in my opinion do treat you worse. They don't like it when a woman, especially a beautiful woman is seen to reject them, their ego is doubly bruised so they tend to come back with nastier insults.

I get regularly approached and asked out on the tube, trains, in the street, cafes and if you get this regularly because of your looks then the law of averages will mean you come in to contact with more men and more arseholes.

Your post is wholly wrong. You're saying beautiful women are not treated any differently and it's in our heads if we are treated badly and we need to put up and shut up and be grateful for the 'advantages'.... In your mind what are the 'advantages' of being beautiful?

With the caveat that I am probably not as beautiful as I've been told/think.

And yes my looks have directly impacted my mental health, causing an eating disorder, anxiety, OCD, and depression.

Ah I see this is a thread not interested in peoples experiences but to put down women.

I don't think I'm much to look at all , in fact I did not date until I was 29 due to feeling ugly.
I was envious of a girl at work , she was slim but had curves , long dark hair , perfect features and I hated to work with her I felt inadequate .
I saw pictures of her on fb not long ago , still beautiful new hair cut and as my brother said sexy specs look.
But about a week later she popped up again on my time line , no make up on at all and to be honest she looked plain and average with incredibly bad skin. It was all an image .

@Ffsseriously I'm not sure if you are including my post or not but I don't see how anyone could deny that being attractive makes you a target for nastiness. Jealousy brings out the worst in people so obviously if someone is pretty they are going to be targeted for that, especially as a teenager.

I think the point people are making is, I have rejected men and they have been foul and abusive. I have had strangers approach me (not all the time but often enough) to say they like me , I have had people hate me for spurious reasons its normal.
I think undoubtedly pp will have encountered jealous people but what we are saying is nasty people will be nasty and they look for something to hang it on, so prettiness, fatness, ugliness, braininess, glasses, being too loud, being too quiet.
All stupid reasons for stupid people to be nasty so we are saying everyone gets it, they have just used the excuse of prettiness.
But it is also annoying that if we or from the sounds of it anyone makes any negative comment or observation its blamed on jealousy whether its true or not.
Its just assumed that it must be because they are so beautiful what else could it be?

@NoatheQueen I noticed that little caveat too. Why would truly unusual beauty make a difference? If 'true' beauty makes a difference to life experiences then some degree of beauty will also have an impact, even if to a lesser extent.

@NoatheQueen you know I could say the same I am telling you all my experiences and it is being ignored and now its because im jealous really??? I think point made

@Drunkenmonkey no caveat but clearly looking like Angelina Jolie brings different experiences to being above average but still in the realms of day to day good looking. And I never said that being an unusual beauty brought more nastiness just a different experience.

@Ffsseriously I'm sure if the thread title has been 'tell me what it's like to be fat' we would have so many posters come on to voice their awful experiences of bullying and degradation and abuse in the street etc.
Would we just devalue those too and say that 'everyone gets that'.

Everyone's experiences are different but this post was asking how it feels to be beautiful and lots of posters have voiced negative experience that have come from their looks which are perfectly valid and it comes across like you are calling those posters deluded 'its not because you're beautiful we all get that'.
The experiences I detailed were very much looks specific and I was targeted by some pretty nasty people. I think life at school would have been a lot easier had I blended in. Had I had big glasses or been really overweight etc I probably would have had other experiences that were equally (or more awful) but still different.

You never know if men would have fallen for you too if you weren’t beautiful

Other women will try to compete against you, no matter how nice you are to them

If your sister is an ‘ugly duck’ she might resent you for your looks and you won’t ever have a good relationship

You can only be good friends with women that don’t feel insecure around you, so other beautiful women and/or very confident ones

There’s always pressure to make the most of your looks and aging sucks

It’s better to be average I think

I think it’s probably true that men being arseholes is not related to beauty, it’s just general misogyny.

What fucks with your head whether you really are beautiful or were just told you were (the difference is irrelevant to the personal experience imo) is that men use that as a lever to come on to you, telling you that they just can't help it because you’re so gorgeous. So you’re supposed to be grateful for your looks but they are used to harrass you.

@Drunkenmonkey ok I think you have made sone fair points and im sorry I have devalued your experiences that is rude of me.
But last point I blended in and still had sone awful experiences I think thats all I was trying to say.
Actually whats sad is how so many people have had awful experiences for our varying reasons.

@Ffsseriously fair enough I really appreciate you saying that. I do agree that there are probably a lot of experiences that happen regardless of someone's appearance and it is a shame there are so many arseholes out there!

I agree with @Drunkenmonkey
@Ffsseriously sorry I'm a bit lost in how you're running rings with semantics here.
The OP asked about those who are considered physically beautiful and I, on several different posts gave my opinion of my experiences. If you don't believe me or agree thats fine, just putting my experiences across.
My examples i give are those where my looks have been mentioned and explicitly given as the reason.
Now I certainly don't think if someone smiles at me or is rude to me I ever think ah that's cos I'm beautiful. Meh couldn't care less.

What I think is sadly true is that some people are intent on being mean, unkind and vile to others and they will pick on an attribute and try to bring you down.
And let's face it we've all had vile experiences of men being misogynistic who will use anything against us ...looks, clothes, height, weight etc to make us feel like shit.

I'd still like to know if we're all treated the same why

I've no doubt at all that some experiences, good and bad, are looks specific. No doubt at all.

But as a result of this thread, I do now doubt whether the extent of the difference between the beautiful and the ordinary is quite as pronounced as some people really want to believe. If it was, we ordinary lookers wouldn't get these experiences too, and we do. It's not devaluing someone's experience or "gaslighting" them (ffs) to say "That much cannot be entirely beauty based because I'm a plain Jane and it happens to me." I doubt, at a class level (so not targeting any individual) whether the difference between plain Janes and Sally Supermodels is QUITE as huge as some people think. I mean, I could have written some of those posts. Some beauties on here seem to think that retail staff are rude to less attractive folk, or plain Janes never get selected by an approaching man out of a group of friends.

The one about bar service was a good one. Everyone hates being jumped over at the bar. It's annoying. Why would you take it as "bitchy women" rather than "annoyed at being overlooked" unless on some level you have a bit of confirmation bias going on? And anyway, isn't the barman the arsehole here?

And if you (generic you) have already decided that plain Janes couldn't have any comparable experience, even though you can't explain why they get this shit too (I mean, #MeToo was pretty inclusive) and that any possible alternative explanation has malicious, bitchy intent...is it entirely beyond the realms of possibility that this might be affecting what you perceive as looks-based hostility? And, without in any way excusing bullying or assault, that it might be affecting your interactions with other women in a way that leads them not to warm to you?

My best mate described me as "stunningly gorgeous, but in a really threatening way, like one of them colourful venomous frogs" 😂😂

For the record, I've never considered myself to be anywhere close to stunningly gorgeous - I scrub up quite nicely with make-up etc, like most people do, but I'd much rather be thought of for being a decent person and a good friend.

Beauty fades, and as I've got older, I'm really grateful for being the ugly kid at school, as it meant I spent much more worthwhile time in developing a sense of humour instead.