thepuppyclub:

“The right to be ugly” is a personal statement that needs to be embedded in a broader context, that is, however I present, whatever I do, if you ascribe meaning to it, then I must not let it affect my soul. It can’t be separated from the contant risk that I might be punished for what I do, or rather, what I refuse to do: the economic status of “beauty” is a behavior, not an apparence, and cannot be severed from its economic nature. The contrary of beauty is a lack of behavior, if “ugliness” is a refusal, that means that a neutral body under the patriarchy is not allowed to exist. As such, it is crucial to teach young girls that they are allowed to behave the way they want, and that they must reject the unjust standards dictated to them. But we cannot stop there. We must dismantle the industry of beauty, even as it seeps into activism. And when beauty disappears, so does ugliness, because it is necessary to destroy the binary process of thought: you are either beautiful or ugly, valuable or low-status, a body or a spirit, one or the other. That is when you become whole.