Ah, the modern mantra: ‘Love yourself as you are’. A phrase as noble as it is hypocritical in a world where Botox is more common than breakfast. Welcome to the circus of self-acceptance, where jugglers balance syringes of facial fillers while reciting their slogans in defence of self-love.
The Myth of Boutique Self-Esteem
‘Know thyself,’ said Socrates. But the industry has reworded this maxim to ‘Know thyself and discover everything that needs improving’. And so a perverse cycle emerges: the idea that self-esteem is not a state of mind, but a seven-step skin-care kit.
The concept of self-esteem has been hijacked and turned into a premium product. Have you ever noticed how beauty campaigns claim that their products will ‘empower us’? That's funny, because real empowerment would never depend on buying a lipstick worth 300 reais.
Although, to a certain extent I understand, because loving yourself as you are doesn't mean embracing skin decay with resignation. In fact, it means recognising that natural perfection is a fallacy and that there are effective ways to perfect the work of chance.
Both we and science know that the human body is a biological machine programmed for obsolescence. Nietzsche already said that ‘...man is something that must be overcome...’ - and as much as we know that he wasn't referring to the Beauty Industry - why not overcome ourselves with a strategic needle of botulinum toxin? What's wrong with that?
We are like sculptors of ourselves, constantly retouching our own art. Michelangelo looked at a block of marble and saw David. We look in the mirror and see a potential upgrade.
Let's just say that all this irony is as palpable as that detox juice we drink to ‘cleanse’ our bodies of the weekend's dietary sins.
Hypocrisy Detox
The same society that shouts ‘Love yourself as you are!’ is the same one that worships flawless skin and symmetrically sculpted bodies - not forgetting designer clothes, shoes and accessories, of course. The ‘beauty’ market is not growing by chance. There is a dubious reality where naturalness is exalted - and at the same time - retouched with filters and photo editing software.
And then there are the diets designed to ‘lose those unwanted kilos’.
Let's take the most sacred of diets as an example. The one that promises real miracles: the detox diet. Anyone who thinks that this diet is only for eliminating toxins (or the guilt of excessive consumption of substances and alcoholic beverages at the weekend) is mistaken. It is also used to cleanse our conscience of hypocrisy and lack of self-responsibility.
The Paradox of Aesthetically Enhanced Self-Love
Let's just say that ‘loving yourself’ is quite an elastic concept. For some, it means accepting yourself without filters, without make-up and without the help of external interventions. For others, it means accepting yourself to the point of investing in aesthetic enhancement. After all, if you can optimise software, why not optimise your own appearance? Modern self-love is the subtle combination of self-acceptance and surgical self-healing.
The Stoics believed that we should accept nature as it is, without resisting its flow. But what if nature itself gave us the technology to defy time? It would be an outrage not to use it. As Oscar Wilde once said, ‘Beauty is a genius in itself. It needs no explanation’. So a well-done lip filler is an act of genius.
The Beauty Industry's Greatest Trick Was Convincing You That You're Always Incomplete
Let's have a little reflection:
Imagine waking up in the morning and looking in the mirror and discovering that you are... perfect. Yes, perfect, nothing is missing, everything is in place. Your skin naturally glows as if it had been sprinkled with the dew of the gods, your hair has a volume and shine worthy of shampoo commercials, your eyes haven't gone to your knees and your self-esteem is more stable than a monk in a trance.
Now, with this image in mind, ask yourself: What would happen to the beauty industry if this were the natural state of things? Simple. It would collapse.
The Perpetual Insufficiency Machine
The industry's great move has never been just to sell products, but to manufacture needs. As our dear Jean Baudrillard once said, ‘Advertising doesn't sell a product, it sells a lifestyle.’ And what kind of lifestyle is that? One in which you need a new serum, a new acid, a new miracle procedure - which leaves your face in living flesh - so that, one day, you can achieve an ideal that never existed.
The truth is that perfection, as a marketable concept, needs to be unattainable for the market to keep going. And for this to happen, the seed of perpetual insufficiency must be planted in us. Something is always missing. If it's firm, perhaps it's symmetry that's missing. If it's symmetrical, then it's time to invest in ‘natural beauty’ - which, ironically, requires an arsenal of cosmetics to look like we're wearing nothing.
Beauty as the Most Modern Religion
Nietzsche said that ‘God is dead’, and perhaps the beauty industry has taken his place. It has its temples (dermatological clinics and spas), its priests (influencers and beauticians) and its holy scriptures (the promises in adverts and packaging).
It offers you a paradise - a face unmarred by time, an eternally youthful body - but like any well-structured religion, this paradise never actually arrives.
We're always in search, always in penance, always in need of ‘just one more product...’ and/or ‘just lose a few more kilos...’.
Self-image and the Mainstream
If Michel Foucault were among us, he might say that the beauty industry doesn't just sell products, but a model of internalised surveillance. We observe, judge and punish ourselves before others do it for us. ‘Is my skin too dull?’, “Does my nose look strange in the light?”, “My forehead is too big, I'd better hide it!”, “I'm too fat...”. We become our own jailers.
And don't think that this aesthetic oppression only applies to women. The male market is growing by leaps and bounds. After all, men also need to be convinced that they are imperfect.
If deodorant was once enough, now there are moisturisers for ‘male skin’ (as if it were made of titanium), rejuvenating gels and even hair dyes that promise to reverse time - and I'm not even talking about surgeries to enlarge certain parts of the body. The game is the same, only the packaging changes.
What the industry will never tell you
The greatest heresy we can commit against this empire is to realise that we are already complete. That our skin, our features, our little ‘imperfections’ are really just the marks of a life lived.
That ageing is not a disease to be fought, but a natural process. That real beauty is not a consumer goal, but a state of being.
‘Nothing is enough for those who consider little enough.’ - Seneca.
And perhaps the greatest act of rebellion we can commit today is to look in the mirror and simply say: ‘I'm fine the way I am.’
Imperfection as Existential Philosophy
The beauty industry has built its fortune on the idea that we are always lacking. Unattainable perfection is its greatest asset and dissatisfaction is its fuel. However, freedom begins when we realise that we don't need to fix anything, because we were never broken. Beauty lies in acceptance - and that, ironically, can't be bought.
Now, if this article has made you rethink your relationship with aesthetics, great! If not, great too! Not least because you're the one who's going to feel the power of the acid on your face (and in your pocket), aren't you?
Leave a comment, suggest topics and share! And if you want an extra dose of information, keep exploring the articles on the blog or go straight to our UN4RT backstage, where we explore between the lines of culture, art and society. Because at the end of the day, knowledge is the only skin-care that really lasts and transforms.
‘The illusion crumbles when we question reality’ - UN4RT
For intellectual masochists, the sources, references and inspirations are there. Go read, study and question!
Socrates, Apology of Socrates (written by Plato).
Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra and The Gaian Science.
Botulinumtoxin, a substance produced by the bacterium Clostridium botulinum, used to reduce wrinkles and other medical conditions.
Michelangelo, Italian Renaissance artist who created sculptures such as David and Pietà, as well as the frescoes in the Sistine Chapel.
Stoics, Ancient Greek philosophers who advocated virtue, reason and self-control as the path to happiness, accepting fate with serenity.
Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray.
Rodrigo Polesso, This is no longer a diet book.
Jean Baudrillard, The Consumer Society.
Michel Foucault, Surveillance and Punishment.
Seneca, Letters to Lucilius.
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