By Comparison

A few days ago, I read an interview with Khloe Kardashian. I usually make it my business to avoid that family, as they say, like the plague, but the topic of the article was interesting. The interview was about the Kardashian sisters and how Khloe is supposedly the "ugly" sister (as we all know there has to be at least one). She said that it's difficult to maintain a healthy level of self-esteem when she is subject to a constant stream of negative comments. In fact, I recall hearing (I think it was on The Soup) someone call Khloe Kardashian the Hulk, meaning that she is a big monster.

Of course, Khloe Kardashian isn't the first female celebrity to be criticized for her looks (or perceived lack thereof). It's still cool to take jabs at Hillary Swank, Nancy Kerrigan, and Sarah Jessica Parker for looking like horses (Maxim magazine actually had to issue an apology to Sarah Jessica Parker for calling her Barbaro, the famous race horse who was put down after suffering a leg injury). And there have been many actresses and women of note who have been subject to insult because they're not "attractive" or don't fit the "ideal" of beauty.

We know that things aren't going to change anytime soon, no mater how much we challenge the prevailing wisdom or how much Lady Gaga attempts to redefine beauty with self-acceptance anthems like "Born This Way" and her ideal of the ugly-beautiful, we're still going to judge people by the way that they look. It sucks, but it's true.

This, ugly truth (if you will) of course, got me thinking... for every Khloe Kardashian, who is penalized because of her looks, there seems to be more than a few famous types who a given a free pass despite their looks. Ok, right off, I realize that the free pass primarily refers to men. Somehow, a dude can be the type of guy that, when you see him, makes you think of freight trains and dirt roads, but as long as he doesn't favor Joseph Merrick, he's got a chance of making someone's hot guy list.

My example of this phenomenon is the actor Adrian Brody.

By the way, Joseph Merrick is better known as "the Elephant Man".

I remember watching some old footage of Rolling Stones fans back in the 60s, who said that the members of the band were so ugly that they were cute, kind of like how one thinks of a shar-pei, a dog so hideous you can't help but think it's adorable. Those fans got me thinking... maybe that's what's it. Maybe the thing is, is that there are some people who are, objectively speaking, not so good looking, that are made good looking by what they do. It's not the clothes that make the man, it's his occupation. Our looks are enhanced by what we do.

Last month, while watching the Academy Awards, I cheered as nine inch nails frontman, Trent Reznor, picked the Oscar for best original score for The Social Network. Now, as a decades-long nin fan, I am more than well aware that Trent has been (and probably still is) the object of many-a-fan's prurient fantacies. But as I watched, I thought, this guy is a dude whose looks got a boost by what he does for a living. Really. Not to cast stones at anyone's glass houses, but objectively speaking, Trent Reznor is no George Clooney. I'm sure if he worked in any other industry other than the music industry, say, for Fed-Ex or for the city planner's office, I seriously doubt that he'd have made anybody's sexy guy list. To be honest, if I saw a sparklett's man who looked that pissed off, I'd be afraid to open my door to let him pick up my empties. But it's not just him, it's alot of guys in the music business. Likewise, Barry White made his name as a sultan of love, but if he did anything other than sing and make sexy music, I'd bet big bucks that he would have had a hard time getting dates.

Hot dates, anyway.

Alas, the looks enhancing properties of one's occupation seem only to apply to men. As of yet, I have not seen a woman whose "looks" were enhanced by what she does. Which brings me back to Khloe Kardashian. She's right. It is really messed up that she's compared to her "better" looking sisters. I think that the more "unconventional" beauties like Khloe Kardashian, Lady Gaga, and Angelina Jolie (remember her looks were considered "unconventional"?) say they're beautiful, too, the more we'll get past the narrowly defined parameters of the (supposedly) ideal aesthetic. I'd like to think that eventually we, as a culture and as a species, will learn to move beyond mere aesthetics and mean what we say when we say that true beauty is on the inside.