I wish we could rewire our brains to see more nuance. When I talk to the students or adults around me, everyone seems to have an immediate answer. If you have a bad grade, study harder. If you like a girl, ask her out with confidence. Confidence gets brought up a lot. Oh, and if you look different from other people, get over it.
Everyone in the world has an unconscious bias. It does not matter if you believe you are perfectly fair and equal to all the humans on this planet; we’re biased to choose friends, lovers and enemies depending on beauty. When you pass by someone in the street with a physical condition, the systems within your body send a message to leave them alone. Perhaps you take an instinctive step away, or you watch the afflicted person out of the corner of your eye. This repulsion does not make you a bad person. I have these reactions too. They are simply human.
Ugliness will not be normalized but rather will continue to be a tool for othering those who do not meet society’s beauty standards. The world is doomed to condemn ugliness, unable to shift their views through argument because of what centuries of evolution has ingrained.
When I was about 12 years old, I went to a summer camp for kids with dermatological conditions. I suffer from an autoimmune condition called alopecia. Alopecia causes hair loss on the scalp, and in some cases, all across the body. On my way to this camp, I kept thinking how wonderful it would be to not feel like an alien in human skin, finally surrounded by kids who had conditions like mine. However, this would not be the case —I too began to stigmatize others’ appearances.
When I arrived, camp volunteers ushered me into a cabin where a counselor helped me set up my bed sheets. I remember being off put by the way each staff member included Christianity in their introductions. Their sentences could not be left without an addition commenting on our “purpose in God’s world.” At the time, and now, I do not believe that a benevolent God gave me this condition. It is a punishment.
I hope this does not give the impression that the camp was terrible. I swam and ate good food, I painted a house on a hill that I have kept until this day and I learned how to properly salute from a counselor who was in the military. No matter how much I enjoyed myself, however, I could not stop thinking about how strange the people around me were. I started to compare my form of disease to theirs. I thought I was lucky — lucky to not have a condition where my skin was peeled and inflamed. Indeed, I am. People with alopecia are less likely to experience negative social reactions to their condition as compared to those with psoriasis.
At camp, it did not matter that I had spent my life looking for acceptance because there, I did not have to hide my condition. However, that freedom was more of a burden. I could no longer turn to a prospective friend without wanting to shun them for their irregular body. As days passed, I wanted to cover my alopecia more than ever. I could not stand the idea of my fellow campers’ acceptance, where we would make a community out of shared sickness. I needed to separate myself from their diseases and their seeming acceptance of them.
I was not entirely to blame for my resistance to the other afflicted kids. People have built-in responses of disgust and fear to what they deem to be ugly. You — and I — believe subconsciously that the ugly can harm us. The ability to distinguish beauty from ugliness, and danger from safety, is what has kept humankind alive.
On the last day of my stay, we took a bus to a theme park. Around 50 kids piled in, and off we went. To my surprise, they let us roam the park without interruption or supervision. It was one of the first times in my life I felt true freedom, with no parents or siblings guiding me to specific rides or guiding me away from junk food. For a moment, I believed I was just like anyone else.
Yet, there was a feeling I could not shake off: self-consciousness at the assumption that every laugh or side-eye was directed toward me. I was looking around in pure fascination and excitement, and people would turn away at the sight of me. Their reactions reminded me that I could not, and cannot, have it all: normalcy.
That night, as we returned, the staff announced a talent show in the recreational center. I got up on stage and performed with a particular smugness, counting on the same luck that made my condition ever-so-slight compared to others. I hoped to receive thunderous applause, and I did. Right after me, a girl, maybe 9 or 10 years old, went up on stage. She had psoriasis all over her face, making her look as red as a beet. At that moment, my bias took hold of me. She could not be better than me because I was lucky to be better looking.
Yet, when she sang, her voice was the most beautiful thing I had ever heard. For what seemed like infinity, she belted a song and then gently stepped out of the spotlight. I was stunned, and then I was sad. If only she were attractive to society, she might be famous. Her abnormality clouded my judgment, furthering the belief that people will never be able to view what they deem as ugly as any sense of normal. Society is pathological, and any attempt to change the human race is met with resistance.
It is easy to advise people on their lives and easy to tell them that confidence is the solution to their problems. There is never a solution, and any conversations about how society views the ugly are ultimately fruitless, thanks to the hardwiring of the brain. Attractive people have benefits in the workplace and in the rest of the world. People cannot resist the urge to stare at the afflicted as they walk by or treat them as anything but contagion. It would take generations upon generations to try and fix this innate reaction — yet I know there will be no change. There is no reason for this bias to shift and no reckoning to convince people they do not need to be beautiful, as society reinforces the gorgeous every day. It will remain this way until civilization dies off. Still, I will beg you: Please do not look at me in the street.
Contact Noble Garcia at ncgarc4@emory.edu.
