I have this pretty big space between my two front teeth. It and my weight were easy targets growing up. It was just a part of childhood, so I didn’t take it personally. I don’t think I ever considered myself ugly, but I have, over the years, done a lot to become more physically appealing. I’ve lost weight, I’ve gained muscle, and I try to keep a fresh haircut.

Once I had enough money to afford braces, I had to decide if I wanted to change my teeth. It wasn’t because I disliked my smile; I actually loved it. It was me.

However, I also knew my gapped-tooth grin did not align with Western beauty standards. I was aware that a “better” smile would give me more opportunities. It would attract more women. It could even be the difference maker in a job interview.

It was around this time I learned the gap is viewed as beautiful in some African countries. Some people will even go through a medical process to add the gap, similar to how so many westerners are expected to remove the gap.

After learning this, it felt pretty silly for me, a Black man, to “fix” my gap. What would I do next? Fix my wide nose and my big lips? No, I embraced my smile, and I love it, even though, by Western beauty standards, it would be considered an ugly smile.

When I talk about “ugly” in this piece, I am talking about Western beauty standards. I do believe beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but we also love to pretend ugly doesn’t exist.

I was talking to a friend a few days ago, and she asked me, “What does it mean when a white person says they are colorblind?”

I said something like, “Consciously or subconsciously, they are saying they don’t see how my Blackness impacts my experiences.”

She then said, “What does it mean when someone tells an ugly person that beauty is in the eye of the beholder?”

This really hit me. I am completely dismissing someone’s experiences because the actual conversation makes me uncomfortable.

So, let’s talk about it.

In the eye of the beholder

Beauty is subjective. Just because I find someone attractive, it doesn’t mean someone else will. However, the beauty standards set by Western society are very real. I would even argue that if we find someone attractive who doesn’t fit those standards, we still objectively know they are ugly.

Let me give you an example. Sometimes I have students, especially girls, who will refuse to show a picture of their new boyfriend to their friends. Why?

Well, in most cases, when the student finally submits to peer pressure, her friends will respond with stuff like:

“Eew, you talk to him?”

“You can do better!”

“He chopped!” (This translates to ‘He is ugly’ in adult language.)

Sadly, in many of these cases, the student who was once excited about a new relationship loses interest.

Ugliness, like race, is a systemic problem. We can all acknowledge pretty is a privilege, but we struggle to admit that being ugly creates experiences on the opposite end of the spectrum.

We have to be honest about the existence of ugliness, again being used based on traditional beauty standards, to fix the problem.

Lookism

Lookism is a term coined in the 1970s during a fat acceptance movement, and it eventually evolved. In short, it describes the common phenomenon of judging a person’s character based on physical appearance. By 2000, it was considered to be a form of discrimination, but it has not received the same attention as stuff like racism and sexism.

Despite many people feeling the need to weigh the importance of one -ism against another, all of them should be acknowledged, so we can work toward eliminating them.

Lookism is no different. I would not look at a woman or a trans person and tell them their experiences don’t matter. If an ugly person tells me their experiences, no matter how beautiful they may be to me, I’m going to listen to them.

Our society is driven by beauty. It is so ingrained in us, and so few people talk about it from the perspective of being ugly, that it is easy to dismiss it.

We’ve all heard of pretty privilege. We can even look to the extremes of this. Someone like Ted Bundy, despite being a serial killer, had dozens of seemingly normal women fawning over him and the media talking about him as if he were some handsome mastermind.

However, I’ve had many friends point to men they felt were creepy just because they had a less appealing physical appearance.

Unfortunately, this isn’t just a problem for adults. I ran into multiple stories about parents either considering giving ugly children up for adoption or abandoning them completely.

Jono Lancaster is one of those children. He was born with Treacher Collins Syndrome which impacts the bone and tissue development of the face. Although he has never met his parents, he says they abandoned him because he was too ugly.

Outside of looking different, he is healthy, outgoing, and has experienced long-term romantic relationships. He understands people treat him differently, but he is driven to prove them wrong.

He even had the opportunity to get surgery, but decided against it because he said, “God made me like this, and I was born like this for a reason.”

Robert Hoge was another abandoned child. He was born with a tumor in his head and mangled legs. When his father described him to his mother, she refused to look at Robert. She refused to take him home. In her diary, she wrote, “I wished he would go away or die or something.”

How does Robert know these sad details about his early life? Well, his mother started to visit him in the hospital. She would still complain about how ugly he was, but after a family vote in which all of Robert’s siblings wanted to bring him home, his mother agreed to do so.

Robert said they grew to have a special bond. He understood why she was so hesitant to interact with him, to even look at him.

Robert’s story is another inspiring one. He says, “Everyone is uglier than they think; everyone is more beautiful than they think, too.”

Although Jono and Robert seem to be happy, their stories show the disdain for ugly. Parents, mothers, willing to give up their children just because they are ugly.

Imagine how the rest of the world will treat you.

Too Ugly to Assault

In 2019, it was revealed two men were acquitted of rape charges by the highest court in Italy. The reasoning? In short, the woman was too ugly. Her story was not credible because she “looked like a man and was therefore unappealing.”

Tarana Burke, a Black woman, planted the seeds of the #MeToo movement in the mid ‘90s when she met a young girl at a youth camp who confided in Burke. Burke had her own sexual abuse trauma, but she wasn’t completely ready to fully respond. However, this led to MeToo a decade later. Like me, you probably didn’t hear about MeToo until around 2017, when thinner, whiter faces and celebrities began sharing their stories.

Burke’s story, as a fat Black woman, was pushed into the shadows because it is easier for people to find sympathy for traditionally beautiful people.

The “Why would he assault someone so ugly” is a consistent defense for the most monstrous people. Unsurprisingly, the orange man has used some version of this defense multiple times. Of course, many people support him. “Why would Donald Trump assault this ugly woman. He is rich. He can have any woman he wants.” I would love to end with some hope here, but we see he is still sitting pretty in the White House.

Sadly, being ugly doesn’t just mean being ignored. It means being dehumanized. It means being both the victim and the monster in some people’s eyes.

It is important to note that assault is usually about power, but even more importantly, attraction does not equate to traditional beauty standards.

Taboo of Ugliness

These experiences are related to the idea of epistemic injustice which, as defined by Miranda Fricker, is when a wrong is done to someone and their capacity as the knower is diminished due to systemic bias. In other words, we will refuse to listen to someone because of the systemic bias at play. In relation to the previous examples, this would be ignoring a woman who accuses a powerful man of sexual assault because of conscious or subconscious biases reinforced by the system in which we live.

In Thomas J. Spiegel’s paper, Lookism as Epistemic Injustice, he breaks down the different types of epistemic injustice related to lookism. He discusses the testimonial examples, like women not being believed because they are too ugly.

Another type of epistemic injustice that Spiegel coins is the “taboo of ugliness.” Spiegel states:

“There are cases in which an ugly person — who knows they are ugly and knows she is being discriminated against based on their looks — is told that she is not ugly. This can be motivated by nothing but good intentions on the side of the person discounting the ugly person’s experience. Since we know that being ugly is considered an undesirable trait, it seems that good manners command, some may think, to deny the ugly person’s ugliness, despite the person denying it might secretly be cognizant of the fact the ugly person is in fact unattractive.

As Spiegel points out, epistemic injustice related to race and gender is different because they are, for the most part, easily identifiable. If someone diminishes a Black person’s claim about injustice, they cannot deny that the person is Black.

In the case of ugliness, people are more likely to say something like “You aren’t ugly, so this cannot be the reason you were wronged.”

This is an easier conversation for most people, but it only strengthens the systemic prejudice. I’m not saying you should agree someone is ugly, and leave it at that. However, I encourage people to truly listen and engage with those experiences.

There isn’t anyone out there marching for ugly people. Nothing will change if we refuse to acknowledge the problem.

What happens if we continue to push aside the dangers of lookism? Sadly, I see it in my classroom, especially with my young men.

Looksmaxxing

Looksmaxxing is an attempt to maximize one’s physical attractiveness. I’ve mentioned healthy ways to do this, like working out or braces, but looksmaxxers tend to move into more dangerous territory.

I wrote about looksmaxxers a couple of years ago. I thought it was a fad that was going away; However, it is on the rise again in my classroom and online.

Although in theory, looksmaxxing is something anyone can do, the movement is specifically a young male movement. These are usually boys who are unpopular in school and unpopular with girls. The impact of attractiveness for men is usually downplayed a bit when compared to the impact on women’s lives, and maybe rightfully so. However, it is still important for young boys to know their experiences aren’t a complete illusion. When they look for advice, they are given generic tips like showering, working out, and growing up.

For a teenage mind, this does little to assuage their current pain. They turn to the internet, and they are pulled in by predators like Andrew Tate and incel forums.

Let me introduce you to Braden Eric Peters, better known by his streamer name Clavicular. Although an extreme example of a looksmaxxer, I already have students looking to him as an inspiration.

Peters is 19 years old and is a very popular looksmaxxer. These are just some of the things he is doing or plans on doing to “maximize” his physical appearance.

• He started testosterone and steroids before he finished puberty.
• He bone smashes, which is taking a hammer or hard object and hitting your face for an extended period of time to create microfractures that are supposed to reform to strengthen the appearance.
• He admits bone smashing may not work, but the swelling he gets around his face looks good even if it's temporary.
• He is infertile at 19 because of the drugs that he takes, including some necessary for him to get an erection.
• He uses meth as an appetite suppressant to stay lean
• Surprisingly, he does not really work out. He does not care about health at all.
• He is already 6'2 and pretty high on the traditional beauty scale, but he wants limb lengthening surgery so he can be 6'6.

Peters doesn’t seem to do this specifically for female attention, but because of all the social benefits of being the most attractive person in the room. In every moment, he wants to be the guy.

He is obsessed with mogging, which basically means dominating someone in appearance, presence, and status. The idea of another man mogging him drives him crazy.

It is clear to me that Peters needs help and support, but as he predicted, it seems his money and status has made him almost untouchable and blind to any reasonable advice.

How does such a young person end up here? They usually find the wrong groups online. Their anger is turned outward, and instead of learning to love themselves despite the society they live in, they become desperate to change or completely disillusioned.

Peters expects to die early. Nothing matters outside of obtaining the perfect physical appearance.

It doesn’t seem like someone like Braden Eric Peters had a lot of love in his life. His parents placed a lot of weight on physical appearance, and although they took his drugs the first time they caught him, they gave up after that

Love takes time and patience, especially when working through the tumultuous teenage years and a society obsessed with the perfection of social media.

Love is out there. People love me despite my gap. People love Jono, even if it wasn’t his biological mother. Robert found love with his mother, even if she initially turned her back. In a harsh world, in a world that is far too fast, reminding people they are loved can go a long way.

You can love by listening. Don’t dismiss someone’s experiences because they make you uncomfortable. Push past the systemic bias.