Summary Of A Woman's Beauty Put Down Or Power Source By Susan Sontag

As Humanity Changes Beauty Changes
In her essay “A Woman's Beauty: Put Down or Power Source” Susan Sontag, a women’s right activist, explains general ideals and observations towards societal pressures on women’s beauty in contrast to men’s beauty. Although she presents historical and current positions on the subject, she generalizes humanity’s views and lacks in acknowledging that society’s perceptions evolve over time.
Sontag makes a broad statement that everyone, meaning both men and women, agree to the popular perception that beauty for women, is based only on their physical body parts. While handsome being the perception of men, is more than visual focusing mostly by their character. (Sontag, 644-655) With such a general argument Sontag fails to inform the reader that beauty evolves over time. Wendy Lewis explains in her article “Medicine & Health” that the concept of beauty today is no longer searching for flawlessness but feeling healthy and being proud of one’s age (2009). The basics of Sontag’s argument were based entirely on the perception at the time the essay was written. Even though she includes historical background, and indirectly states that the concept of beauty did changed from pre-modernism to post-modernism. She failed

to acknowledge that the views of beauty would change for the future generations.
Sontag mentions in her essay: “What is lamentable is that it is (beauty) the only form of power that most women are encourage to seek” She further states that “It is also a duty-It is her work.” (645) Though this subjective statement she can be speaking directly to her female readers.

And being a rights activist herself, involving perhaps her personal experiences and emotions. Including this in her essay also, omits that women are not encourage to pursue education and economical status; instead focusing only on looks. Lewis adds in her article that the new view of beauty is about lifestyles (2009) In contrast to Sontag’s believes in beauty being a job, Lewis describes the modern term of beauty as an overall healthy life

choice.
According to Sontag men do not care for their physical bodies as females do. Their beauty is only assessed as a complete being, as well as from what is not seen but shown. Furthermore, she includes in her essay that every individual in society has this common perception. (Sontag, 644-655) However, her claim is not applicable to today’s society. Lewis, states in her article that both men and women today undergo medical procedures because the shame to do so has been diminished. (2009) Men in today’s society care more about physique than Sontag mentions in her essay. By extrapolating beauty, Sontag is directly stating that character and personality is more important for men then it is for women. But this is not the case, both sexes are self-cautious of their bodies, even more so today with the influence of social media. By generalizing the perception of beauty, Sontag is also avoiding the reality of beauty; simply not every person in society had that common believe at the time and still today the reality of beauty is different for everyone.
Sontag’s overall statement of humanity involves only current views at the time it was written and as a result is outdated to today’s societal perception and reality of beauty. The view’s of today for both sexes has changed from looks into a more complex idea with many different aspects. To speak of beauty as just looks is not a relevant statement about today’s society.