Susan Bordo Discovers The Male Body Summary

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Americans usually associate the value of optimism with positivity and the value of pessimism with negativity because remaining optimistic seems to be a societal goal. However, optimism and pessimism go hand in hand and they are both needed daily. Susan Bordo wrote an article titled "Beauty (Re)discovers the Male Body" touching on the various perceptions of viewing beauty and art. In this article she utilizes both pessimistic and optimistic views to describe the current beauty industry. Several ideas that can be stemmed from Bordo's writing include how pessimism is usually frowned upon, but it can be helpful; how an overly positive outlook can be toxic; and how to balance pessimism and optimism.

Some people may argue that an optimistic outlook is favorable while …show more content…

While excessive pessimism may not be a good thing, pessimism is needed. Without being able to see the glass as "half-empty" Bordo would not have been able to identify some major problems in the beauty industry such as "the powerful taboos "of "the explicit depiction of penises and male bottoms" (186). If we only acknowledge the positive things happening around us we would never notice all the detrimental facets that need improvement. Bordo used pessimistic thinking to highlight all the issues in the beauty industry that we can improve on. Another reason pessimism can be helpful is that it can help spur change. Bordo was inspired to write her article due to the incident while reading a magazine. In this magazine was an ad with an attractive male model. This delighted and intrigued Bordo as it was a very uncommon experience for her to see this. Instead of thinking it from an optimistic perspective that "this as good as its going to get" she felt this great experience for her should not just be a rarity. This experience inspired Bordo to write the article "Beauty (Re)discovers the Male Body," advocating the equal depiction of males and females in the beauty

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