Be Ashamed to Shame

Most people these days slam magazines and the fashion industry for depicting the perfectly unattainable body. All too quickly we pass the buck and tell everyone its not our fault, that we are being drowned by that falsity of the media and we can’t be blamed for our own body perceptions.

But have you ever really stopped to think about your own actions? Have you ever stopped to consider that people are willing to actively body shame others? That not only does the media show us these perfect images, but that we take them on board, we embody them and splurt them out whenever we think its ok to do so. Yet really, it is never ok to do this. It’s never ok to tell someone they’re too skinny or too fat or that they’re ugly and you’re not. It’s never ok to say you’re better than someone because of your acne-free skin or your silky smooth legs.

We blame the media yet we fail to realise the issue resonates within us. We are the ones transcending the messages created by the media. We share the memes making funny of people because of their weight, their looks. We have become enslaved to the power of social media, because we think we can remain anonymous behind a screen, on the other side of which someone is crying because of the hurt, the embarrassment, everything you have made them feel because of the spiteful words you have shared so flippantly.

Why do we find it funny? As a society we find it funny to ridicule others in that way. We are sick. Utterly sick, rotting inside.

Morals: mine, yours, ours?

Morals. We all have them, they shape our behaviour, they often dictate what we do in life and how we view what others do. Yet one thing I despise is the attempt made by many people to impose their moral views on others. Why do I say this? Because morals dictate what is right or wrong to YOU. Of course we see that society embodies collectively agreed upon morals such as the respect for other peoples property or personal information. This is often reflected in the law too, this is what Aquinas calls ‘Natural Law Theory’ and we can clearly see this in, for example, Human Rights law, the laws on theft and of course, the law on murder.

So whilst we have these collectively acknowledged/accepted morals, there will be people who deviate from them, for example, criminals. Furthermore, some people have different morals, like I said, your morals dictate what is right or wrong for YOU. You draw on your own experience and upbringing to form your own morals, hence we always say 'the moral of the story is...'. Nothing gives any person the right to assert their morals as above and beyond the morals of others.