“We are hard on women, it revolts me. Young, they are never enough this, or too much that, to be beautiful. And when they get older, they no longer exist, ”rebels the author and feminist Marilyse Hamelin. In a new book to be released on Tuesday, she has gathered ten voices, to which she added her own, to reflect and to challenge preconceived ideas about beauty.
“The quest for beauty according to pre-established standards is a trap, a seemingly superficial undertaking, but in reality generating immense suffering,” she writes in 11 short essays on beauty. To escape the tyranny of preconceived ideas.
In our Western societies, beauty is associated with thinness, youth and whiteness. To achieve this ideal, which we are constantly harping on with advertisements in magazines and on our screens, some do violence to themselves, both physically and psychologically. Slimming diets, makeup, cosmetic surgery, etc. “Looks like there is no way out,” says the one who herself had surgery a few years ago to “slow the clock”.
If she had “gas” to write an entire book on the theme of beauty, Marilyse Hamelin wanted to give voice to other women, she said in an interview. Among them: the authors Perrine Leblanc and Heather O’Neill, the former politician Françoise David, the columnist Estelle Grignon or the artist Marie-Hélène Bellavance. There is also the signature of a man, Alex Rose, intentionally placed in a minority position because “women are clearly more affected by beauty dictates”.
Throughout the pages, we discover the beauty through the eyes of each author. The texts alternate testimony, rant, fiction and memories. The reflections are linked and sometimes intersect, mixing irony, pain, compassion and hope.
Marilyse Hamelin for her part focuses her essay on ageism, not getting over that in 2021 we can still compliment a woman by telling her that she is “beautiful for her age”. “This is to say that beauty is the prerogative of youth, [alors que] magnificent “not young” women, who have the sacred fire, who electrify me, there are plenty of them! “
In her essay, Estelle Grignon reveals all her frustration and the difficulty with which she struggles, as a trans woman, to find herself beautiful. “One of the hardest things for a trans woman at the start of her journey is not so much to imagine herself as a woman as to imagine herself beautiful. To think that one day, under those footballer’s shoulders, this incessant facial hair, this jawbone jaw, this absence of curves, there could be something other than a mutant being, ”she writes.
In interview with The duty, she tells the story of her obstacle course to get closer to “beauty ideals” and thus avoid transphobic gestures and comments (which never really stop). Finding yourself beautiful means learning how to put on make-up, go under the laser to make your hair disappear, take hormones and accept their many side effects.
In the eyes of Perrye-Delphine Séraphin, it is impossible to talk about beauty without talking about colorism, the subject at the heart of her short essay and her master’s degree in communication and culture at York University in Toronto. Colorism, she writes, is “this misconception that the physical attributes of dark-skinned black women are necessarily ugly while those of” lucky “fair-skinned women are automatically attractive, an idea widely conveyed by our society. “.
Plunging back into her memories, she recounts having for a long time avoided exposure to the sun on the recommendation of her mother so as not to darken her skin further. As a teenager, she tried whitening creams and started straightening her “frizzy” hair.
“I realized I was beautiful when I started to appreciate my strengths. […] Despite my progress, the fact remains that there is a violence that continues to be transmitted. For example, it is difficult in the world of dating, where there is still a lot of racial prejudice, ”she confides in an interview.
“I shed tears of suffering, of sadness, but also of joy while reading the essays. Some surprised me both by the form and the content of their text. […] Above all, I learned a lot, and that’s what I wanted, ”summarizes Marilyse Hamelin, who led the collective.
Course error
This thirst to “learn” on the subject, she explains by an error of course which marked her with a hot iron. In February 2020, after watching the Super Bowl halftime show starring singers Jennifer Lopez and Shakira, Marilyse Hamelin was irritated by the comments on social media. Most praised J. Lo’s beauty and body, insisting that she “looked good for her age” (50 at the time).
Exasperated by the situation, she shared a “double-barreled nocturnal status in the form of a joke” – in her own words – criticizing the singers’ undernourishment. A comment that is not at all past.
“I put my foot in my mouth, I admit it”, she concedes today, believing that she could not find the words at the time to express her discomfort vis-à-vis the pressure that ‘society exerts on women to always look slimmer and younger.
She says she took criticism for days after it was posted and felt like “less than nothing.” “It was a big injury. I brooded over it for a long time and, true to myself, I told myself that I had to do something with it, that I get something out of it. This is how the idea of making a 22-hand collection on the theme of beauty gained ground.
The successful project, Marilyse Hamelin says she comes out “grown up” and very satisfied with the result. The height of luck, she also discovered a new passion: publishing. ” I did not expect that. I discovered the happiness of being in the author’s head, the satisfaction of helping him tie up and improving his text and the joy of finding THE right word ”, confides the one who has since launched into the freelance in this path.