Marsha Make-Over
September 21, 2007 by Tracee Sioux
Filed under Parenting
Can public criticism, say from an entire nation, make you change your hair and face in a drastic way? Would you change your hair color? Would you surgically alter your face?
Marsha Clark, attorney in the infamously televised OJ Simpson trial did. She’s now a blond who straightens her hair and wears a lot more make-up. The ladies on The View were hypothesizing that she had plastic surgery.
And who can blame her? If the entire country participates in criticising your appearance, hair, clothes and looks might you feel bad about yourself? Might you shrink away from public exposure in other cases? You might have plastic surgery. You might hire a stylist or bleach your hair.
If you are a high profile lawyer like Marsha Clark, you probably won’t ever make the mistake of thinking your brains are more important than your appearance again.
I had an appointment of a personal nature earlier this week. I was planning to go to the gym right after. I thought, well I’ll just dress for the gym, no one will see me or care what I’m wearing. On my way out people, professional people wearing business attire, came up to to me to introduce themselves. They had seen a story I had written and were approaching me as a writer.
I immediately reconsidered my sweats and old t-shirt choice. Surely they should have at least been fashionable and designer work out clothes?
Since people DO make their judgements about us based on appearance, should we just accept it and change our appearance to meet their expectations?
To say appearances don’t matter or clothes don’t matter flies in the face of the evidence. Look at Britney, Marsha Clark, Star Jones the focus is on how they look.
I don’t have any idea what kind of new case Marsha was working on.
Hillary should drop out of the race to work on her weird hair and big hips. Forget the presidency! You need highlights and a personal trainer STAT!
No one likes being judged, and it can be painful, but there are more important things in life. Really, there are! Everyone has to find a way to roll with the fact that you can’t control what others think about you. No matter what you wear or wax, someone will always be poised to tear you apart.
To quote Rick Nelson, “You can’t please everyone, so you’ve got to please yourself.”
I think it does matter how you look, but you shouldn’t solely dress to meet others’ expectations. There’s something to be said for wearing what’s appropriate for a given situation, e.g. I wouldn’t go to Target in my underwear. But I think it’s also important to have your own personal style. That’s what I fall back on to keep me from diving headlong into trends that don’t suit me, or to blunt criticism of how I look.
Not to say one’s personal style can’t ever change: I think it should occasionally. But purposefully, not in order to embrace every trend that comes by or to please someone else.
I think appearance is important – but I also realized a long time ago that the minute I decide to walk out the door in old grungy clothes and no makeup, that’s the day I run into EVERYONE!
I think it’s some unspoken law or something.
I think there is “putting your best foot forward” and then there’s going too far. I think the problem is that we’re all supposed to be “on” all the time. Not the least because we’re all vicitms of media scrutiny. You become a lawyer, suddenly you’re TV personality and judged by the same standard as Pamela Anderson.
The problem is that it’s killing us. Doctors are dropping out of health care because there is more money in cosmetic treatments. It is easier for anyone with a few thousand dollars to get a breast implant than it is for a woman with breast cancer to get a lumpectomy.
It used to be said that politics was show business for ugly people. Based on the first comment, it appears that is no longer true. I wonder how many senators are already missing major votes because they’re having botox appointments.
I went and bought some cute work-out clothes because I realized that I was the only one wearing cast-offs to work out in. After reading my post on Marsha Clark one friend told me “I want to live in Tracee-world where other women don’t judge you by the roots in your hair and visible panty line.” Taking a group class and realizing I was the only one who looked similar to a bag lady was my final clue.
I said, “So do I.”
But, apparently, I realized, this is not the way the world works, no matter how much I want it too.