The Pursuit of Beauty in Korean Society

The Pursuit of Beauty in Korean Society

  “People don’t understand the need for me to look perfect”. The words of Kim Kardashian are a reflection of the nature of Korean women. Contemporary society has created a new culture that puts pressure on women, particularly the women of South Korea, to look their best. As such, women have gone out of their way to reach the meaning and the overall description of beauty. The most surprising fact of it all is that there is a standard that has been set to meet the requirements for beauty. For Korean women, beauty is measured by pale skin, high nose bridge, big eyes, skinny legs, cherry lips, and a small face. With this mounting pressure of the Korean women to look good, the women have had to go out of their way to meet the beauty needs. Business organizations have, however, taken advantage of the ready market in South Korea, and the beauty products business has gained popularity in the nation. The incorporation of beauty in Korean culture is gradually causing destructive impacts on the culture of South Korean. Ideally, evaluating through highlighting how the obsession with beauty has impacted on the culture can effectively enhance the understanding of the concept.

The hyper fixation of Korean women on the narrow beauty standards in society contributes to changing the dreams and ambitions of women. Unlike initially, when women would want to work hard and become successful in either their employment sectors or their academics, the women of contemporary society are more focused on beauty.

“Not just cosmetic surgery clinics, but dermatologists and other beauty-related procedures and products are fairly easily accessible in Korea” (153). Korean women have been proven to be obsessed with becoming beautiful to the point that they have subjected themselves to a series of correctional surgeries that are strictly for enhancing beauty. In Korea, in the present day, there is nothing that sells more than a beauty product. The societal pressure has turned women into a new group of individuals who have no regard for natural products. Due to their obsession, beauty products have gained popularity in the Korean economy, and as of now, the value for beauty products has continued to rise. Following this, the Korean economy has been increased in terms of the revenue collected.

Additionally, the influence of beauty on Korean women has impacted on the culture of marriage. Ideally, marriage is becoming an expensive entity that most people would rather avoid. This is because the men are forced to spend so much money in the name of making their wives look beautiful. Unlike some time back when the women in marriage would be more reasonable than the men in terms of prioritizing their needs, the women in the contemporary marriages are more focused on the direction of maintaining and investing in beauty. Most women have imposed these expenses on their husbands. In this culture, for a person to be treated with the right amount of respect as a husband, he must be in a position to take care of the beauty needs of the wife. The Korean women have obsessed with the art of perfecting their beauty to the point that they have created a belief in the Goddess of beauty. Lee supports that “The “three goddesses” of plastic surgery beauty (who have identical faces like the women in Mind C’s illustrations) are praying for the woman’s “eternal youth and immortality” and “infinite potentials” after the surgical rebirth” (161). Unlike the traditional women who were focused on issues such as marriage and the welfare of their children, this new lot is more concerned about the things that they can do on their bodies to enhance their appearance.

The Korean culture has been reinforced through the incorporation of the art of beauty and makeup in movies. Most of the Korean movies and cinema in the present times have incorporated aspects of makeup and beauty. An average Korean woman is depicted as a person whose vision is outstanding, and there is no other attribute that she can be given except the beauty that she carries. Taking advantage of the changing culture of the South Korean women, TV shows that begun rising and producing narratives that are impactful on the South Korean women in terms of showing them what they want to see and know. Chan and Xuel argue that “Winter Sonata has been telecast in Japan several times since its debut in 2002, and achieved immense popularity amongst middle-aged Japanese women” (292). Over the years, middle-aged women have taken advantage of the TV shows and the improved technology to shift their focus on the technological advancements that take place in their nation. As much as some women will pick a critical lesson from watching the commercials, most of them have selective watching, in which they only see what affects them directly, such as the kind of beauty products to use. Furthermore, the South Korean women have developed a culture of staying at home and looking pretty for the husband, who is expected to take care of the family needs and, at the same time, take care of the wife. Unlike most women in contemporary society who would prefer independence and cater to their children, these women are all up for the husband’s provision as they stay at home and clean up.

The South Korean women’s culture of obsessing with beauty has impacted on the masculinity of their men. Arguably, the man in the Korean culture has changed into someone that is viewed as not only stable in the aspect of providing for their wives, to the point where they have to accept the responsibility of the children. Miyose and Engstrom support that “gender norms that are occurring throughout various cultures, such as the introduction of the new man” (4). The contemporary Korean society has created a culture in which most of the men have the burden of the whole house on them. Following this, most of the men have taken it as their responsibility of fighting against the unrealistic beauty standards that have been set for the women by society. This is because women are not only losing their minds in the journey for chasing beauty, but they are also risking getting diseases such as cancer through conducting experiments like skin draft that make them appear paler. Other than the makeup session, the women in the Korean culture have been subjected to slavery by their desire to become beautiful to the point where they feel pressured a lot but cannot do something simply because they have to meet the societal standards for a lovely person.

Following the increased obsessing with beauty and looking lovely in the Korean culture, the act, instead of the practice of several surgeries and investing in vision, has contributed hugely to the formation, instead of the expansion of the paratracheal society. As much as the women with all these acts towards achieving beauty have good intentions, they are sending different impressions in the society and, as such, attracted to the wrong people. In other words, the level of objectification of women is increasing. For example, there has been a risen number of reported assaults that have been mainly pinned to the obsessing to the beauty that they depict. As such, some men in society have gotten the impression that these women are in dire need of attention and reciprocation of their endless efforts to show beauty. According to Miyose and Engstrom (2015), “Confucian patriarchy later transformed into modern industrialized patriarchy, which adopted the normative Western dichotomy of gender roles into its dominant gender ideology”. Stemming from the shared beliefs of Confucianism, the men of the contemporary Korean culture have been subject to a misguided form of feminine shift on the beauty and surgeries to resemble anime characters. As weird as this may sound, the incorporation of the beauty standards in the Korean culture has intensively impacted on the originality of the Korean culture and is currently creating a big deal out of the whole issue. Slowly, the once economically oriented society is shifting into a beauty and self-focus community in which men have to work. At the same time, the women enjoy the benefits that it comes with.

The new wave of Korean women’s pursuit of beauty is challenging the initially set beauty standards and fails to recognize the traditionally recognizable perceptions of beauty. Ideally, the women in contemporary society are faced with challenges of low established standards. They are used in attempts to identify the beauty standards that are an essential part of shaping culture.  One major factor that can be seen in both cases is that the high set standards that society is impacting on Self-esteem since the people who do not use makeup are considered ugly, and as such, their self-esteem is bruised in the process.   Face and body shaming among Korean women have become a standard norm in contemporary society. This is because of the changing culture in the modern Korean society, in which the women are all about makeup, and without that, the women have to wear makeup if they are to be considered beautiful.

Conclusively, the shift, instead focus that the women have developed over the years in which they conduct surgeries and also wear a lot of makeup. The contemporary society has identified the narrow line through which beauty is defined, and following this, the South Korean women have managed to maintain their beauty. Most of the husbands are now on the receiving end in which they get involved in the affairs of the ladies by providing for them the resource as well as the finances they need in the making up. Additionally, the women have created this as the standard for measuring the beauty of a person to the point that body shaming and low self-esteem are the results of the shaming, and this makes other women unlikable. The obsession of the South Korean beauty with makeup is an institution that is causing objectification and sends mixed signals to the men in society.

 

 

References

Lee, S. (2020). Cosmetic Surgery in Contemporary Korean Art* [Ebook] (1st ed.). Retrieved 14 March 2020, from.

Miyose, C. (2015). Boys Over Flowers: Korean Soap Opera and the Blossoming of a New Masculinity [Ebook] (1st ed.). Retrieved 14 March 2020, from.

Chan, B., & Wang, Xueli. (2011). Of prince charming and male chauvinist pigs: Singaporean female viewers and the dream-world of Korean television dramas. International Journal Of Cultural Studies, 14(3), 291-305. https://doi.org/10.1177/1367877910391868