Beauty, Changing the Game, Iconicity, and the Lady Gaga
Manolo says, the Manolo has been in the ferociously interesting conversation with his internet friend Eliza Wharton about the matters of beauty, style, and what makes someone the modern icon.
Over the course of this conversation, the Manolo has stated the few of his beliefs, which he will now deliver as the set of provocative Don Colacho style aphorisms:
1. Beauty is not negotiable.
2. If you are not blessed with beauty, change the game.
3. The best way to change the game is by being very different.
4. Great beauty can make you the icon, but beauty is neither necessary nor common among icons.
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And now, for the explications:
Beauty is not negotiable
'Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale her infinite variety'... ORLY?
The rules of feminine beauty cannot be changed, no matter how much we may wish that they could be. They are as immutable and as fixed as the stars in the heavens: youth, fecundity, symmetry, and the pleasing hip-to-waist ratio.
We may try to convince ourselves that there are other standards of beauty, but such attempts are pretty lies we tell ourselves to make us feel better about our relative lack of beauty.
As cruel as they seem, such statements say nothing about our worth as individuals, or our goodness, or our merit to our family or the world.
Physical beauty is the gift given without reference to merit.
Although, it is the strange gift that inevitably dissipates with age. And one may still be compelling even into oldest age, but one should not be confused: compelling and beautiful are not the same thing. Beauty is compelling, but often the compelling is not also beautiful.
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Gloria Swanson, First Beautiful, then Compelling
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If you are not blessed with beauty, change the game.
Voted Least Likely to Date James Brolin
As youthful beauty fades, or was perhaps never fully present, this is where the art and magic of contriving the desirable is found.
