#image

As soon as a woman's primary social value could no longer be defined as the attainment of virtuous domesticity, the beauty myth redefined it as the attainment of virtuous beauty. It did so to substitute both a new consumer imperative and a new justification for economic unfairness in the workplace where the old ones had lost their hold over newly liberated women. ↗

— Naomi Wolf

#beauty #body-image #marketing #self-esteem #society

The same concept of freedom held by the woman who embraces the Western secular identity who feels that she has the right to dress how she likes and adopt any image that fits her desires, is also held in the minds of the men who adopt the Western secular identity. The view is that they are free to view and treat a woman in any way that they wish, for their mind and desires are the standards by which they live their life. Indeed, this is the essence of the concept of freedom and the basis of the Western identity. ↗

— Shabaat of Hizb ut-Tahrir

#beauty #body-image #eating-disorders #society #beauty

From the elevator, Mabel watched the old woman's bare feet hobbling away, a trail of salt and the lace hem of her nightgown left in her wake like sea foam. ↗

— Libba Bray

#beauty

Weight and body oppression is oppressive to everyone. When you live in a society that says that one kind of body is bad and and other is good, those with “good” bodies constantly fear that their bodies will go “bad”, and those with “bad” bodies are expected feel shame and do everything they can to have “good” bodies. In the process, we torture our bodies, and do everything from engage in disordered eating to invasive surgery to make ourselves okay. Nobody wins in this kind of struggle. ↗

— Golda Poretsky

#body-image #diet #dieting #diets #oppression

Eating is not a crime. It’s not a moral issue. It’s normal. It’s enjoyable. It just is. ↗

— Carrie Arnold

#diet-industry #eating #eating-disorders #self-esteem #society

a simple dream, set in a city park, along an avenue of mature elms, whose overarching branches turned the avenue into a green tunnel into which the sky and the sunlight were dripping, here and there, through the perfect imperfections in the canopy of leaves. ↗

— Salman Rushdie

#dreams

A mud-stained sunlight began to splatter the sodden fields, and the hateful, nasal world of birds began to come to life. It seemed to me that I was coming out of a suffocating nightmare and that the low clouds flying before the wind were the shreds of an evil dream. ↗

— Blaise Cendrars

#dark #imagery #inversion #dreams

When a court officer suggested quarantine for Nerissa, she grabbed the man's pen and jammed it into the back of his hand, screaming that he was a Crimson Guard witch come to remove her memories and replace them with bird-song. They decided to skip quarantine after that. ↗

— Caitlin Kittredge

#lovely-way-with-words #mental-image #funny

I’m not going to let my insecurities keep me from having a good time. I think that if you don’t loose your self-consciousness, you can’t really be present in a situation. For example, if you’re at The Louvre, but you’re thinking about how much you hate your jeans, you’re not really at The Louvre. So in your memory, when you look back, you’re always going to be like, “I was wearing those jeans I hated”. And you’re not going to remember anything else. ↗

— Christina Ricci

#body-image #inspirational #inspirational

You should totally get implants," she said admiringly in the mirror. I shake my head. "I don't yet know what I'm going to do with my life, Diane. But I'm hoping being shaped like a barbell could only be a hindrance. ↗

— Emma McLaughlin

#intelligence #intelligence