Nilacharal

Beauty and our culture

Beauty is not the most important requisite for a human life. But that does not mean that it does not have its own value. All our literature praises the beauty of a woman in umpteen ways. When a parent begets a baby girl or when a lad is getting married, everyone expects the girl to be beautiful. It could be the beauty of hair, beauty of eyes, the perfectness of nose and teeth, or it could be the beauty of body curvature. Even in Ramayan, authored by poet Kamban, the beauty of Sita is described in an exaggerated (sordid?) way. I myself am an ardent supporter of the belief that Rama was depicted as human incarnation of God Himself as no human being can be characterized as noble like Him. If such is the veneration/commentary for the physical beauty of a woman in our culture, as reflected by our literature, why is that, of late, a few odd groups raise a hue and cry about beauty pageants.

Is beauty contest a violation of our culture?

One should not overlook the fact that the beauty contests are not the latest happenings and we have been conducting it for quite sometime. However, this hue and cry started or coincided with Ms Aishwarya Rai and Ms Sushmita Sen winning the titles in the international beauty contests. The protest got aggravated when many others followed these pretty women in the last 3-4 years. Let us debate on the arguments in favor of and against these beauty contests.

The opponents of these contests say that it is an insult or violation of our culture. They even say that recognizing and rewarding the beauty is against womanhood. Do they mean Poet Kamban disrespect Mother Sita? Coming back to culture, how many uncensored and censored movies and stories get released or published that do not affect our culture. The suggestive and compromising posters are if anything to be condemned as they come onto your eyes when you drive on roads in towns and cities. The kinds of dance movements choreographed in the latest movies give the entire graphic details of the human copulation. Also, the dialogues are many times very vulgar. Are these not assaults over our culture, which considers sex as a secret, and not-to-be talked about matter?

I do not subscribe to the view that sex is advocated in our culture as a secret subject. But many believe so due to the distortions that our culture had undergone. In most of our temple towers, the sculptures show the descriptions of sexual postures of many forms of sex. This is not discussed here to support the obscene vulgarity in movies/stories. This is brought to the notice to stress a point that even the sex when described in a sophisticated way was considered part of the culture by our predecessors. 10-15 years back one would have hesitated to talk about condoms even in a friend's circle. I remember the controversy over director Bhagyaraj's dialogue in one movie where he had used the word "Nirodh" (one trade name for condom). After a lot of discussion, Sensor Board finally cleared this dialogue, probably keeping the rate of population growth in mind. Today, the commercial advertisements on this product describe everything about this product. These are highlighted here to suggest that the culture is an evolving process and it is not something to be frozen.

Is beauty contest a cheap entertainment?

It is also accused that beauty contests are promoted as a cheap entertainment as pornography in many countries is unlawful. It is also said that those who have connections in the porno-world promote these contests. I refute both the arguments, as many in the country do not even know about Aishwarya Rai's performance in the beauty contest but they know the movies in which she starred. So the beauty contests are not a part of the (cheap) entertainment except may be for the elite and the well-informed people.

Coming to the porn angle, if it is accused so because of the level of physical exposures involved in such contests, these contests at least in India are conducted by respectable organizations (e.g. Femina) and are telecast. If the participants clad reduced attire that does not mean it is cheap or porn. What is the level of exposure when a girl participates in a swimming competition? Can she swim with 6 yards saree clad on her? If you take the advertisement for panties (even briefs!) either physical or pictorial models, some companies focus their product in such a filthy way, to show the usefulness or effectiveness of their product, that makes the viewer uncomfortable.

More than 80% of the censored movies depict heroines/heroes drenched in rain and they leave nothing for the audiences' imagination. In some movies, the scenes and the double meaning dialogues are so filthy that it could only arouse vulgar feelings in young minds, depending on their creativity. A more serious thing is that in our movies, of late even in TV serials, the rape scene is shown with so much finer detail and so explicitly that it can only create a havoc in the minds of young people. These scenes show the physical (sexual) assault on a woman as a common unwanted thing. The effect of these scenes on the psychology and consequent degradation of the culture (to respect a woman) is silently ignored by those who bother only about the exposure of Aishwarya Rai-s and Sushmita Sen-s on the dais in a beauty contest.

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