Lookism

Lookism (or looksism) is a term that describes prejudice or preferential treatment based on how a person looks. The concept is important to an understanding of gender and society as it relates to issues of social status. If someone can be said to gain higher social status due to the shape, height, or structure; perceived ability; age; attractiveness; or “sexiness” of her or his body rather than skill or experience, then lookism has played a part in a discriminatory practice that affects society as a whole. Lookism suggests that certain parts of society have a narrow frame of reference that is used to judge a person by how he or she appears. Such a frame of reference allows only so-called traditional forms of beauty past its self-regulated vetting system. When this system becomes part of dominant ideologies in a given culture, unrealistic expectations may be placed on certain members of that society to conform to a set of norms. Yet it is never clear, an anti-lookist might argue, exactly what traditional forms of beauty involve. Where an ideal is defined, such as the thinness ideal in certain societies, that ideal seems unreachable and is understood by anti-lookists to encourage worrying social trends, such as the use of plastic surgery to conform to a particular standard. Anti-lookists believe that if everyone could be accepted by society looking the way they do, with no requirements to conform to an unrealistic standard, society would be more equal.

In particular, the term lookism has been used in conjunction with sizeism to criticize discrimination against those who are perceived as, or who self-define as, fat. The connection to gender theory occurs via notions of what a man or a woman should look like. It is also impossible to separate the debate from issues of power and race, and class and sexuality. According to the theories of Judith Butler, such notions are constructed but nevertheless have power in terms of their reiteration. If power is related to a way of looking and that relationship is cited in the further attribution of power, power arises from such an attribution.

This process of reiteration occurs via particular outlets, such as advertising, and therefore can be connected to the functions of the marketplace. It can be argued that the marketplace produces particular bodies, which can be sold back to the viewer. Therefore, the relationship between the viewer/consumer and the advertiser is critically important if one is to examine how particular ways of looking result in certain people being negated or made invisible while others are legitimized.

The way someone “looks” has three crucial and overlapping meanings. First, one can refer to the way a person appears or is perceived by a viewer conjoined with the way a person appears to or is perceived by herself or himself. According to feminist thinkers, such as Sandra Bartkey, when one is objectified, a further process occurs whereby one is made to see oneself through the viewer's eyes. One learns how to look acceptable according to the dominant ideology. This tool could then be used for political coercion or could result in mental illness, such as an eating disorder. From a feminist perspective, a possibility for liberation is discovered via knowledge that the process occurs, but it is not possible to escape the process itself.

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