Monday, August 20, 2012

Looks and Yucks

It's a wee point and I apologize for my shallowness, but why the devil are the cable talking heads insisting that Paul Ryan is handsome or photogenic? He's certainly not.

Granted, I'm only a guy and a straight one at that. Maybe I should be disqualified from commenting. Yet, I have eyes. I've read much literature as well as such analysis as the Survival of the Prettiest (I recommend it and bought it long ago).

Rep. Ryan appears to be the love child of the infamous sexter Anthony Weiner and a cartoon character like Dumbo or Dopey the dwarf. For the later, it's the ears. Disney is predatory about protecting copyright, so no pix of them here.

However, consider the official, public portraits of Ryan and Weiner.

They are more than separated at birth. Ryan on the left has the absurd ears. Both have disproportionate features that preclude them from that pretty class.

In addition, both project (my sense) smarminess and lack of sincerity. I'd count my fingers after shaking hands with either.

Why should it make any difference if Ryan is another cartoonish, Dumbo eared, Dudley Do-Right jawed very plain guy? It's only because mass media are telling us again and again that he is attractive. We are programmed to believe that if a woman or man is a looker, she or he has other virtues.

Amusingly, our society simultaneously clings to the dumb-blonde and similar stereotypes that pretty folk can totally lack common sense. That's another matter.

In this campaign, a meme is that Romney and Ryan are the pretty pair. Their campaign does nothing to say, let's forget our rugged, swarthy good looks and talk about issues. They'll take it.

They're not about to advertise, "Vote for Dopey and his dopey economic failure."

We should note that Paul Ryan is hard to look at. Whoever started the meme that he's a beautiful person was wack and just plain wrong. If we get over that fantasy, perhaps we can get to his fantasy budget proposals.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Ryan is handsome by the standards of Washington DC the measure of which is a hog wallow infested by classic trolls from the Black Forest of Germany.

:D

Elias N.