The life and times of a deformed female! What I have experienced of life!
First lesson of being deformed: you are evil no matter what you do. You are impure, you are undeserving, you are filth. There’s no way that mutated body was created by the hand of God.
Beauty is goodness. Ugly is evil. (Watch any Disney movie!) If you were beautiful we’d let you get away with murder. If you are ugly we won’t let you get away with throwing a pencil across the room.
You cannot afford to have any accidents or missteps as an ugly person. You will not be forgiven. You will be reviled for minor misdeeds that would be overlooked if you were pretty.
Ugly women are not women. They are just things, or monsters at best. They do not deserve to be in the presence of “real women.”
If you are ugly we will try to pretend like you don’t exist. We wouldn’t want you to speak to us. It could lower our social status.
I’ve had a lifetime of severe bullying and humiliation by the “beautiful people.” Beautiful people have done things to myself and to others that were so cruel and heinous, I would never have even come up with the idea of doing the kinds of things they did, and saying the kinds of things they said.
As an ugly or deformed person you are very likely to be victimized by physical assault. If it does not get physical, it will be verbal. You will likely have to carry some form of protection with you, as I do, when you are out on the streets
I do not deserve the good things in life, such as marriage, a home, an exciting job, an education, and nice clothes. Poverty, lonesomeness, and homelessness are acceptable conditions for the deformed.
Deformed people should not attend church, pray to god (he won’t care), or make wishes/ have dreams (they are not deserving)
Deformed people must overlook all offenses and evils done to them by social superiors, and can never expect retribution
Deformed people never receive justice and compassion the way ordinary people do
Deformed people are neglected when sick or in distress. You will find out that if a normal person has a minor injury, and a deformed person has a serious injury, the normal person will be fussed over, while the deformed is ignored or roughly handled
Doctors and nurses will not treat you with the same level of care as normal people. They will try to get you off their hands as soon as possible.
Cinderella would not have become the princess if she were not pretty. Remember the ugly stepsisters
You are a “witch”, and you are “mean”
“Remember what I’ve taught you, Quasimodo.
You are deformed
And you are ugly
And these are crimes for which the world shows little pity
You do not comprehend
Out there, they’ll revile you as a monster
Out there, they will hate and scorn and jeer
Why invite their calumny and consternation, stay in here”- the Hunchback of Notre Dame by Disney
To be ugly is to have committed the ultimate crime.
But keep something in mind. I have seen so much evil masquerade as good. I have experienced so many beautiful people whose hideous souls are masquerading around in beautiful bodies.
66 comments
I had a friend tell me that it wasn’t a good idea to marry a beautiful girl because they typically don’t have much personality and chances are, they’ll probably cheat on you. So find a fat one that is ugly because they all turn out that way anyway. Hah!
Reason I say this, beauty is only skin deep.
i don’t know where you live. here where i live i have always seen deformed and disabled people being treated with a lot of compassion and being helped by somebody everytime they need it, without asking. in Hinduism there is a saying that being abnormal is a blessing in the sense that it neutralizes the bad karma done by that person in the past (it could come out in more gruesome ways otherwise) and it also evokes compassion in those around him and helps them gain some good karma by helping him.
but apparently the situation is not same everywhere.
what country are you from?
Rach, you have a strong and singular voice. Your writing struck me so that I just went back and read a number of your previous posts. You’ve said you “had meant/hoped to contribute a lot to the world, obviously circumstances prevented that.†This is a wholly understandable statement given what you suffer and have suffered, but as a stranger looking in, I say you are mistaken: you have eloquence and poetry in you, clearly, and are contributing here and now.
You express the strength of your pain and your vision of the world in a way that can, could, does give a voice to others who do not have your ability. You say you are ‘retarded’ because of your other disabilities, but nobody who writes like this could be called so — it is an injustice to who you are, truly. Many who are talented — indeed many who are counted genius — are in other areas of their lives damaged. That does not diminish their particular gift; indeed it may add a depth of insight impossible to achieve within one of those sleek ‘Oscars’ lives.
I am an artist, and live partly by weaving my own wounds into my work. Your voice resonates with me, and while I can only attempt to imagine what you have experienced, I feel a kinship with the way you are metabolizing it into your words.
It’s clear from comments that others have noticed these things. How could they not. You prove with your words that you have become, against brutal odds, a forceful, memorable, resonant presence.
How long it took you to learn and navigate the mundane things — brushing your teeth or fast-food combat — is a testament to your endurance and does not lessen your obvious intelligence one whit. The evidence of that is in front of me on this screen.
here’s a TED video of the ugliest woman in the world. We all have our kind ugliness to deal with in life.
http://youtu.be/c62Aqdlzvqk
It’s terribly sad to face the reality of the biases borne from aesthetics. Although I’m not deformed myself I can attest – and surely everyone – that there is favoritism and even subtle oppression of those that do not adhere nor meet to the (Eurocentric) standards of beauty. It’s absolutely crippling to one’s self esteem. It’s so easy for people to say “just accept urself da way u r!!!111!!” when they’re already on the upper end. Up to a certain point there isn’t much you can do to ameliorate yourself in terms of that, but indulging in self neglect does not abate the issues and exacerbates it if anything. Make hygiene a priority, dress nicely (and to your preference) and most of all project a good attitude. In my high school there was this girl with a deformed face that I was actually fairly close to, she had an amazingly sweet personality and everyone loved her. Although how one looks plays a somewhat significant role in how likable a person is, their personality is the utmost definitive decider of that. (except for shallow, superficial people, but who gives a shit about them?) My ex (if you could call it that, ex really close friend perhaps?) was amazingly beautiful but ended up having a shit personality so it was easy to get over her.
I love the video that FCM posted, she’s great 😀
@ Bipolar: USA
@ FCM I have seen Lizzie speak before I think she is wonderful. I also think she is very pretty in an unusual way most certainly not the “ugliest in the world” as she has been called.
Lizzie is not nearly as deformed as some of us also she is not mentally handicapped. Being mentally handicapped leads to much worse treatment. I am not trying in any way to make light of her suffering which I’m sure has been immense.
I have a much more “animal” appearance than Lizzie. I resemble more a bird or snake than a human being.
@ queaero it definitely depends on how severe and unusual the deformity/disability is. Mine is on the extreme end of unusual and severe and there is a hierarchy with the disabled. For example if you have a minor disability like a minor facial deformity you are going to be treated relatively well in society. If you have brain damage it gets a lot worse. LIke the people with Down Syndrome at school and myself who was many years behind the other kids intellectually/socidally- we were treated extremely badly, publicaly humiliated all the time. If you are a person in a wheelchair you will be treated mostly ok. If you are Joseph Merrick “the elephant man” you basically died and went to hell the day you were born.
@ Ishmael thank you so much for what you wrote. I am so happy my writing has meant something to you. I do have a very strange form of intelligence, I know that I am aware of things and perceive things in a very different way than the norm. I am mentally retarded, I don’t know how else to put it, needing help with common everyday things that a ten year old should be able to do.
@ stendarr you are right about what you say. I was at a huge disadvantage because it took me much longer to develop any kind of personality than it should have. That’s what happens for some of us who are mentally impaired: all I could do even in high school was just mimic and imitate others basically just repeat everything they did and said. I had no personality of my own. For instance I would not be able to tell you my favorite color, I would wait for someone else to say and then copy theirs. I only just began to get a personality of my own a few years ago.
This made me laugh 🙂 We all get old and ugly. And die.
^^Bipolar American’s comment made me laugh, not this post. This made me angry to read because it is true.^^
Disney can be so beyond awful at times (okay most of the time), it boggles my mind.
You are a fabulous writer my dear. You are insightful and the truth of it is people ought to be honored to come across you. I once knew a young man in college who was “mentally disabled” (I have such a hard time calling him that as he’d say the most brilliant things.) But, no he wasn’t of average capability and needed help. He was also deformed too. I enjoyed his company until he moved on to better things. ha!
Society can be terrible. Life can be terrible.
Keep being beautiful.
You are undoubtedly beautiful; I am sure of that.
@ Frightened thank you very much. I am very hard on the eyes and monstrous looking, I assure you. I also believe there is a lot more to me (on the inside, call it the “soul” if you like) than what meets the eye. Society judges us on the things we have no control over like intelligence and looks and that is too cruel. It’s like they expect the disabled to conjure up some magical powers to cure themselves, and if they can’t do so, get out of the way.
I love Disney I have watched the movies over and over. BUT it is incredibly slanted. The hero is always beautiful, the villain is always ugly. They’d never dream of an unattractive princess, can you imagine a Down Syndrome Disney princess? Of course not. Would Cinderella get the glass slipper if she weren’t a beauty? Of course not.
Long story short, people can be real jerks. If somebody has a problem with another’s looks, they should get a hobby. Life is too short to torture each other for superficial BS.
It’s been said that poking fun at other’s physical or mental abnormalities builds tough skin that conditions you for life. But conditioning works one of two ways, so don’t get cut.
Karma. What goes around does come around… eventually.
false. Some never get their deserved karma-stab.
karma is like rolling dice at a craps table. Life is pure chance. Just because you did a good deed doesn’t equal one is coming in return. It’s all chance. Rolling a 2 twice in a row is unlikely, but it happens. Because of chance. It can be broken down mathematically, and the rolls are nearly predicted!
With a million rolls there will be an expected amount of 2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,and 12 delivered. The numbers will fall into the odds category due to calculated expectations….but the order in which they are distributed….all chance.
Or karma if you fancy that term.
Some don’t get their karma-stab. Many do. It’s like anything else in life… There is rarely 100% accuracy. So be it.
i don’t think you understand what Karma is supposed to mean.
The reason you can roll a 2 twice is because the 2 still exists as a possibility in the second roll… not “because chance.”
The reason you “may never” roll a 2, is “because chance.” The 2 exists, but there’s no guarantee it will ever occur, even if probability states it “should.”
Karma is all about the circular hope that people who either do good deeds without expectation, or do harm to others without consequence, will “somehow” be magically rewarded or punished, based on “building their karma” in whatever way. Nothing to do with chance.
You could further extrapolate that people who do good things frequently, are more likely to encounter a returned benefit, usually from the gratitude of another person… and that people who do bad things frequently, are more likely to piss off the wrong person and suffer the consequence of retaliation.
clevername, we rarely agree… but it’s okay. I understand but disagree with your point and dissertation.
that was actually directed at BA, you ninja’d me. 😛
lol, clevername… My bad… It was unintentional, my friend. 🙂
Clevername, you have a biased opinion on karma because it is a theory and you have accepted it. When it doesn’t hold true, it because “someone didn’t get the karma-stab”?
How about the more logical reason, it’s a trendy idea that makes you opt for the moral high ground. It’s a trick, it doesn’t hold any significant sense and it’s definitely all chance.
Chance is the unpredictable outcome happening when certain elements are available, then they just happen. Not mysteriously set into motion by a force of the scale of karma. I can see the appeal of wanting to believe it, but I’m too sensible to ignore the absurd idea of it. Not a hill I would want to die on.
Oh look, I bet on 2 and the shooter just rolled a 2. That pays 30:1. Karma must have willed that into action? Absolutely not
I’m on a roll, I bet the Field and 4,3,2,9,9,10 all doubled each bet on those 6 rolls. We should stop calling it craps and call it Karma!
Living good and winning big with Karma!
….to be continued….
……but wait. The poor chap next to me bet on “7” for each one of those 6 rolls. He lost every time and now he’s broke.
I guess he was stabbed by Karma?
I’m up several thousand and I’m feeling confident about my karma. So I put a $500 chip on Hard 8…….hard 8 is rolled and it pays 8:1
With all this money and the help of karma, I’m going to cash in my chips and go to the hot tub to meet some chicks. The longer I stay, the more likely I’ll get a karma-stab and lose my fortune
Or is it the rational and completely probable notion that the odds of the house are stacked against me mathmatically I will lose if I keep playing? <—- correct answer
Next day, I walk up to the karma table. It’s the come out roll and I put my money on the don’t pass line. A yo-11 is rolled by the shooter. The dealer takes my money.
Karma is catching up to me, so I go to the casino buffet and regroup.
Off-topic… but BA mentioned a casino buffet. I miss the old-style casino buffets. There used to be a ton of them. They were good and cheap… I went to one casino recently and the buffet was gone… but there was a bunch of over-priced national-brand restaurants in its place.
After breakfast buffet, I return to the Karma table. Still up thousands, I bet conservatively. I’m playing the don’t pass line and the field. I’m placing the same amount with each bet, but I’m losing.
I end up losing all my chips to the casino.
Why?
Because karma brought balance to my gambling experience?
Or
The odds are on the house, keep playing and they will take all your money.
So lesson learned on walking away at the craps table.
Next time when I’m up, I’ll use good judgement and critical thinking to leave at the right. Instead of counting on karma to pay back my due winnings.
smh*
My karma ran over your dogma.
Lose your cat? Try checking underneath the tires of my karma.
@distant road. The reason the buffets are gone isn’t because they make more money with the franchise restaurants. It’s because all the people that really enjoyed them collectively had a bad ratio of karma…so as karma always does, it removed the buffets from the casino.
This was unfortunate because over 1,500 had a really good karma rating. …victims of karma-stab.
Once again, karma keeps making a case to it’s validity!
I don’t own a cat. But my neighbor does and his karma is up to spec. No sense in questioning this terrible tragedy, it’s obviously a karma-stab.
@BA: Now I understand… I guess I can stop writing letters to the editors of the “Press of Atlantic City” and “Las Vegas Sun” DEMANDING that the buffets be returned… I mean… If the karma ratio is to blame, then I guess I can understand.
My karma rating in the restaurant was actually pretty good as I had a great burger… but my karma rating back at the casino stunk. I did have a comped room, however, so my karma rating went back up. Although down on $, being able to watch The Weather Channel in a free room made it all better.
Well after you run the ups and downs, the disappointments and triumphs it’s pretty easy to see it’s all about prospective and the randomness of life. But that won’t suffice because karma explains this in a better way. No matter how balanced that trip was or how life typically is….keep doing good things. The power of karma will turn your good fortune up a notch.
Unless you fall victim to a karma stabbing.
I don’t believe in karma at all. I wish life was fair: good for good and evil for evil. It just doesn’t work that way. Some of us are just born to suffer. And the people that bullied me, nothing bad ever happened to punish them. What I have experienced of life is that the innocent suffer in the much more extreme ways and the guilty are let off the hook. Some sadist god running the show.
Fascinating discussion, I hope you won’t mind my joining in.
First thing’s first – being ugly on the inside beats physical ‘imperfection’ every time. Some people are such skunks on the inside..
Second, I’m very pissed at NBC &Co – for not airing the special winter Olympics. What the ****? That’s the one I want to watch!!! This is the true spirit of the Olympics – the display of impossible courage and stamina and endurance. I find every one of those athletes as beautiful as the bright sun. Watching them compete inspires me to get better, do better, be better. When life hits them hard, they find a way to bend the rules, to bend destiny.
Comcast, which owns NBC, should have at least aired the Special Olympics on one of NBC’s sister networks. They own plenty of sports channels (such as the regional Comcast SportsNet) that most cable subscribers have access to as part of their packages. Right or wrong, I didn’t expect the Special Olympics on NBC… but I did expect to have them broadcast somewhere accessible.
This is what happens when just a few parent companies own a bunch of networks… Programming choices go through the cellar.
NBC and Comcast will feel the wrath of karma. That will probably prompt them to show them for the summer games.
Bipolar, you’re getting seriously stuck on the karma subject : )
Wouldn’t you say that things seem just a bit easier to handle if one threads more .. lightly? Threading that much in one place is bound to leave some sort of hole.
Yes, life is sea of imperceptible randomness in which we struggle to impose some order. Even when we succeed, it’s temporary or superficial at best, and could easily be destroyed by the next unexpected, big wave. More the reason to thread lightly and try not dwell on any single thing too much. Wouldn’t you agree?
lol, BA… Those poor shareholders will suffer when the wrath of karma hits Comcast! 🙂
@distant road – don’t have cable (can’t afford it). I think they should air all Olympics – including the Special Olympics – on PBS, period. Not spend major $$$$ to get the sole rights on coverage and then tape it, and show only bits and pieces with more commercial time than recordings, like they did for the Winter Olympics.
Don’t give a damn about their sport channels and golf tournaments and whatever other crap they consider generates more money in commercials. If enough people boycott their cable subscriptions, things might change, who knows. In any scenario, greediness is not the best economic principal, and the bigger they get, the more uncontrollable greediness gets. It’s simply statistics – if this doesn’t change, things will get bad for them at some point, and it’s got nothing to do with karma.
It’ll be a long time, gillian, before we see any professional sports content on PBS. There is simply too much money involved. Any boycotts that do happen involved < 1% of subscribers. If more were involved, they would have followed the money and changed policy(ies) by now.
The movie Wall Street decades ago had a classic line: "Greed is good." When it comes to the companies, they exist for the shareholders… NOT employees, customers, vendors, the public good, etc. The more greed they can legally get away with, the better for the shareholders. Welcome to Wall Street (the movie and the reality).
@Gillian, this hole you speak of sounds a lot like the karma theory.
This all started as a debate of sorts, then turned into me continuing with witty examples of sarcasm and undefendable shots to drive a point home.
A silly idea as karma and it’s catch all explanations when it fails should be grilled like this….and the threading will probably continue.
…as clevername thinks….oh karma has a plan for you!
I’m gonna launch KarmaHasAPlanForYou.com and make millions…
Precisely, and those greedy bastards will get the karma due to them. Gigantic networks continue to make the same decisions but that will change eventually. You have to believe. lol
@distant road – I know Wall Street and its greed very well. Its got more to do with the megalomania and greediness of a rather small boy club of big executive who consider themselves the next best thing after the Greek Gods, rather than shareholder value.
Comcast will have to change or become the next Blockbuster (which filed for bankruptcy in 2010). They are trying to, but I my personal, highly judgmental, skewed opinion is they are not doing anything right. Nope : )
That karma website could have a set of boxes where users enter their good deeds and shortcomings. Then they’ll report what has come back to them. With sophisticated computer code, we’ll be able to show percentages and dashboard the status of your contribution/return.
Definitely will need to employ moderators to encourage those that are experiencing a troubled or miscalculated trend.
@Bipolar – I feel that I should be careful not to reject karma outright just in the remote possibility that it happens to have a plan, and decides to stick it to me for mocking it, you know ; – )
One can never be too careful with karma things, I’d say : )
You would be a perfect candidate for that website.
I have an idea for that bad karma website ( based on an very good short film, “The Candidate” – highly recommend it):
Just put up a list with big companies deserving bad karma, and a Bad Karma and Good Karma buttons – just like the thumbs up and down on youtube, and simply let people vote.
Who knows maybe some high level executive will remove his nose from his behind when the thumbs down count gets close to a 9 digit number.
Apologies for starting this off-topic rant. That’s the last one on it, I promise.
p.s. Actually, if we could award good karma in the same way for our people here, might not be a bad idea (probably technologically complicated for a free website though)
@Bypolar – you probably are not too familiar with quantum theory. If you were, you’d know not to reject outright any probability, regardless of how tiny or infinitely close to 0 it might be : )
Thank goodness, I think this subject has been driven into the ground.
I’m tickled that no one defends karma any longer. My job here is done!
@gillian: I like the idea of having karma buttons for contributors here. Some techie sites I visit have similar functions so you can see how one’s peers assessed his/her contributions. Here, it might be difficult or get ugly quick. If somebody has a genuine mental illness that is impacting their ability to communicate or makes them act out, they may lose karma points for a situation that is genuinely out of their hands. I appreciate accountability but I’m not sure it’s a good idea to give negative points to people already suffering from depression, etc.
@ba: I’m gonna look into that site… if only for purposes of giggles. It would be interesting to have something set up… if only to demonstrate the concept. : )
lol… I’m done, too 🙂
Quantum theory can clutter your head with all sorts of nonsense because the possibility of any idea has a chance. Depends on how wild your imagination and how vast your memory is…
@distant road – I meant only a ‘Good Karma’ button for here, not both ways. Life is hard enough as it is without meaningless criticism online. Maybe we could do with a little more cheering (although Bipolar will probably disagree, arguendo)
@gillian: I like the idea in principle. If they could add the code and launch a trial run, I’d be interested to see how it goes. I can predict some issues with it but I’d still be curious as to how it’s implemented.
Only good karma buttons?
That’s like every kid getting a trophy for signing up.
Do as you wish, but remember when you alter the path of karma results, it’ll catch up to you….
I’m feeling like the more sarcasm I pour into this, the more karma is losing ground
true enough, BA… That’s one of the issues I see with only a ‘good karma’ button. It could become a popularity contest pretty quickly with friends voting for each other and withholding votes from anybody else. But it would be interesting to see how things developed. If it was presented as an “x week trial” with the understanding that it would be taken down after “x weeks” for assessment, it might be worth it. I’m a former student of psychology and I like to see how people work.
… and I understand: Don’t alter karma results. lol
@Bipolar – I’m feeling like you are beating a dead horse.
Some kids should get a trophy for just signing up.
I think it’s not very likely for popular people with hoards of friends who’d vote for them to end up here.
Maybe… maybe not. “Hoards” might be a strong word… but there could be some sympathetic or otherwise non-neutral voting.