The art of criticism

Recently I was hanging out with some friends when we started commenting about a well-known actress. Being women, the breakdown of our “victim’s” aesthetic defects automatically started:

-“That’s not her real nose”

-“Look how far down her belly button is! One more tummy tuck and it will reach her toes!”

-“Obviously, if I had her money I’D look like that!”

And we were off. It was criticism without malice, just small “observations", but this resulted in the ever popular response from the opposite sex when they witness such a debate:

-“Women just LOVE to criticize other women! Especially when the other one is HOT!”

Of course, being one that doesn’t like to keep her opinions to herself, I couldn’t help answering:

-“The thing is that you guys do EXACTLY the same thing when we girls notice another guy, but you sum up your criticism in one simple phrase: ‘Oh please, that dude is GAY’”

I don’t have to tell you that this provoked uncontrollable laughter in our group because of how TRUE my response was. Girls, hasn’t this happened to you? Or, guys haven’t you been guilty of saying this to girl at least ONCE? Especially when that girl is someone you have your eye on?

In general, and with a few exceptions, guys don’t give a detailed account of the imperfections of a member of their own gender when they feel intimidated by him. They prefer to summarize his “defects” with “he’s homosexual” to let us know that CLEARLY we don’t have a chance with that guy because we aren’t exactly his type.

But, why do we do this?

Many would say that it’s because we secretly envy that person’s appearance or a particular feature. Others would say that it’s because we feel threatened by him/her and it’s our way of taking away merits and feeling better about ourselves. Or, we just need to put someone down to boost our self-confidence (shame on you…)

My answer is much simpler: because we are HUMANS.

As humans, we each have our faults. And many times criticizing others is one of them, and not only when it comes to the APPEARANCE of “x” or “y”. It’s also VERY common to point out in others characteristics we, ourselves, possess.

-“He/She is SUCH a gossip! Always talking about other people!”

(Psst, aren’t you “gossiping” too by saying this to someone else?)

-“He’s/She’s so lazy! Never does anything!”

(Said while using Facebook or Twitter at work. Worse yet, you write it as your status…)

-“He’s/She’s so stingy! You’d think we die and take our money with us!”

(Said while folding a dollar bill in half, so it looks like more bills, while getting up from the table in your favorite restaurant…)

We’ve ALL been guilty of criticizing others. Whoever says otherwise is lying.

So, what can we do?

Like I said before, criticism is one of our faults. The problem is that on many occasions people do it out of MALICE. Those who do, we ignore. And if WE are one of those, we learn that first we must take a close look at our OWN defects before searching for them in others. Why? Because possibly we are only “self projecting” and what we are seeing is only a reflection of who we are.

In reference to criticizing looks or appearance, if it’s because of a secret envy, let’s head for the gym! There’s nothing better for boosting our self-esteem than taking care of ourselves, and not only to look good (gravity takes care of outer beauty through out the years…), but for our HEALTH. After all, what counts is who we are on the INSIDE.

The rest?

Just NOISE.