Why are so many girls/women insecure with their looks?

[Anonymous]

I have been hearing from a lot of girls/women directly or indirectly that they are insecure about their looks. Some of these women/girls are VERY attractive. Why does this happen?

[NamerOfStars]

Two reasons (well, probably more, but two big ones): first, we're biologically driven to compare ourselves to our neighbors to assess or social status and position in life. Catch is, we were never meant to live in societies as large as we do; pre-settled civilization human tribes peaked at about 150 members. So if you saw 100 people doing better than you with attribute X, you weren't good at it. Now, in a society of (depending on exactly how you define it) hundreds of millions, it's impossible to avoid seeing those who are richer, smarter, stronger, prettier, etc. than you- and thus to feel you're not measuring up. It's not about "are you attractive?", it about "are you in line with the socially mandated standards?".

Secondly, there's still fantastic social pressure, primarily but not exclusively on women, to be pretty. This makes sense from a biological standpoint, of course, but as old notions of value have shifted, things have changed: the traditional pattern of "grow up, get married, have kids, repeat once per generation" faded to allow people more personal freedoms. Not a bad thing, but the lack of standardization meant a lack of status markers, and women, having their traditional targeted goals made not only unnecessary but sometimes unseemly (there's often quite a bit of social backlash against women who choose the traditional wife-and-mother homemaker role). Since women socialize the way women do (without the broader tolerance for deviating behavior that men afford one another), this is a recipe for widespread misery.

With men it's different. Our traditional social targets never went anywhere; the acquisition of resources is still our most reliable (and often only) road to social status. The irony is that in "liberating" women from their traditional role has shackled them to it all the harder: most of us have only the one way to prove ourselves; almost all of them have to prove themselves in only the one way. The only real way out is to abandon living life according to social expectation, but that's a very lonely road few are willing to walk.

[SjE78]

mostly cos of how society instills what it says as the ideal look, size, weight, and well... pretty much every aspect of women from an early age... (same with guys too) if it doesn't conform it should be ridiculed... though over recent years a lot of progress in the view of how people percieve each other has drifted a bit further from the indoctrinated outlook of what society states is correct and many have started thinking for themselves... however it still has a lot to go before the old views of what we all should look like and what we should expect is stamped out and people accept who they are and are accepted as such

[Marilynjuana]

I think this doesn't just stop with women, today's society has made many men quite insecure as well. Social media etc makes us focus on shit that at the end of the day doesn't even matter.

[Quackthulu]

What would you expect when we have been raised to think that unless we look a specific way we are more or less worthless?

[maucikay]

Social media, the film industry, magazines... all portray the perfect woman and it’s hard to live up to those standards, even when it’s obvious they’ve been photoshopped. At least for me, seeing so many beautiful women in TV shows and on billboards makes me feel insecure because it makes me feel like I have to change myself to be attractive to myself or for a guy.

[ItsTheNephilim]

This^.

[TheReaILifeGrumpyCat]

Maybe they are around dooshy people who don't make them feel comfortable or make effort to make them feel safe and secure and not judged or stuff like that.

[magiusX26]

same reasons we guys are insecure about our looks

[Anonymous]

Media and pop culture