E
endlessemptiness
Iron
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- Aug 3, 2022
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I’m ethnically Asian (Filipino) but this may apply everywhere due to the ubiquity of misformed faces.
Growing up, my family had a clear hierarchy of superiority. Certainly, those of the generation above were to be respected by those below. But even within a generation, older members were to be respected by younger ones.
Now what I’m wondering is if having a low position in a pecking order causes certain behaviors such as rounding of shoulders, a slack jaw or even mouthbreathing, and other behaviors associated with ugliness. In a sense, one could regard soyface as an extreme form of this submissiveness. The reason I feel this is that we naturally assume different body language depending on whom we’re around. We know from personal experiences with dogs that they engage in such behavior, from rolling on their back to curling their tail in fear, and we see various forms of dominance and submission in chimpanzees and other animals. Many mewers have remarked that good bodily posture significantly contribues to results; so how can one successfully mew in a state of mind that causes rounded shoulders? Even our voices get higher in submissive states; perhaps if we grew up that way, the structures involved in a deep voice may likewise never develop.
Whenever I’ve been in a submissive state of mind, it seemed more appropriate to relax my eye and jaw muscles, because if I practiced what we now recognize as mewing or having hunter eyes, there’s this both feel and look to it that I’d only consider…haughty, perhaps to a point of defiance, to the point of challenging the superiority of others. For all the talk of posture, commenters seem reluctant to discuss social or psychological contributions to it.
Having good ‘facial posture’ and posture overall to me always felt challenging, but not physically. It was as if I were inviting others to fight, as if I were a male lion prowling into territory of another pride, as if I were a young yak in the Himalayas or a ram ready to vie for mating rights to a herd. I cite how good posture maximizes height (the real-world signifance of which can be appreciated when standing down a bear in the wild), displays the shoulders (a hallmark of upper body strength), and even thrusts out men’s privates for display (in a state of nature, literally swinging it around; sorry for the visual). A certain amount of confidence or even swagger would be required to pull this off.
Further, every time I tried having good posture as a kid, I had people comment on it immediately, but often not in a positive way. Often it was snide, like, ‘Oh, look at you now,’ as if it were more amusing than impressive, inspiring them to put you down more than to respect you. People certainly notice good posture immediately, but the attention is often negative.
To me, it seems people on the playground, people on the street, people in general have an interest in others being non-threatening, not necessarily for the sake of their physical safety, but to preserve their status. People are territorial. It’s like what Jordan Peterson speaks of with lobsters—but perhaps with crab mentality. And so, the fact that 80% of humans have croniofacial dystrophy may not be some tragic side effect of processed food or curtailed breastfeeding. It may not be a bug, but a feature in life; since humans will always have hierarchies, there will always be superiors and inferiors; by definition, they cannot exist without each other. And so, just as there can only be a small percentage of bulls, stags, studs, Chads necessarily can only be just a portion of men, because it requires adopting a non-submissive look which one will have to defend from intimidation from other men (and likely in actual combat in the wild). Maybe they don't call them 'hunter eyes' for on reason. Maybe they don't call it a warrior skull for no reason, either. Maybe that's why adopting good posture can feel like a Promethean task of continuously rolling a boulder to a hilltop that's always beyond reach. When you're mogged constantly by 6 footers and Chads, that's persistent downward pressure telling you to to submit to it all.
Look with hunter eyes at a parent reprimanding you and they’ll say ‘don’t look at me like that.’ Look at a boss like that and similarly face negative consequences. I learned as well from research that when lifting, or in combat sports (which can be applied to combat in general) one should basically mew as it gives more stability for defense and generating strength and offense. To me, mewing and good (facial) posture itself would inherently be associated with strength and a combat stance, and thus would be perceived as threatening. Of course we'd expect all facial expressions to have an effect on others; we have numerous muscles on the face that researchers haven’t found a function for other than expression, and we have parts of the brain dedicated to analyzing faces. Good facial posture should be no exception. If we adopt good facial posture it would certainly convey a particular message. So if one wanted to be accepted into a hierarchy, it would be of benefit to adopt a submissive look.
It just seems to me that people around you, even family, or perhaps especially family, can suppress your ascension the most. If you are unfortunate enough to be the youngest in a family or community, and others are very guarded about their superiority—as opposed to adopting a supporting role and encouraging you to look proud and stand up straight—then you will never develop your face fully. Is it any wonder that women project onto Chads a bad boy personality? If we were raised to be submissive, do our faces grow longer, grow softer, such that we assume or grow into the 'niceness' or 'creepiness' women will later project onto us over life?
What’s further interesting to me is that women don’t seem to rate men so much in terms of an absolutes i.e. having ‘enough’ height or having a good enough face; it’s not so much about meeting a threshold. A woman rates men more on a curve relative to what else she can get. So basically, it’s the top percentage of the pool (whether that percentage is the top 20 or top 2). But what that means is that it’s about rank, more than absolute looks. And if humans are social animals, and if social animals have pecking orders, does the face merely reflect the degree of your submissiveness, your rank (or perhaps defiance of the social structure), and the years of (facial) posture that sculpted your bones?
I also find it interesting that whites, the most highly rated ethnicity by women, have a vertically flatter social structure than others. Filipinos have almost universally soft faces. East Asian cultures of Japan, Korea, and China are incredibly formal in social structures and minute interactions. Asians eat more ancestral foods than westerners, more of the seafood and guts and fermented stuff. Yet Changs are rare, and in my observation, Chinese and Japanese women have quite crooked teeth. I admittedly haven’t lived in China or Japan, but have lived in cities in the US and gone to schools with a lot of first or second generation Chinese, who presumably ate their parents’ food. And yet, Chads in each ethnicity seem to take on a similar, model-like appearance; as some point out, they seem to be of their own ethnicity. It's as if being a non-Chad that ‘brings out’ or exacerbates one’s ethnic characteristics, makes them more noticeable.
Fully developed faces, I believe, in fact look defiant, because, to me, in this world where others want you to stay down, to stay descended, you in fact have to be defiant, and that you in fact have to attract fights, because the reality is that we ourselves are, like those yaks, like those rams and chimpanzees and dogs and lobsters and crab, just as much animals and territorial and called upon by nature to vie. And just as mammals fight with fangs or horns on their heads, so too do we compete with the bone of our faces.
It just seems to me that there’s a social or psychological dimension to achieving good looks, and if the discourse is to strike at the root of the problem, to see the situation in its entirety, or even just for an individual’s personal use, there’d have to be discussion of that social or psychological contribution to aesthetics.
Has anyone else had such ideas?
Growing up, my family had a clear hierarchy of superiority. Certainly, those of the generation above were to be respected by those below. But even within a generation, older members were to be respected by younger ones.
Now what I’m wondering is if having a low position in a pecking order causes certain behaviors such as rounding of shoulders, a slack jaw or even mouthbreathing, and other behaviors associated with ugliness. In a sense, one could regard soyface as an extreme form of this submissiveness. The reason I feel this is that we naturally assume different body language depending on whom we’re around. We know from personal experiences with dogs that they engage in such behavior, from rolling on their back to curling their tail in fear, and we see various forms of dominance and submission in chimpanzees and other animals. Many mewers have remarked that good bodily posture significantly contribues to results; so how can one successfully mew in a state of mind that causes rounded shoulders? Even our voices get higher in submissive states; perhaps if we grew up that way, the structures involved in a deep voice may likewise never develop.
Whenever I’ve been in a submissive state of mind, it seemed more appropriate to relax my eye and jaw muscles, because if I practiced what we now recognize as mewing or having hunter eyes, there’s this both feel and look to it that I’d only consider…haughty, perhaps to a point of defiance, to the point of challenging the superiority of others. For all the talk of posture, commenters seem reluctant to discuss social or psychological contributions to it.
Having good ‘facial posture’ and posture overall to me always felt challenging, but not physically. It was as if I were inviting others to fight, as if I were a male lion prowling into territory of another pride, as if I were a young yak in the Himalayas or a ram ready to vie for mating rights to a herd. I cite how good posture maximizes height (the real-world signifance of which can be appreciated when standing down a bear in the wild), displays the shoulders (a hallmark of upper body strength), and even thrusts out men’s privates for display (in a state of nature, literally swinging it around; sorry for the visual). A certain amount of confidence or even swagger would be required to pull this off.
Further, every time I tried having good posture as a kid, I had people comment on it immediately, but often not in a positive way. Often it was snide, like, ‘Oh, look at you now,’ as if it were more amusing than impressive, inspiring them to put you down more than to respect you. People certainly notice good posture immediately, but the attention is often negative.
To me, it seems people on the playground, people on the street, people in general have an interest in others being non-threatening, not necessarily for the sake of their physical safety, but to preserve their status. People are territorial. It’s like what Jordan Peterson speaks of with lobsters—but perhaps with crab mentality. And so, the fact that 80% of humans have croniofacial dystrophy may not be some tragic side effect of processed food or curtailed breastfeeding. It may not be a bug, but a feature in life; since humans will always have hierarchies, there will always be superiors and inferiors; by definition, they cannot exist without each other. And so, just as there can only be a small percentage of bulls, stags, studs, Chads necessarily can only be just a portion of men, because it requires adopting a non-submissive look which one will have to defend from intimidation from other men (and likely in actual combat in the wild). Maybe they don't call them 'hunter eyes' for on reason. Maybe they don't call it a warrior skull for no reason, either. Maybe that's why adopting good posture can feel like a Promethean task of continuously rolling a boulder to a hilltop that's always beyond reach. When you're mogged constantly by 6 footers and Chads, that's persistent downward pressure telling you to to submit to it all.
Look with hunter eyes at a parent reprimanding you and they’ll say ‘don’t look at me like that.’ Look at a boss like that and similarly face negative consequences. I learned as well from research that when lifting, or in combat sports (which can be applied to combat in general) one should basically mew as it gives more stability for defense and generating strength and offense. To me, mewing and good (facial) posture itself would inherently be associated with strength and a combat stance, and thus would be perceived as threatening. Of course we'd expect all facial expressions to have an effect on others; we have numerous muscles on the face that researchers haven’t found a function for other than expression, and we have parts of the brain dedicated to analyzing faces. Good facial posture should be no exception. If we adopt good facial posture it would certainly convey a particular message. So if one wanted to be accepted into a hierarchy, it would be of benefit to adopt a submissive look.
It just seems to me that people around you, even family, or perhaps especially family, can suppress your ascension the most. If you are unfortunate enough to be the youngest in a family or community, and others are very guarded about their superiority—as opposed to adopting a supporting role and encouraging you to look proud and stand up straight—then you will never develop your face fully. Is it any wonder that women project onto Chads a bad boy personality? If we were raised to be submissive, do our faces grow longer, grow softer, such that we assume or grow into the 'niceness' or 'creepiness' women will later project onto us over life?
What’s further interesting to me is that women don’t seem to rate men so much in terms of an absolutes i.e. having ‘enough’ height or having a good enough face; it’s not so much about meeting a threshold. A woman rates men more on a curve relative to what else she can get. So basically, it’s the top percentage of the pool (whether that percentage is the top 20 or top 2). But what that means is that it’s about rank, more than absolute looks. And if humans are social animals, and if social animals have pecking orders, does the face merely reflect the degree of your submissiveness, your rank (or perhaps defiance of the social structure), and the years of (facial) posture that sculpted your bones?
I also find it interesting that whites, the most highly rated ethnicity by women, have a vertically flatter social structure than others. Filipinos have almost universally soft faces. East Asian cultures of Japan, Korea, and China are incredibly formal in social structures and minute interactions. Asians eat more ancestral foods than westerners, more of the seafood and guts and fermented stuff. Yet Changs are rare, and in my observation, Chinese and Japanese women have quite crooked teeth. I admittedly haven’t lived in China or Japan, but have lived in cities in the US and gone to schools with a lot of first or second generation Chinese, who presumably ate their parents’ food. And yet, Chads in each ethnicity seem to take on a similar, model-like appearance; as some point out, they seem to be of their own ethnicity. It's as if being a non-Chad that ‘brings out’ or exacerbates one’s ethnic characteristics, makes them more noticeable.
Fully developed faces, I believe, in fact look defiant, because, to me, in this world where others want you to stay down, to stay descended, you in fact have to be defiant, and that you in fact have to attract fights, because the reality is that we ourselves are, like those yaks, like those rams and chimpanzees and dogs and lobsters and crab, just as much animals and territorial and called upon by nature to vie. And just as mammals fight with fangs or horns on their heads, so too do we compete with the bone of our faces.
It just seems to me that there’s a social or psychological dimension to achieving good looks, and if the discourse is to strike at the root of the problem, to see the situation in its entirety, or even just for an individual’s personal use, there’d have to be discussion of that social or psychological contribution to aesthetics.
Has anyone else had such ideas?
