Body Bizarre

 

I take for granted that this man is very proud of his "adornments" which I find hideous. Maybe this is a "Each to one's own taste"-case as there aren't any fixed rules when it comes to looks? Well, I think there are natural, i.e. in-born expectations to the looks of humans and these expectations constitute our concept of "beauty".

The body of this young lady will be considered "perfect" in Western countries of 2023, but some will mourn her tatooes and see them as disfiguring. Well, I for one don't like tats which in my opinion all too often turn into something that look like patches of dirt. They may be political or maybe even religious statements and I suppose that they as such should be respected, but I shall never see them as adornments.

The tatooes and needles of the persons above were chosen by the users, but what about those weird body deformities that were not chosen, but which in many ways come to represent the personality of the individual? A human, born as e.g. a midget, is something more than an uncommonly small person, but still that's what he/she is seen as: A midget is a midget. But what if one looks at a well-known midget like e.g. Henri Toulouse Lautrec? What describes the best the best? Is he first and foremost an artist or a midget to most people? Or put it in another way: Is he more of a midget than of an artist?

Small he was, but as an artist he was large and no one can deny it although they may not like his harsh paintings of "The Merry Life" of Paris, the prostitutes, alcoholics, etc..

He didn't live by his disabilities, but some did, like e.g. the twin girls that were born by the unmarried and poor, English woman, Kate Skinner in 1908. Maybe she never intended to keep them even if they had been perfect as she, being unmarried, might have known that she couldn't take the financial responsibility of their upkeep. Well, actually she ended up earning money by selling the twins to a woman who exhibited them as what they were considered at that time: Monsters or Freaks. These children were innocent victims of the early 1900-ideas about valid human looks. Being conjoined they were not accepted as anything but "bizarre" or "inhuman".

The woman who bought them was Mary Hilton whom they were to call "auntie" and they are known by her surname of Hilton: Daisy and Violet Hilton. As such they were taken on tours, just exhibiting their "weirdness" or performing in some way. It's a sad fact that they referred to this "auntie" and her daughter as their Owners. Something like that didn't interest the audience because the only thing they saw was their looks. However, in their life time they went from "sideshow performers" and "vaudevillians" to "film actresses" as they came to appear in some movies, "Freaks" and "Chained for Life". Something which just were another way of keeping them in their assigned rôle of side show freaks.

Both of them married, but whereas the marriage of Violet lasted for 10 years, the one of Daisy lasted 10 days.

Defined by their looks ever since their birth they never really left the "freak"-life that was assigned to them by those who paid to look at them. To me that's the real freakishness of the matter ....

  

https://www.healthline.com/health/pycnodysostosis

 

https://wellcomecollection.org/works/sctkmtb4 

 

Wikipedia