Wear Your White Tee

            To be human is to have flaws.  To be adolescent is to feel like everyone is always looking at them.  No one is a stranger to the feeling that it is impossible for anyone to look passed our freckles, or our glasses, or our illness.  The fact is that some people are calling them “connect the dots”, or “four eyes, or “retard”.  Parents and adults in general, tend to think that repeating the words “they are just stupid, you are beautiful the way you are” is enough to change the self image built inside of a person.  But, if you remember correctly, that never helps.  It sounds a lot like “beauty is important” and therefore, you are telling them what they want to hear.

            There seems to be an insurgence of this idea in the media today.  Young adult books are based around the theme “be yourself”.  Lady Gaga’s “Born This Way”, Katy Perry’s “Firework”, P!nk’s “Perfect”, and Selena Gomez’s “Who Says” are just a few of the self love anthems playing on the radio today.  Even television is reverting back to its cheesy Full House approach to teaching the same valuable lesson. This past week’s episode of Glee, however, used a slightly different (though no less cheesy) technique.  Each member of the group was to come to accept their biggest insecurity by facing it.  Or rather, by literally wearing it, in big black letters on their plain white t-shirts.

            We are not all perfect or “beautiful” in the most popular sense of the word today, but we can only be who we are.  Negative judgment only truly hurts when it comes from within.  Teach every kid you know to embrace their quarks and differences.  Show them how to take away the power of those negative words by owning them instead.  Stop enforcing the idea that beauty is important and instill the idea that beauty is what you are.

            My t-shirt says A-Cup.  What does yours say?
Since writing this post, I did this project with my little sister and niece.  Angie, always being big for her age and Alyssa being more innocent than the average child chose these words for themselves.  We decided to put a positive spin on things and put attributes they were proud of on the backs of the t-shirts.