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Should ugliness be considered a disability (legally)?
Yes! People should not be allowed to discriminate against the ugly. 31%  31%  [ 5 ]
No! I hate ugly people. They deserve all the abuse they get. 25%  25%  [ 4 ]
Oh look, SHEEP! .... I mean chupacabras! AARRRGGGGHHH! MY GOATS ARE SUCKED! 44%  44%  [ 7 ]
Total votes : 16

GoonSquad
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07 Feb 2014, 7:20 am

According to this story from Freakonomics.com ugly people suffer significant disadvantages in American society. They earn less, up to $200,000.00 over a lifetime. They have fewer friends and lovers. They are much less happy than pretty people. The ugliest males are often forced into lives of crime, while the ugliest females are forced out of the workforce all together.

Yo clickity.

Is this okay?

Or, should ugly people be classified as disabled and protected from discrimination under the Americans with Disabilities Act?

Should pretty people be taxed to level out their advantage?


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ArrantPariah
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07 Feb 2014, 9:12 am

GoonSquad wrote:
Or, should ugly people be classified as disabled and protected from discrimination under the Americans with Disabilities Act?


The ADA doesn't cover ugliness. If I have two equally qualified candidates, but one is pretty and one is ugly, then I'm entitled to select the pretty one and enjoy some eye candy.

GoonSquad wrote:
Should pretty people be taxed to level out their advantage?


It doesn't sound very practical. How is the government going to know how pretty someone is, in order to assess the tax? Are people going to self-report? Or, will the government put our mugshots on-line, and the votes of citizens will determine our prettiness scores, which will be used in a taxation formula?



GoonSquad
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07 Feb 2014, 9:36 am

^^^ There are actually computer programs that can analyze your face and tell how ugly you are... It measures facial symmetry.


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ArrantPariah
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07 Feb 2014, 10:04 am

GoonSquad wrote:
^^^ There are actually computer programs that can analyze your face and tell how ugly you are... It measures facial symmetry.


http://www.ushmm.org/outreach/en/articl ... d=10007679

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After Hitler took power, Nazi teachers in school classrooms began to apply the "principles" of racial science. They measured skull size and nose length, and recorded the color of their pupils' hair and eyes to determine whether students belonged to the true "Aryan race." Jewish and Romani (Gypsy) students were often humiliated in the process.


Sorry for having invoked Godwin's Law so early in the discussion, but this one seemed inevitable.



GoonSquad
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07 Feb 2014, 10:52 am

Hey, what's a thread without Nazis?

Just to be clear, I am only talking about symmetry, not specific measurements. There's a pretty good amount of research to suggest that symmetrical features are considered attractive by all humans across all cultures.

At any rate, I'm really less concerned about proving people are attractive for the purposes of taxation. However. I think ugliness does have sufficient negative impact on people's lives to warrant some kind of mitigation.


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Kurgan
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07 Feb 2014, 11:17 am

Having an IQ of 85 means that you won't function in anything beyond a menial job. Should a low IQ that's still above the limit for mental retardation qualify for disability benefits? Stuttering can severly limit your prospects of passing a job interview. Should stuttering qualify for disability benefits?

This thing about ugliness starts way back in kindergarded (remember how none of the popular girls were ugly, and how the ugliest girl didn't have friends?).



Janissy
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07 Feb 2014, 11:22 am

GoonSquad wrote:
According to this story from Freakonomics.com ugly people suffer significant disadvantages in American society.

Agreed. Interestingly they bring up certain types of crime where ugliness is an advantage because of the intimidation factor.

Quote:
They earn less, up to $200,000.00 over a lifetime.


$200,000 over an entire lifetime is not actually that huge a difference. Assuming a working career of 40 years (adulthood through retirement), that comes out to an average of 5,000$ per year. Although we would all like 5,000$ more per year if handed to us, I don't think it's enough of a differential to justify government involvement.


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They have fewer friends and lovers.

A situation which most definately should not be remediated by the government. The government meddles in our personal lives quite enough without the shuddery thought of them assigning friends and lovers to the citizens.

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They are much less happy than pretty people.

Again, no business of the government.

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The ugliest males are often forced into lives of crime,

where their ugliness is apparently an advantage. Not that I believe this statistic

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while the ugliest females are forced out of the workforce all together.


not that I believe this statistic either,

However, both statistics would certainly be true if they are counting the "ugliest" as people whose faces have been damaged by traumatic accidents or genetic syndromes. But if so, they are covered under functional rather than aesthetic disability.


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Is this okay?


Yes. I don't want the government meddling in who people associate with in their free time and I also don't want the government putting all citizens on some sort of linear attractiveness scale and then requiring employers to accomodate that somehow.

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Or, should ugly people be classified as disabled and protected from discrimination under the Americans with Disabilities Act?

No. If they are ugly because of traumatic accident or genetic syndrome, they are covered by ADA anyway because of their functional disability. Where exactly would you draw the line? Most people are neither ugly nor beautiful but are somewhere in between. Everybody is better looking as a young adult than as an old adult. Beauty can be enhanched through diet, exercise, clothing choice, makeup and hair style, hygeine. And beauty can be removed through neglect of those things and through outright bad choices. Few people look as terrible as meth addicts. But many of them started out ok looking and sometimes actually very attractive prior to drug induced deterioration? Should beauty be measured only by inherent facial structure? But what of the people who destroy their faces via hard living? They are uglier than people with less regular features who take great care of themselves.


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Should pretty people be taxed to level out their advantage?


*cough* Harisson Bergeron *cough* no.

The stratospherically beautiful, such as movie stars and top fashion models, do make more money than their plainer brethren (me!). But they get taxed on that income just because it's income. And then there are the pretty people who are just muddling through. Many of them are on this board (from time to time there will be a thread on the link between autism and beauty and people post their selfies- always selfies). Should they (you??) be turned away from any disability benefits because their beauty theoretically balances out the disadvantage of autism?



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07 Feb 2014, 11:37 am

If two people show up for a job with the same exact skills the attractive person is more likely to get the job.Sad,but true.I believe they would also get a lighter sentence in court than a person not as aesthetically endowed.


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07 Feb 2014, 11:45 am

Aversion to ugliness is a reflex, and not always a conscious decision. It’s human nature to seek the pleasant over the unpleasant. Attraction to beauty is as much a part of being human as breathing. It’s why pictures of puppies are more popular than photos from the Texas Chainsaw Massacre. All the lawyers in Washington DC cannot change human nature, they can only cash in on the effects. Why not take this issue up with Hollywood where the standards of beauty seem to be decided and promoted.



GoonSquad
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07 Feb 2014, 11:52 am

Janissy wrote:
GoonSquad wrote:
According to this story from Freakonomics.com ugly people suffer significant disadvantages in American society.

Agreed. Interestingly they bring up certain types of crime where ugliness is an advantage because of the intimidation factor.

Quote:
They earn less, up to $200,000.00 over a lifetime.


$200,000 over an entire lifetime is not actually that huge a difference. Assuming a working career of 40 years (adulthood through retirement), that comes out to an average of 5,000$ per year. Although we would all like 5,000$ more per year if handed to us, I don't think it's enough of a differential to justify government involvement.

Okay, let's hold it right there....

We are talking about a demographic that's likely occupying the lowest socioeconomic levels. If you are making less than $20k/year, $5000.00 is a huge amount! It could be a life changing amount.

If you are a female who had the misfortune to be born into a poor family, you have no access to good nutrition or medical and dental care, you will probably not be very attractive. You are likely to be obese, and have bad skin and teeth. Also, you are not likely to have the resources to fix these things.

In this case, appearance would be a significant factor in keeping you poor.

Are you really saying you have no sympathy for a person like this? How is she any different from a person who is discriminated against because of dark skin?


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Janissy
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07 Feb 2014, 12:41 pm

GoonSquad wrote:
Janissy wrote:
GoonSquad wrote:
According to this story from Freakonomics.com ugly people suffer significant disadvantages in American society.

Agreed. Interestingly they bring up certain types of crime where ugliness is an advantage because of the intimidation factor.

Quote:
They earn less, up to $200,000.00 over a lifetime.


$200,000 over an entire lifetime is not actually that huge a difference. Assuming a working career of 40 years (adulthood through retirement), that comes out to an average of 5,000$ per year. Although we would all like 5,000$ more per year if handed to us, I don't think it's enough of a differential to justify government involvement.

Okay, let's hold it right there....

We are talking about a demographic that's likely occupying the lowest socioeconomic levels. If you are making less than $20k/year, $5000.00 is a huge amount! It could be a life changing amount.

If you are a female who had the misfortune to be born into a poor family, you have no access to good nutrition or medical and dental care, you will probably not be very attractive. You are likely to be obese, and have bad skin and teeth. Also, you are not likely to have the resources to fix these things.

In this case, appearance would be a significant factor in keeping you poor.

Are you really saying you have no sympathy for a person like this? How is she any different from a person who is discriminated against because of dark skin?


The ruination of looks from living in poverty does happen, but it doesn't happen for decades. There are good looking people in slums, housing projects and trailor parks but they tend to be under 30 years old, although some manage to keep their looks somewhat into their 30's and some start losing them in their late 20's. Youthful attractiveness doesn't save them from poverty when they are young and it isn't what keeps them in poverty once they lose their youthful good looks. They are kept in poverty by everything that happened or didn't happen in their 20's. What happened is often parenthood. What didn't happen is often college. This is not their fault. But beauty wouldn't have saved them. Lots of them did have youthful good looks and it didn't save them. Looks don't pay for college.

I do not agree with your premise that looks are a significant factor in what keeps poor people poor. I've seen too many good looking young people going to their crap jobs on the bus with me.



GoonSquad
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07 Feb 2014, 5:02 pm

^^^ Well, I can agree that poverty is probably a bigger factor for failure, but being fat and dumpy doesn't help matters...

Also, I'll allow that there are a lot of pretty, poor kids who don't go downhill until their late twenties. But there are even more poor kids who were born butt-ugly and only get worse thanks to poor nutrition, etc.... and they don't have a chance.

Right now, I'm doing a class on diversity and cultural competence....

I'm finding the psychology of discrimination fascinating. Most people feel sympathy for victims of racial discrimination, or discrimination based on gender or sexual orientation, but I've yet to find any to sympathize with and support those discriminated against because of their appearance.

:?


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Janissy
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07 Feb 2014, 5:27 pm

I do agree that good looks are an advantage and looks discrimination does exist. But I think it's very subtle and hard to pin down because the categories are so amorphous. Like IQ, most people reside in the peak of the bell curve for at least part of their lives. I also don't think it can cross class boundaries and financial differences will be within classes. The beautiful poor person has an advantage over the ugly poor person but does not have an advantage over the ugly middle class or wealthy person. The looks can influence small things but they can't bump you up to another class or drag you down from the class you were born into.

Maybe it's because most people aren't beautiful that there is so little sympathy for the ugly. Most people are just ordinary. I am just ordinary. I do have sympathy for people who had ugliness thrust upon them by chance. Terrible burn scars. Born without a chin. The sort of obesity that comes from a horribly damaged metabolism (Risperadol is infamous for doing this damage, for example). But most people really aren't all that ugly. Nor are they beautiful. They are just in the giant middle of the bell curve of looks and slowly slide towards the ugly end with age. If they are wealthy they can hold onto the looks a little while longer but not idefinately. I can't muster symapthy for somebody who looks only marginally worse than me because for all I know I look marginally worse than them in the eyes of various people. How can I feel sorry for ugly people when the people I am calling ugly have just as much reason to feel sorry for me? Beauty is in the eye of the beholder to some extent for the giant middle of the bell curve, though not the extremes.



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07 Feb 2014, 7:42 pm

Standards of beauty change over time. Women who were considered beauty queens in the earlier 20th century today might be considered fat. Models who you see on the runway today at one time would have been seen as skinny hags. What is ugly today might be beautiful tomorrow.


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07 Feb 2014, 9:55 pm

intelligence, and guile. that is what you need if you are ugly. maybe some superficial charm if you are a good liar.



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07 Feb 2014, 10:24 pm

Should ugliness be considered a disability (legally)?

No, and only because there is no metric to objectively determine the degree of "ugliness" a person may have.