Rhetorical Analysis of the Ugly Truth About Beauty Essay Example
Rhetorical Analysis of the Ugly Truth About Beauty Essay Example

Rhetorical Analysis of the Ugly Truth About Beauty Essay Example

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  • Pages: 3 (805 words)
  • Published: January 20, 2017
  • Type: Essay
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Rehtorical Analsysis of “The Ugly Truth About Beauty” There is a cliche quote that people say, “Beauty is in the eye of beholder. ” But in the essay “The Ugly Truth About Beauty” (1998) Dave Barry argues about how women who spend countless hours on their so called “beauty” whereas men seem not to care. Barry uses juxtaposition and exaggeration to poke fun at men and women behavior and shed light on the harm that the beauty industry is doing.

When Barry argues his point of his essay he addresses both genders, but more specifically teenage to middle age men and women, but he writes about it in a humorous and light-hearted manner. In the essay, Barry juxtaposes men and women views of beauty by using

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the famous supermodel, Cindy Crawford, as the standard of apperance that women strive to achieve, even though that the women could never exactly look like Cindy Crawford, no matter how much or the way you apply the make-up. As for the men Barry uses the famous actor Bradd Pitt, as the strandard that men, not necessairly try to achieve, but as how a man is not suppose to be or act.

He claims that men look at Brad Pitt as a pretty boy and that he would be ignorant to the tasks of a real man. Barry uses a different examples to juxtapose men and women view about beauty using Barbie and Action figures. He uses action figures for, of course, the men and that men not strive to look like the action, but how men uses action figures as a model of how a

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man is supposse to act and carry himself. In contrast Barry uses Barbie as women standard of apperance. Women want to look like Barbie, but women would have to be “seven feet tall and eighty-one pounds of which fifty-three of those pounds would be bosoms. Even though that was a bit of exaggerated, that is really what women are trying to achieve. Barry also juxtatposed the time that men and women spend on apperance. Men would spend four minutes of on their “beauty regiement,” as Barry stated which is mostly spent trying to get the shaving cream out of their hair and the fact they are not bleeding to badly, the would think they have done something. As for the oppsoite sex, women, would spend on average five thousand hours on their fingernails, which in most cases go unnoticed.

The only reason that women care this much about their appearance is because of the standards that the beauty industry has set, which is very difficult to actually achieve and causes problems for the health of women. Such as annerexia, depression and other serious health concerns. Not only does Barry uses juxtapositon he also use exaggeration to argue his views. Barry uses exaggeration to add a sesnse of humor to the essay. He exaggerates the Barbie doll proportions giving her a height of seven feet and eighty-one pounds with fifty-three of those pounds being bosoms.

He also exaggerates mens complacency with their apperance even “if their faces cause heart failure in cattle at a range of 300 yards, and when their faces sag and their noses bloat to the size of eggplants and their

eyebrows grow together to form what appears to be a giant forehead-dwelling tropical caterpillar. ” With these exaggerations he shows how women are willing to try and be like something that is very hard to achieve, even though they have already achieved their goals in the eyes of men and others. He shows how men are careless about their appearance, even though they may look horrendous; they care more about manly activities.

As you can see Barry really used juxtaposition and exaggeration to a great extent, to really argue his point about the differences between men and women point of views when it comes to beauty. He shows men aren’t as in to the appearance as women and they kind of just go with the flow. They take care of the necessities of the body and not take much time in preparing of the day. Men are more concerned in lawn care and manly activities, and these ideologies are taught when they are children and learn from their action figures and from these action figures taught them how and what a man is suppose to be.

Women on the other hand are exactly the opposite, they will spend countless hours on their beauty, and strive to look like someone else, and their ideologies come from the beauty industry telling them how they are supposed to look. So the main point of this essay is that “beauty is in the eye of the beholder” and that you should not spend hours on something that is already perfect and not let anyone else tell you otherwise.

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