LOOKING BEYOND

`````A number of years ago, I visited a small museum attached to the Ursulines Convent in Quebec City. I was looking at a tapestry when an elderly nun approached me and began to explain its history. It had taken years and years to make, with literally several people working on it. I studied it and could see no breaks in its needlework at all. The museum featured an exhibit of the living condition of the nuns; it was not lavish. I could picture them over the years---hunched over the tapestry in silence or prayer as their hands set to work. Unlike for most women, it would not hang on the walls of a home to be passed down from one generation to another. Then, one day, I went to hear them sing. I say that I went to listen, as one could not observe them, for they were cloistered. The church was in an L shape, and where they sang was not observable to us. The choir was incredible. In not being able to look at them, it was solely the voices that became the focus.

````` I started to think about the concept of an entire society that worked that way; one that wasn't based on how everything looked and packaging. All of our films today are solely driven by CGI and not plot or acting. The leads are often ex-models. Acting skills aren't really that important anymore. Look how quickly Meagan Fox was replaced when she got out of line. There's a lot of good looking women in Hollywood.

`````I doubt that in today's society a person like Janis Joplin would make it. Sure, somebody like Beth Ditto can have a following in a small market, but she is certainly not mainstream. Joplin was huge in the l960's, when people were more accepting of physical imperfections. Now, a size six is seen has over-weight and will be air-brushed. In fact, Katy Perry was recently air-brushed on the cover of "Rolling Stone" magazine. This was once a counter culture magazine and would never have considered doing something like that. No, what sells now is mediocre as long as it looks good. Think Shania Twain and her belly button. All of the top selling songs sound exactly the same.

`````I just read a study which stated that kids who bully get away with it because they look good. This research suggested what I always knew. Nobody would tolerate this sort of behaviour from the less then beautiful. In fact, we let Karla Homolka literally get away with murder. Her husband is sitting in a jail cell still while she is on a sandy beach with her newly beloved and a baby. Had she been three hundred pounds with an over-bite, that deal would never have been made. Justice is not blind when it comes to good looking people.

`````Some people laugh about the fact that men are now also feeling the brunt of the beauty brush stroke. I think it's just sad; more victims. Young boys are now also falling victims to eating disorders. I hardly think that this is equality.

`````If we're going to judge somebody, let's do it because they're rednecks on purpose. Let's condemn them because they do evil deeds. But, to mock people because of their weight, skin colour, height, etc is ignorant. As I said, in some ways, I liked the idea of the convent. All that we heard was the beauty of their voices and we accepted it.