Comments on: Eyelid Gluing for a “Western” Look

By: Marr

Marr — Wed, 24 Nov 2010 13:58:46 +0000

A lot of Asians already have double eyelids…
Does straightening your hair make people want to become more “Asian”?

By: Rukai

Rukai — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 17:29:59 +0000

My maternal grandmother was a Taiwan Aboriginal decendent with double lids and large eyes. As you all know, an Asian can have small eyes with double lids, or large eyes with single lids. This grandmom married a single lid man with genes from Northeastern Asia. Their kids have an assorted mixture of the double and single lids. My mother got the single ones. She then married my father who had Caucasian features and was an offspring of the Atayal of Taiwan. (Recently there are articles on the possibility of homosapians evolving from East Asians.) I as a younger woman had pronounced double lids from the inside. However, when I turned 40something, there started to form an outside crease on top of my left eye that scared the hell out of me. I later realized it was to stay. As years went by, my right eye is forming the same outside lid. You can see both the earlier inside lids and the later grown outside lid, or lids. The right eye sometimes goes back to the inner lid looks. I then read some early twentieth century Japanese researcher’s observations on the Aboriginal peoples of Taiwan, and learned that those women looked more Chinese in their younger years. When they were about 50, they started to have their ancestral looks. It was an enlightenment to my morphological changes on my eye lids. I wished I had read the books earlier. So much about eye lids. I am now relaxed not worrying about them any more.

By: From Asian to Caucasian: Response From a Reader « The Grand Narrative

From Asian to Caucasian: Response From a Reader « The Grand Narrative — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 15:00:10 +0000

[...] facial features and shapes and so on. I’d even concede that double-eyelids, for instance, may not be quite as “Caucasian” as I first thought, and that Korean women may get the operation simply to make their eyes look bigger (and thus more [...]

By: Lauren

Lauren — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 18:38:07 +0000

im caucasian yet i have monolids and “slanted” eyes (i always have) so does my brother and mom, my brothers often mistaken for asian I however have blue eyes so im not lol but i do have dark hair. So therefore doublelids arent always “caucasian” I actually love my eyes and how they look exotic and not like everyone else the reason i would use the eyelid tape is to merely make them bigger when on some days my eyes become really small.

By: Jei

Jei — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 20:50:26 +0000

Hm. I remember being on a forum where someone complained of waking up with one single eyelid and one double eyelid. I imagine that if I had single eyelids I might do this from time to time for aesthetic variety or an ocd desire to be symmetrical, but I can’t imagine doing it all the time. Single eyelids are just as good as double eyelids, and as this girl has shown, more versatile. I had single eyelids when I was younger, and kind of grew out of them, but I imagine I’d keep them if I had them now. Mono lids are quite attractive to me, no more attractive than double lids, but different, and I hope that that variety can be prized more in the future. (Ah, well, this response from me seems a little rambling and ineloquent… Forgive me, I am tired.)

By: F. L.

F. L. — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 08:10:16 +0000

I’m Chinese, and for most of my life, I never noticed the whole mono-eyelids and double-eyelid. One day, I switched from glasses to contacts and everyone in my family (and Asian classmates) commented about my prominent double-eyelids and round eyes. When I finally noticed it, I felt I looked weird compared other Asians. However, everyone said it was really attractive. Ever since then, I never look at a fellow Asian the same again. I’ve noticed that there’s a whole variety of eye shapes. I’ve seen really round eyes with mono-lids and narrower eyes with double-lids.

I agree that double-eyelids are not desired because it is a “Caucasian” or a “Western”, but because it is considered a standard of beauty. There are Asians who desire double-lids for the wrong reasons.

I remember watching a clip from the Tyra Show where a Korean-American woman underwent a Blepharoplasty surgery so that she can achieve the double-eyelid look. At first she went on about being the only Asian girl in town and was made fun of being Asian. Then she claimed that she got the surgery just because her eyes were getting droopy.

One time, a gay Asian-American in the audience recalled only dating white men because he loved their white skin, light-colored hair and their round eyes.

Now that makes me sad. I’ve seen really attractive men and women with mono-lids. Double-eyelids are overrated, believe me.

By: Michelle

Michelle — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 23:01:33 +0000

There are many people with double eyelids in Asia. Double eyelids are a standard of beauty for some people and it doesn’t mean that they are trying to achieve a Caucasian look. They want what the people in their society have. They are influence by the people in their country. Only a small small fraction would possibly do it for that.

Pale skin has been a standard of beauty for some time in Asia before the West even venture there like China and Japan.

Please note that we are all human beings. Some of us NOT MIXED Asians are able to be born with large eyes, pale skin, different color eyes (yes there are NATURALLY green and blue eyed Asians who are not mix!!! like this ethnic group in China and can be found in other Asians as well), and whose hair color is not BLACK naturally! Can you honestly say..somehow they alter their genetics to be Caucasian before they even know what a Caucasian is?

People have a wrong idea of Asians trying to be like Caucasians when it is only a very small percentage. It’s the general stereotype that if Asians don’t have slanty eyes and buck teeth, they made themselves more Westernized, more Caucasian. The majority wants to fit into their country’s standard of beauty, some of the standards that have existed since before Western Colonization. For example, those eyelid gluing is popular among teens by making their eyes larger, which makes them look more cuter in pictures. Look at those ULZZANG pictures. Some Asians standard of beauty is cuteness. You can find lots of necklaces that are very girly, pink and have bows.

By: Andy

Andy — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 00:11:27 +0000

Erika,

Pale skin has been the standard for beauty in Japanese society (and East Asian countries in general) for ages, prior to western influence. What are you talking about?

If you guys want to make a better argument, look towards South Asian women wanting lighter skin and make connections with British colonialism.

East Asia is a more difficult case.

By: Andy

Andy — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 00:08:36 +0000

This article is a bit simplistic and a little too Eurocentric, this coming from an Asian American.

There are many East Asian (and Asian American) women with monolid and double eye lids. It just so happens double eye lids are deemed more beautiful in Asian (and Asian American) communities.

Is this to say a long history of white privilege and racism didn’t influence these cultural ideas of beauty? Of course not. I’m sure it did. But East Asia has had its own standard of beauty that happens to overlap Western notions of beauty.

And our ideas of beauty are dynamic, and therefore subject to change with time. In case you didn’t know, many East Asians have very fair skin tones, and, again, lighter skin tone happened to become the beauty standard prior to western influence.

Let’s not oversimplify reality here guys.

By: Cindy

Cindy — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 16:41:43 +0000

There’s another product that’s similar, but its for more western eyes. Its called Eye Magic – The Non-Surgical Eye Lift. Their web site is http://www.eyemagic.net if you’re interested.

Keep up the good blogging!

By: Erika

Erika — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 14:11:34 +0000

White folks sure love to imagine they’re placed atop a pedestal when it comes to standards of beauty. Jeez.

“YES, as the people repeat, Asians DO have double eyelids too (some do), but no one has explained to me SPECIFICALLY why it suddenly trumped monolids.”

Because standards of beauty change? In the late 90s it was more fashionable to be tanned in Japan, but that changed rather quickly so that paler skin was more desired. I don’t get why only eyelids need to be politicized.

By: A_von

A_von — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 04:52:13 +0000

I don’t have any proof (ta-da, you win). I just meant that probably not every single, solitary Asian woman back in the day before colonialism wanted monolid or even double eyelids (since it is a naturally occurring thing) or even the popular beauty ideal. Just like how not every woman wants to look like a fucking Barbie today. Yes, maybe it was an isolated incident, but considering human nature and how we are not all slaves to trends, I wouldn’t doubt that in history, an Asian woman wanted double lids just because she saw them on another Asian woman and thought they were pretty. That’s all I meant.

By: Yoni

Yoni — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 02:09:39 +0000

A_von, then why did she WANT double eyelids? Beauty standards before colonization were all about light skin and MONOLIDS. Do you have any proof that Asians wanted double eyelids, even before Westernization? Because a lot of drawings from back then emphasize the beauty model as fair skinned, perhaps slender and “graceful” looking, with monolid eyes. They did not have double lidded eyes at all. It didn’t look even like the bubbly and doe-eyed round eyes without the double eyelid. (that was the look I wanted)

By: A_von

A_von — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 01:19:08 +0000

Did anyone ever figure that even in the past, before the invention of plastic surgery, that Asian women (and men) wanted to have double lids, but just didn’t have the proper technology? No doubt, the influences of west, east, and everywhere have shaped perceptions of beauty. But even before cultures were acquainted with one another, I wouldn’t doubt that one woman with monolid eyes saw another woman with double lids and wondered if she couldn’t create the same look (or vice versa even).

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 23:11:06 +0000

“I’m a Japanese female living in Japan. I completely agree with Keith. I am the only one in my family to have monolids, the rest have huge double-fold eyes. I have not for a second considered double-folds “caucasian”.”

That would be because of new “rationales” made up by people who wanted to counter what they saw as an “accusation” of trying to look Eurasian. Not all of them know that the bigger eye being popular look is because of the fact that earlier, it was about looking Eurasian. Then, the trend became so common, it probably became about “culture”. But, their “culture” DOES want them to look Eurasian. It’s like arguing that you think women should be submissive, because you were brought up by “traditional” values. But those traditional values ARE sexist, no? That makes that speaker a sexist person. Huh, dialogues do help.

And yes, “double eyelid”s are “popular”, but you haven’t answered why it is the “beauty” and why monolids are seen as “plain”. Even the woman in the picture of the eyeglue ad already has double eyelids, but it looks like monolids, because the lid is on the inside. Why is “awake” and “doe eyed” seen as the beauty ideal?