I have mostly read articles and a few debates on Reddit on this topic so I don't know much myself. However, someone in r/seduction recommended the book "Looks: Why They Matter More Than You Ever Imagined" - https://www.amazon.com/Looks-They-Matter-More-Imagined/dp/0814480543

The author has spent 30 years researching how our appearance affects all sorts of aspects of life and apparently the results are pretty depressing, for example; children who look better than their siblings get better taken care of and get more love from their mothers, or employees who are attractive earns on average 10% more than average co-workers for the same amount of work. The author seems to conclude that beauty is very important in every aspect of life, and because it's always seemed to be that way through-out history, that it's genetically programmed.

What's your opinion on this topic? How much does appearance matter in various aspects of life, according to you? Is it our "toxic culture" or genetically programmed?

Obviously the worse people feel about themselves, the more products they'll buy, and companies knows and exploit this, and sets harmful standards of beauty.

But on the other hand, those who points this out and uses the suffering it causes as evidence that it must be against human nature, against our natural state of being, seems to - in my opinion - fail to recognize that just because something causes suffering doesn't mean it's unnatural. Lots of animals compete with their beauty in nature, it's very widespread behavior, and doesn't animals who face rejection as part of their natural mating behavior suffer with depression and decreased self-esteem too?

One example that comes to mind that natural life doesn't mean a lack of suffering, is a wild species of pig in which the females have a sexual preference for males with very long tusks, which grows backwards towards their skull. This has put a high evolutionary pressure for ever longer tusks. The problem is, the tusks don't stop growing, and eventually reaches their skull and slowly begins to pierce it, causing the pig to die a painful, slow death.