In 2012, People Magazine announced that Beyoncé was the “Most Beautiful Woman In the World.”

As a feminist, I would argue that women should not be judged on what they look like, and thus should not worry about society’s (or People Magazine’s) beauty standards. But this is all much easier said than done, especially when Beyoncé’s flawless face is staring at you in the grocery store.

In her latest album, Beyoncé examines the idea of beauty and how it is formed and encouraged by the society we live in, specifically in her song “Pretty Hurts.” The music video shows Beyoncé as a pageant contestant, preparing for the competition, picking out outfits, throwing up in the bathroom and then losing the pageant. The video is a clear criticism of the beauty ideals that our society encourages women to strive for. Beyoncé sings, “We try to fix something but you can’t fix what you can’t see/ It’s the soul that needs the surgery.”

While Beyoncé criticizes this form of beauty, I don’t think she is saying that beauty is bad. What she, I and feminism believe is that self-worth should not be based on the value that others place on your beauty.

Another one of her songs, “Flawless,” touches on the idea that women should embrace the way they look, as Beyoncé claims “I woke up like this.” This song gives women the power to love themselves for who they are, and feel confident with the way they look naturally, because it emphasizes the idea that women don’t need to change to be beautiful.

While Beyoncé’s music and videos seem to promote the idea that women should find themselves beautiful, I would argue that Beyoncé also plays a part in the unrealistic beauty ideals that are transmitted to women through the media.

Her music videos are the epitome of glamour, and her makeup and wardrobe play a large part in her self-expression. In her documentary, she can be seen wearing hair curlers in the hospital bed right before she gives birth to her daughter.

With the advent of “selfie vehicles” — Facebook, Instagram, etc. — some have criticized Beyoncé for the pictures she shows to her fans. There is no way anyone looks that perfect all the time, but Beyoncé seems to suggest that it is possible.

While this dichotomy between singing about self-love and promoting unattainable ideals of beauty can be difficult to understand, I see the beauty aspect of feminism as just another choice that women should be allowed to make — makeup or no makeup, hair done or not, women should be able to choose what makes themselves feel beautiful, not forced by society to conform to them.

What if you slip up? Is it OK to shave your legs? What if you like putting on makeup?

I argue that none of that makes you any less of a feminist.

In the well-known feminist book The Beauty Myth, author Naomi Wolf asserts that “the enemy is not lipstick, but guilt itself; that we deserve lipstick, if we want it, and free speech; we deserve to be sexual and serious — or whatever we please; we we are entitled to wear cowboy boots to our own revolution.”

In her documentary, Beyoncé included many personal videos when she was at home, in bed or in front of the mirror, clearly wearing no makeup and truly being herself. The interview that is woven throughout the documentary with clips of her celebrity life features an all-natural Beyoncé, sitting on her couch with jeans, a T-shirt and minimal makeup.

Beyoncé is happy to embrace her natural beauty and encourage others to do the same, suggesting that you can be a powerful and successful women and blow-dry your hair. If you are aware of the pressure that society inflicts on women to be a certain kind of beautiful, you can make decisions regarding your appearance based on what makes YOU feel good, not what will get you on People’s list of the most beautiful women in the world.

Basically, if you choose to wear makeup or high heels, you should do it  because these things make you feel good and sexy and wonderful. Your motivation should not be based on the idea that blow-drying your hair makes you more beautiful. There are days when we style our bangs so we can face the day with a kick-ass attitude, and there are days when it feels just as good to let it air-dry, frizzies and all.

Just remember, ladies, we flawless. And if you want to wear nail polish sometimes to feel that way, that’s OK.

If you’re looking for someone to go to the Beyoncé/Jay-Z tour this summer, HANNAH STRUMWASSER can be reached at hstrumwasser@gmail.com. 

Before Kevin Spacey was ruthless United States Congressman Frank Underwood, preying on girls half his age, he was Lester Burnham, a middle class American man — who also preyed on girls half his age.

“American Beauty” is a 1999 Best Picture film by Sam Mendes. It’s up there on my list of greatest movies ever made. This great piece of work instructs us to “look closer” into what gives ordinary lives meaning, and how we react to truths about ourselves and others. Such themes are persistent throughout life, but they hold a certain weight in youth.

Lester’s in the throes of a mid-life crisis. Morning masturbation sessions are the highlight of his days. He’s a man with a family, but that doesn’t make him a family man. His materialistic wife hates his guts, and his daughter thinks he’s a “lame-o.” It’s dysfunctional.

We’ll focus on the daughter, Jane. She’s an insecure girl who finds no anchor in her family. She turns to others in her life. But even these others betray her needs. When her best friend, Angela, becomes the object of Lester’s desire, she finds herself in the hands of the mysterious, wonderstruck Ricky Fitts. And finally, to tie the main cast together, we have Ricky’s father, Frank, a strict, abusive man who hates gay people more than Donald Sterling hates black people.

Jane’s insecurity stems from many reasons — a preoccupation with image, a struggle to embrace sexuality and the disconnect she experiences with her parents. In other words, she’s a teenager. In one of the most famous scenes of the movie, she and Ricky admire a video Ricky shot of a plastic bag being tossed and turned by the wind. Maybe it’s Ricky’s intoxicating voice, maybe it’s the haunting score, but this bag takes on a life of its own. In these moments, we find beauty in something mundane. Perhaps Jane’s own turns and tosses can be viewed similarly.

What would the consequences of our coming-of-age look like if we viewed our growing pains as something of beauty? It would be tough. Just as it’s tough to elicit emotion from watching a plastic bag in the wind. But it may be worth it. Who says there can’t be humors in angst? I fucking love wallowing in despair.

Okay, it’s more complicated than that. Out of all the characters, Ricky’s arc is very minor, only slightly dictated by Jane. He seems to have an understanding of these latent beauties of life. He has a whole library of video recording, with subjects ranging from strangers to dead animals. What a creep. Or at least that’s how society would judge him. In reality, he has a mature sensitivity that is to be admired. And while he sells marijuana to Lester, we do not see him as a drug dealer.

To transfigure pain into something of beauty would help young adults gain an appreciation for the process of aging. For many, this process is less growing up, and more leaving the past behind. Everyone feels some sense that childhood was simpler. Many may have a wish to revert to those hey-days.

These people seem to romanticize. Yeah, childhood was simpler, it was a time of near total dependence on authority figures. Food was put in front of you. Bills were paid on your behalf. But it wasn’t all daisies and lollipops. It was a lot of rules, follow this person and that person, do what you’re told. That kind of sucked if I recall.

Once a person recognizes this, it becomes easier to be an active participant in one’s current state. Now, you may think this is an argument that’s going to culminate in the old adage that you shouldn’t dwell in the past. I would disagree. You should be aware of how the past influences your development.

For Ricky, a past of military school and a father who beats him has left him wary but smart. He has a wisdom that is beyond his age. This leads us to the final truth that “American Beauty” illustrates so profoundly. The painful parts of our aging should not be shied away from.

If you ever find yourself bored in class, think about those dreary moments where nothing seemed like it was going your way. It will help you deal with the future when that inevitably comes. You probably have no idea what I’m talking about. Don’t worry. One day you will.

To understand that last reference, you can either watch the movie or reach ELI FLESCH at ekflesch@ucdavis.edu or tweet him @eliflesch.

Pot. Weed. Devil’s grass. Hell shrub. MJ. Doug. These nicknames (several of which are unique to my own vernacular) are among the many terms used to refer to the common drug, marijuana. In this column, we’ll look at Steven Soderbergh’s 2000 drama “Traffic” and how drugs are now, more than ever, a poignant part of coming of age. It’s my hope that we can create compromise on the effects of drugs, an area so devoid of middle ground. So go ahead, light a bowl of Doug. Relax. We’ll get started.

Drug culture can be extreme. Not in the Nancy Grace sense, where a puff of hell shrub makes a person hungry to murder. But in the sense that drugs have the tremendous power to underscore the thoughts and actions of young adults.

In “Traffic,” they do just this, dramatizing the relationship between the United States Drug Czar, Robert Wakefield, and his heroin addicted daughter, Caroline. The film feels like a documentary that has access to an uncanny truth on the power of drugs. It examines bloodshed from the border to the inner city.

Going through adolescence with the disease of addiction certainly won’t happen to the majority of kids (at least not the ones portrayed in the movie), and is certainly not conducive to arriving at adulthood in a beneficial way. But there might be something to say about some experimentation. This is old news. What’s interesting is what constitutes experimenting and how that affects a person’s thinking.

To write to the broadest area, I will focus on marijuana. Today, teens are subject to tremendous pressures from their friends, family and society. It’s only natural to want an escape. The biggest bone I have to pick with this reason for drug use is that it ignores the fact that life only gets tougher. The biggest tolerance humans have may be the tolerance to endure greater personal challenge as we age. If relied upon, drugs can to a large extent reduce the autonomy by which we dictate how we deal with increasing pressure.

In “Traffic,” Caroline’s mother, Barbara, gets into an argument with Robert over an appropriate way to discipline Caroline after a boy overdosed in her company. Barbara talks about “[taking] the quotes off ‘experimentation.’” She recognizes the danger in her daughter’s addiction. Yet she is the proponent of giving Caroline leniency. This contradiction reflects her understanding of pressure, yet an unstable grasp of how to deal with it. If she, a grown woman, cannot understand the best course of action, Caroline certainly can’t either.

When young adults experiment with drugs, it doesn’t necessarily follow the steps of the scientific method. We don’t structure how we use drugs and how we detect differences between using them and not using them.

It seems we possess a youthful amnesia when it comes to remembering the second requirement of experimentation, that we must pause from use to detect a difference. Many people do stop, not because of crippling addiction, but because the drug loses its luster, and the potency of the first time you really got high. Maybe you don’t feel like a better person for using. Others keep up their habits far into adulthood.

What happens if you stumble upon a perfect balance while experimenting? I’m not sure. “Traffic” doesn’t help too much either, relying heavily upon dramatic situations with high stakes. “The Dude” from the Coen Brothers’ “Big Lebowski” in 1998. There’s a man who’s got himself figured out. But then again, drugs are a huge component of his identity, something many wouldn’t desire.

My final thought on the matter may be anti-climactic. I say everyone should experiment with a lighter drug like LSD or marijuana, but at a point in physical and mental maturity. Yeah, things in high school and college are tough. Deal with it. When you feel like you’ve reached some sort of stasis, play around a little. Many smart, influential people have. Get comfortable. Then get high.

To recommend other hip marijuana names like ‘Gnarly Garden,’ you can reach ELI FLESCH at ekflesch@ucdavis.edu and tweet him @eliflesch.