# Quote — Naomi Wolf, The Beauty Myth

> What becomes of a man who acquires a beautiful woman, with her 'beauty' his sole target? He sabotages himself. He has gained no friend, no ally, no mutual trust: She knows quite well why she has been chosen. He has succeeded in buying a mutually suspicious set of insecurities. He does gain something: the esteem of other men who find such an acquisition impressive.

- Author: [Naomi Wolf](https://www.leafyquotes.com/naomi-wolf.md)
- Book: [The Beauty Myth](https://www.leafyquotes.com/naomi-wolf/the-beauty-myth.md)
- Page: 174
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Naomi_Wolf#The_Beauty_Myth_(1991)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/naomi-wolf/the-beauty-myth/what-becomes-of-a-man

## More from this book

> Pain is real when you get other people to believe in it. If no one believes in it but you, your pain is madness or hysteria.

p. 254 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/naomi-wolf/the-beauty-myth/pain-is-real.md)

> The books and films they see survey from the young boy's point of view his first touch of a girl's thighs, his first glimpse of her breasts. The girls sit listening, absorbing, their familiar breasts estranged as if they were not part of their bodies, their thighs crossed self-consciously, learning how to leave their bodies and watch them from the outside. Since their bodies are seen from the point of view of strangeness and desire, it is no wonder that what should be familiar, felt to be whole, becomes estranged and divided into parts. What little girls learn is not the desire for the other, but the desire to be desired. Girls learn to watch their sex along with the boys; that takes up the space that should be devoted to finding out about what they are wanting, and reading and writing about it, seeking it and getting it.

p. 157 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/naomi-wolf/the-beauty-myth/the-books-and.md)

> Beauty provokes harassment, the law says, but it looks through men's eyes when deciding what provokes it.

p. 45 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/naomi-wolf/the-beauty-myth/beauty-provokes-harassment.md)