Beauty Ideal addition

The beauty ideal has changed a lot in my life time but I don not think that the changes can called empowering. The beautiful woman is still expected to be unnaturally thin, of a certain social class and be very specifically groomed. The changes in the beauty ideal can be said to offer more choices to women but can not be labeled empowering. If the beauty ideal was empowering it would encourage women to accept themselves as they are and reflect a wide variety of shapes, colors and hair types which it clearly does not.